50+ workout

Jean, I'm only 41 but also only swimming just over a year, so I aspire to doing your workouts. Today I modified one of your workouts in this section and it was great. I also just learned to do a lap of butterfly, so this is fun w/ the IM sets to try it a little. I call it The Threes (b/c I have a hard time remembering workouts when my brain is slightly oxygen deprived): 300 easy warm-up kick 3 x 75 (left, right, back TI balanced) 3 x 25 wave (head-led undulate) 3 x (100 IM; 100 free; 100 choice) 0:15 rest on 100s; 0:30 on 300 tried to descend times 300 easy wind down 1800 yards (which fits perfectly into my one hour pool time) Thanks for the inspiration. Tzivia

Hi Tz, A few years ago Swim Magazine had an article about butterfly. The article suggested a way to improve fly which was very simple. Instead of doing a full 25 or 50 fly, just do as much fly as you can do well. They suggested doing 25s and that you do just two strokes of good butterfly followed by easy freestyle. When you reach a point where you can do two strokes of quality fly, you then go to three strokes of quality fly followed by easy freestyle. Eventually you can swim a whole 25 butterfly with good form. This seemed almost too simple to be true, but I gave it a try, and it worked beautifully - my fly really improved. Keep up the good work!

That was an article I wrote. We had about 8 people use that paradigm to get to the point that they could do easy fly for nearly any distance - and another 15 or so get to where 200 fly was no big thang. Most of these were NOT people who had extensive swimming backgrounds but were Joe and Sally Normal Masters. We went to one meet where 6 of them entered and swam the 500 all fly - just cuz they could. One of them did the Hour swim all fly. It worx. The premise is that there is ButterFly and there is ButterStruggle and not much of a middle ground. Once your strokes deteriorate to anything less than nice ButterFly then switch to freestlye for awhile, then go bback for a few more good ButterFly strokes - but NO MATTER WHAT avoid swimming ButterStruggle - it is utterly and completely useless (at best) and dangerous (injuries) too boot. I'll root around in my archives and see if I can drag the article and post it on my web site. later - e -

Thanks, Emmett, for a great article. It really worked for me, as my butterfly was mostly butterstruggle - just barely good enough so the life guard didn't come in to rescue me. :) I am truly one of your success stories. While I have never done a 500 fly, I have swum the 200 several times without falling apart.

I'm happy it worked for you! I found the article (Is there Fly After 25? or Vive le Papillon! depending on where it was reprinted) and I'm updating it to include some of what we've been doing in the last couple years with Short Axis Pulse skills (detailed in Slip-Slid'n Away article on my web site). I'll get our WebGoddes to post it soon.

Jean: I find this thread pretty interesting and I agree with tzsegal that it applies to any age group. I find this type of thread useful and encouraging of the efforts of many of us. Reading the threads where people have amazingly short intervals is impressive but unrealistic for many of us and I have a feeling there are really many of us doing moderate workouts (for lots of reasons) and thriving on it. I hope you keep up the writing and include all age groups.

Hi Effi - glad that you like some of the workouts. I thought it would be nice to post some workouts that are challenging (at least for me), but not impossible like the ones with the impossible intervals (at least for me). I find that some of the LA workouts, which are posted at the top of this forum are interesting and varied, and I have done a few of those lately. Here is a workout I did yesterday. It is an old one from the masters group I swim with two mornings a week. When I find a workout that is interesting I will put it on my computer, then I can do it at a later date. 500 easy 9 X 50 (k/s) (d/s) (s,s) 15 sec. Rest 10 X 150 broken 75 smooth, 50 build, 25 sprint 10 sec. Rest at breaks pull 300 9 X 50 on 1:15 descend the times: 1-3, 4-6, 7-9 200 easy Total: 3400 yards Somehow that 25 sprint was the hardest part of this workout.

OK - I've updated the article about Half Fly and have sent it to my WebGoddess who will likely post it on my site in the next few days under the title "Vive le Papillon!"

Before even trying butterfly I took the advice of some article to avoid butter struggle. It was probably from Emmett or TI. I spent two months doing head-led body undulation ... and about a month with some hand-led thrown in. I was down to about 14 pulses for 25 yards when I first tried throwing in the arms for a butterfly stroke. I did a couple strokes often in the middle of an undulating lap ... then a few more. Now if I run out of steam I just go back to head-led wave and finish the lap that way. No question my butterfly still takes a little extra energy ... like my freestyle did a year ago ... but nonetheless I can make the return trip backstroke and still keep swimming without gasping or resting. I think the start with undulating made an enormous difference. That took longer to get the hang of than butterfly stroke is now. It also has done wonders for my breaststroke. In those two months I knocked two strokes off 25 yds of breaststroke (now 9 - 10/ lap).

Here is a workout I did today. It was adapted from George Boles' book of workouts. 1. 500 easy 2. 16 X 25 on 30 seconds. Alternate free and stroke (breaststroke in my case) 3. pull 500 4. 2 X (100 fly + 200 back + 100 free) on 9 minutes 5. 2 X 200 *** on 4:20 6. kick 16 X 25 - alternate free and choice (*** for me) with 15 second rest interval 7. 10 X 50 free on 1:00 8. 200 easy The 10 X 50 free was tough - my feet kept threatening to cramp up.