IMHO, the difficulty in training breastroke is maintaining good technique. Other than training fly, training *** is the worst.
Also, the 50 is a much different event than the 200 : strength and power versus endurance and lung capacity.
For shorter races, I tend to focus on technique and speed, with some lactic acid stuff thrown in:
- 10x 100 on 1:50 swimming 50 BR at 80% and 50 FR or BK recovery
- 6x 50 BR on 2:00, all as fast as possible for ave time
- 10x 25 BR at 100%, followed by 75 recovery
- 6x 75 BR at 85%, 15 secs rest, 50 BR at 100%, 75 recovery
- fast kick sets: 50s, 75s or 100s at 90%, with 20 secs rest between
- 50s, 75s or 100s BR arms with fins and dolphin kick, focusing on accelerating hands
For longer races, there is no substitute for actually swimming the distance; this means repeats of 200s and 300s BR, with FR or BK thrown in when necessary to maintain form.
There are a number of great breastrokers on this forum who will no doubt opine.
I pretty much agree with Jim,except he is a lot younger and faster and I need more rest.Basically I do one day/week 50 pace,one 100 pace and one 200 pace(and one mixed day and if I can work in a 5th day I do long distance.)On 50 pace day I go 25s full speed on about 1 min. On 100 pace day it's 50s at 100 pace on about 2 min.On 200 days it's 100s at 200 pace on about 3 min.I say "about" because I think it is more important to hold my speed than my interval so I may go off earlier or later depending.I think it is important to get your body used to race pace so that you don't have to think about it in a race.
IMHO, the difficulty in training breastroke is maintaining good technique. Other than training fly, training *** is the worst.
Also, the 50 is a much different event than the 200 : strength and power versus endurance and lung capacity.
For shorter races, I tend to focus on technique and speed, with some lactic acid stuff thrown in:
- 10x 100 on 1:50 swimming 50 BR at 80% and 50 FR or BK recovery
- 6x 50 BR on 2:00, all as fast as possible for ave time
- 10x 25 BR at 100%, followed by 75 recovery
- 6x 75 BR at 85%, 15 secs rest, 50 BR at 100%, 75 recovery
- fast kick sets: 50s, 75s or 100s at 90%, with 20 secs rest between
- 50s, 75s or 100s BR arms with fins and dolphin kick, focusing on accelerating hands
For longer races, there is no substitute for actually swimming the distance; this means repeats of 200s and 300s BR, with FR or BK thrown in when necessary to maintain form.
There are a number of great breastrokers on this forum who will no doubt opine.
100 ***
25 breakstroke kick, with butterfly arms
25 ***
25 fly kick with breastroke arms (btw really good drill with zoomers)
25 break
50's / 75's
25 underwater breastroke pullouts no breath
25 breastroke or 25 sprint free or .... something to make your heart beat fast
lots of splits / groin stretching to improve kick geometry
powerlift squats with heavy weight to build quads for walls (stay away from deadlifts)
again, STRETCH you legs knees and groin
I'm always and advocate of breath control / hypoxic work for breastroke. esp in the 200 length... it will help your pullout distances and can win you races... it also allows you to control your stroke cadence instead of your lungs dictating your stroke length...
goodluck.
I swim 50-200 breastroke though am probably more natually a 200 swimmer.
I don't often swim 200 reps. I tend to use 50s to 100s and vary the intensity and rest interval to work different energy systems. On breastroke, you have to be pretty fit before you can do a set of 200s without really plodding and compromising technique.
You have to work aerobic and anaerobic energy systems in training, as well as practicing race pace, to do a 200. You can get away with training much more as a sprinter for 100, but for recovery etc should have balance. Obviously the quicker you can get through your 100m the less of it will be done with lactic acid in your sytem!
For me more 200m paced workout might be:
4/5 sets of 4x50 on 60 @ 200 race tempo (it's the stroke count and timing that matter more than the time) with an additional minute between sets. This allows you to swim at around race effort without recovering too much between the 50s.
A 100 paced / focused workout would be longer rest and higher pace again. Depending on where I am in my cycle and fitness levels I will do race pace swims of
