Hey, solo swimmers! :wave: Welcome to the thread for all of us who train solo. Whether you train on your own due to a lack of a Masters team in your area (or for any other reason), this is our virtual locker room. Please post training tips that you think would be helpful, or anything else you would like to share with the rest of us. Have a rant? Go ahead and vent here! :rantonoff:
I'll start with a tip:
The most frustrating thing for me training solo is not having a coach on deck to evaluate my stroke and keep me on track, so I bought a waterproof camera and enlisted the help of my husband to periodically shoot video of all four strokes. Shooting underwater video became a knee/back buster, so I bought a camera mount and attached it to PVC pipe, so my husband could stand up straight to shoot underwater video. The camera gets dunked underwater, and he twists the pipe to pan the camera as I swim by.
Today, I bought a 2-pack of 12-inch "Gear Tie" reusable rubber twist ties (available at Home Depot), so I can tie the PVC pipe to the pool ladder (located in the corner of the pool) and shoot video myself. (If I angle the camera just right and keep it on wide angle, I can video me coming and going.)
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After each video session, I upload the videos to my desktop computer and compare my stroke to my favorite Go Swim stroke videos to see what I'm doing well (or not). I also post them on the Forums for feedback.
Ok, solo swimmers, what's your tip?
nice idea for a thread elaine ! … i retired and moved to savannah 6-7 yrs ago
Thanks, Jack! You moved to Savannah 6-7 years ago, and you still haven't switched to Georgia Masters (GAJA)? :nono: Consider this a formal invitation to join our team; we would love to have you! :agree: Have you met Donna Hooe yet? She is one of the coaches with the Savannah Masters team and our Coaches Chair for Georgia Masters. Check us out at http://www.georgiamasters.org :banana:
I do like this thread as well.
In addition to the challenge of not being able to evaluate my stroke, I recognize two other challenges I face as a solo trainer:
1. Mixing up work outs to keep it interesting
2. Mixing up work outs to train better
I swim most of the year for fitness and train for open water swims usually competing in late May to late September. My typical distance for competition is 5K so a few years ago, I'd mainly been training with longer aerobic sets and then noticed I wasn't really improving. I've since added a sprintish workout every other week and a threshold set or two each week and noticed improvement. I'll be checking back here for more ideas.
Thanks, Coyote! Welcome to you all of you other solo swimmers to the thread! :welcome: Thanks for your input, everybody! :applaud:
nice idea for a thread elaine ! … i retired and moved to savannah 6-7 yrs ago
Thanks, Jack! You moved to Savannah 6-7 years ago, and you still haven't switched to Georgia Masters (GAJA)? :nono: Consider this a formal invitation to join our team; we would love to have you! :agree: Have you met Donna Hooe yet? She is one of the coaches with the Savannah Masters team and our Coaches Chair for Georgia Masters. Check us out at http://www.georgiamasters.org :banana:
I do like this thread as well.
In addition to the challenge of not being able to evaluate my stroke, I recognize two other challenges I face as a solo trainer:
1. Mixing up work outs to keep it interesting
2. Mixing up work outs to train better
I swim most of the year for fitness and train for open water swims usually competing in late May to late September. My typical distance for competition is 5K so a few years ago, I'd mainly been training with longer aerobic sets and then noticed I wasn't really improving. I've since added a sprintish workout every other week and a threshold set or two each week and noticed improvement. I'll be checking back here for more ideas.
Thanks, Coyote! Welcome to you all of you other solo swimmers to the thread! :welcome: Thanks for your input, everybody! :applaud:
