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?
Parents
Former Member
Hi everyone, right now neither ElaineK nor I have figured out how to insert a PDF file into a forum post, so for now everyone interested in getting a copy of the Masters Motivational Times (MMTs) should send me a private message through the forum and include their email address. The PDF file is relatively small, only about 60 KB.
And if anyone out there with mad forum skills can explain how to insert a PDF file (as opposed to an image file) into a forum post, PLEASE reply and let us know. Thank you!
For those of you that are unfamiliar with age-group motivational times, they all start with "seed times" that are computed from the fastest times for each event for each age group in recent history, usually within the previous three years. USA Swimming and USMS compute these seed times differently, but they represent a similar concept: if you can swim these times for those events, you have a good chance of placing within the top 16 (USA-S) or top 10 (USMS) at the respective National Championships. Using these seed times, USA-S then computes for each age group six different levels of performance, from AAAA down to B as follows, but note that my description here is simplified by sticking with only short-course yards events for age groups 13 and over:
AAAA: Seed time + 5%
AAA: Seed time + 10% (USMS NQT for events 200 yards and over)
AA: Seed time + 15% (USMS NQT for events 100 yards and under)
A: Seed time + 20%
BB: Seed time + 30%
B: Seed time + 40%
For children 18 years old or under, these motivational times allow (for example) a 12 year-old girl to compare her best time in a particular event to that of an 18 year-old boy in a meaningful way. If the girl is swimming AA times, she is "relatively faster" than a boy swimming A times, even though her actual times may be significantly slower than his. The same applies for Masters swimmers, even though USMS doesn't compute official motivational times, in that (for example) a 65 year-old man swimming A times is "relatively faster" than a 27 year-old woman swimming BB times, even though his actual times may be slower than hers.
Now, for children under 13, USA Swimming makes a series of other adjustments to the motivational times using specific factors for each event, but in addition they also make the following change to the BB and B times for children 10 and under, which represent the *youngest* age group:
BB: Seed time + 35%
B: Seed time + 50%
For the age-group masters motivational times I did not create event-specific adjustment factors, but I have similarly widened the BB and B times for the *oldest* age group for which NQTs are published, which is swimmers 80-84 years old.
I welcome comments and suggestions for improvements, and I especially welcome having any errors identified!
Hi everyone, right now neither ElaineK nor I have figured out how to insert a PDF file into a forum post, so for now everyone interested in getting a copy of the Masters Motivational Times (MMTs) should send me a private message through the forum and include their email address. The PDF file is relatively small, only about 60 KB.
And if anyone out there with mad forum skills can explain how to insert a PDF file (as opposed to an image file) into a forum post, PLEASE reply and let us know. Thank you!
For those of you that are unfamiliar with age-group motivational times, they all start with "seed times" that are computed from the fastest times for each event for each age group in recent history, usually within the previous three years. USA Swimming and USMS compute these seed times differently, but they represent a similar concept: if you can swim these times for those events, you have a good chance of placing within the top 16 (USA-S) or top 10 (USMS) at the respective National Championships. Using these seed times, USA-S then computes for each age group six different levels of performance, from AAAA down to B as follows, but note that my description here is simplified by sticking with only short-course yards events for age groups 13 and over:
AAAA: Seed time + 5%
AAA: Seed time + 10% (USMS NQT for events 200 yards and over)
AA: Seed time + 15% (USMS NQT for events 100 yards and under)
A: Seed time + 20%
BB: Seed time + 30%
B: Seed time + 40%
For children 18 years old or under, these motivational times allow (for example) a 12 year-old girl to compare her best time in a particular event to that of an 18 year-old boy in a meaningful way. If the girl is swimming AA times, she is "relatively faster" than a boy swimming A times, even though her actual times may be significantly slower than his. The same applies for Masters swimmers, even though USMS doesn't compute official motivational times, in that (for example) a 65 year-old man swimming A times is "relatively faster" than a 27 year-old woman swimming BB times, even though his actual times may be slower than hers.
Now, for children under 13, USA Swimming makes a series of other adjustments to the motivational times using specific factors for each event, but in addition they also make the following change to the BB and B times for children 10 and under, which represent the *youngest* age group:
BB: Seed time + 35%
B: Seed time + 50%
For the age-group masters motivational times I did not create event-specific adjustment factors, but I have similarly widened the BB and B times for the *oldest* age group for which NQTs are published, which is swimmers 80-84 years old.
I welcome comments and suggestions for improvements, and I especially welcome having any errors identified!
