Ultra Short Training At Race Pace

So temps are slowly starting to climb and thoughts turn to summer...and long course. So I have a question for any of the USTRP experts here about using the system in LCM pools. Looking at the USTRP table I posted earlier, as a mid-D swimmer I am really mostly interested in the three middle columns: 100, 200 and 400. Certainly I dabble in 50s and the 1500 occasionally so I might do those types of USTRP for a little bit of variety from time to time, but my focus will be in the middle columns. Looking at them, there are 3 possible repeat distances: 25s, 50s and 75s. Are the 25s and 75s supposed to be done in short course pools only? Because starting in the middle of a LCM pool would really play havoc with any attempt to maintain race pace. That leaves only 3 possible USTRP sets for me in a LCM pool, and honestly only two of them are viable sets. (20 x 50 LCM on 0:50 at 100 race pace? No, I don't think so.) I can see the point of doing sets of 25s in the short course pool (ideally SCM I suppose, though that's not going to happen around here) in preparing for LCM meets. But doing sets of 75s seems to violate the principle of specificity in training, because short-course 75s are nothing at all like LCM 75s. So bottom line: how is USTRP supposed to be adapted (if at all) for long course training? I haven't read everything on USTRP by any means, but if I came across this point I didn't pay attention to it at the time. This is from Dr. Rushall: "Ultra-short work is very difficult in 50 m pools. The pools are too long and take the swimmers away from the coach as well as reducing the number of race-specific turns that are done. Although swimmers can swim 25 m and then cruise into the end, it is difficult to get precise times for the race-pace work and the easy swimming in the second half is active recovery but does not allow the amount of reflection on swimming that occurs in a 25 m pool while standing at the end in the 15- or 20-second recovery." So it seems that the answer is "no".

So temps are slowly starting to climb and thoughts turn to summer...and long course. So I have a question for any of the USTRP experts here about using the system in LCM pools. Looking at the USTRP table I posted earlier, as a mid-D swimmer I am really mostly interested in the three middle columns: 100, 200 and 400. Certainly I dabble in 50s and the 1500 occasionally so I might do those types of USTRP for a little bit of variety from time to time, but my focus will be in the middle columns. Looking at them, there are 3 possible repeat distances: 25s, 50s and 75s. Are the 25s and 75s supposed to be done in short course pools only? Because starting in the middle of a LCM pool would really play havoc with any attempt to maintain race pace. That leaves only 3 possible USTRP sets for me in a LCM pool, and honestly only two of them are viable sets. (20 x 50 LCM on 0:50 at 100 race pace? No, I don't think so.) I can see the point of doing sets of 25s in the short course pool (ideally SCM I suppose, though that's not going to happen around here) in preparing for LCM meets. But doing sets of 75s seems to violate the principle of specificity in training, because short-course 75s are nothing at all like LCM 75s. So bottom line: how is USTRP supposed to be adapted (if at all) for long course training? I haven't read everything on USTRP by any means, but if I came across this point I didn't pay attention to it at the time. This is from Dr. Rushall: "Ultra-short work is very difficult in 50 m pools. The pools are too long and take the swimmers away from the coach as well as reducing the number of race-specific turns that are done. Although swimmers can swim 25 m and then cruise into the end, it is difficult to get precise times for the race-pace work and the easy swimming in the second half is active recovery but does not allow the amount of reflection on swimming that occurs in a 25 m pool while standing at the end in the 15- or 20-second recovery." So it seems that the answer is "no".