Training for a 10K

I have Penny Dean's book and have read it in its entirety and recently revisited the training section but it just left me baffled. Getting anectdotal advice from people will hopefully clarify what Dean has written. Your tips are very good. Thank you! The 10K will be in the Hudson River...right now it is still in the planning stages.

In 2008 I set myself a goal of swimming the St Croix 5 mi Coral Reef Swim in 2009, and found Penny Dean's book "Open Water Swimming" (Human Kinetics, Pub.) to be very helpful. The key was to build up to the ultimate distance in 1/2-mi / month increments, matching the race distance one month prior to the race. That is, if swimming 10 k in Dec, complete a continuous 10k pool (or ow) swim in Nov., a 9k in Oct, an 8k in Sept, etc.. I swam the 5 mi in 2009, and again in 2010 (not fast, I am now 63), and will be swimming again this October. My training after that first year has been to swim 2-3 two-mile continuous swims every week, plus a 30 x 100 or 15 x 200 interspersed for a changeup, and another day of kicking for a mile. I no longer find it boring, but rather meditative, zen-like (always been a daydreamer). As far as feeding, the OW swims (> 1 mi) I've participated in always have water boats every mile; so I stick gel packs (1 for each mile) in the legs of my suit (w/a little pre-cut from fingernail clippers at the tear point for easy opening when wet), and when I get water, I take the gel and wash it down w/water, putting trash in water bottle and throwing back to boat. Where is the 10 k you are planning on swimming? Have fun, and I hope this helps...the Penny Dean book is pretty good for the mental prep as well...

I just did a 10K, albeit a strange one as we had to do a surf exit and entry every 1.2 miles, which changes the complexion drastically. In the pool I swam with my masters group 2X week and tacked on an extra 2K or so on my own. So, if the main set was something like 3X (various sets), I'd do 4X, etc. Tried to get in 4 to 5K every session In the OW, I ramped up pretty quickly, and went from 2 mile to 3 mile to 3.5 to 4 to 4.5 and then 5. Longest I swam was 5 miles which I did twice. A few 4 milers, lots of 2 and 3 milers. I think having 5 miles as my max was fine, even though the actual race distance turned out to be 6.8 ::eek: If you can swim 5 comfortably you can swim 6.2

I did my first two 10km's this year. I was doing ~4,000 yard sets with my local masters team, 3-4 times a week, and then did a series of longer swims on my own, building up to a couple of ~10km pool swims. For the longer pool swims I found a lap counting watch (Finis Swimsense, Garmin Swim etcetera) to be invaluable as I could then just zone out and not worry about the lap count. The long swims are a good way to trial whatever you are going to use for feeds. I used Gu Roctane drink for my feeds. On the Ocean 10km I think I would have preferred something with a little less electrolytes (getting plenty from the ocean itself), on the lake 10km it was perfect. I was feeding ~30 minutes on the Ocean swim, the lake was a 4 loop course with a feeding station at the start so ~50 minutes (I'm not very fast). The most important thing about OW training is not necessarily getting the distance in, but getting acclimated to all the things that are different from pool swimming i.e. chop, swells, currents, sighting, water temperature etcetera. As long as you are getting enough OWS in to get used to those things you can crank out your distance sets in the pool. If the swim requires an escort, worth working with the planned escorter early on so they can get used to the idea that you go where they go, so the straighter they go the faster the whole event will go. Above all - have fun on the event :-)

Hi, DC, I'm interested to know more about the lap-counting watch... how does that work, how often did you take a look (I'm a big fan of zoning out, but also like to keep an eye on my pace). Waternixie, I was able to build up from 5K long continuous swim in the pool last winter to 10-12K by April-May. Every Saturday morning I did a long swim; added about 1000 yards each week, then every third week I would back off the yardage to let my body recover. If you can build up to 10K in the pool next winter-spring it will be a great confidence builder.

Hi, DC, I'm interested to know more about the lap-counting watch... how does that work, how often did you take a look (I'm a big fan of zoning out, but also like to keep an eye on my pace). The way I used the watch for the long swims was simply to check the total on each feed break. That way I could estimate my pace and figure out how long I would need to swim after the last feed to make my total distance. I used the pool pace clock to determine when to take a break and an occasional pace spot check (though that was as much for something to do as any reason) I do open turns (never learned flip turns) so can occasionally sneak a look at the watch on a turn, but mostly don't bother. Swimming for time and just spot checking your pace is probably just as a good a way to do things, but I am anal enough to want to know how far I actually swam rather than estimating.

The way I used the watch for the long swims was simply to check the total on each feed break. That way I could estimate my pace and figure out how long I would need to swim after the last feed to make my total distance. I used the pool pace clock to determine when to take a break and an occasional pace spot check (though that was as much for something to do as any reason) I do open turns (never learned flip turns) so can occasionally sneak a look at the watch on a turn, but mostly don't bother. Swimming for time and just spot checking your pace is probably just as a good a way to do things, but I am anal enough to want to know how far I actually swam rather than estimating. OK, thanks. I do open turns too and like to check every couple of laps to get a good idea of my pace and can check myself (or not) as soon as I start to slow. I just started with flip-turns recently (sporadically), but the big disadvantage is not being able to check the clock as frequently.