Swim swim swim swim

The problem I’m having with swimming, no, one of the myriad problems I’m having with swimming is getting the pacing right. I have little concept of if I’m doing a 1:45 100, or a 1:35 100, particularly at the beginning of the sets. So this set is meant to help me with my pacing…

Warm Up
———-
400m swim
8x50m alt kick/drill
———-
Main Work
———-
2×400 pull on 7:00
4×100 on 1:50 swim tempo
4×50 on 1:00 hard pace
———-
Cool Down
———-
200m easy

The 100s were on about 1:40, the 50s on about 45 secs, best one just under 40. Hard work, but I can feel myself getting quicker, and more powerful. I run out of steam, though. The rest periods ore short, and I really feel I need more rest as it goes on. I recover quickly, but not quickly enough!

Feels good to be back in the pool, certainly. New goggles, different goggle spray, celluvisc in both eyes before and after – no red eyes. So maybe it’s the goggles, or the spray, or just that my eyes are really dry; who knows, but I’m back in the pool.

Swim. Stepping up.

This week’s swim sessions are a step up from the previous sessions. More work. More intensity. More speed.

Warm Up
———-
300m swim
6x50m alt kick/drill
———-
Main Work
———-
2×300 pull on 5:50 – 5:20, 5:20
3×200 paddles pull steady 3:50 – 3:40, 3:30, 3:35
6×100 swim picking up efort on 1:50 – 1:40, 1:40, 1:40, 1:35, 1:35, 1:32
———-
Cool Down
———-
200m easy
———-
This was tough. 2600m, most of it at pretty high intensity. If I’m being critical, I tend to cross my left arm over the midline when I get tired, and I lift my head a bit too much when breathing to the right. On the positive side – I actually did this set, which I wouldn’t have even thought of doing last year, or even 2 months ago, if I’m honest. I felt strong, but by the end, I was peched.

2x100s down the pool tonight.

I’ve been looking through the sessions I used to do last year. 5x 50s at the end of a session, leading to me wanting to vomit! Things have moved on a bit.

400m warm up
8x kicking
8x drills (Underswitch, spearswitch, zenswitch)
4x 100 at 2 mins (1:35, 1:35, 1:40, 1:40)
4x 100 at 1:55 (1:40, 1:37, 1:40, 1:35)
4x 100 at 1:50 (1:35, 1:37, 1:33, 1:35)
200 cool down.

Those times are 10 seconds faster per 100m than I was doing 12 months ago, and I’m doing 12 of them now, rather than the 4 I was doing then.

Someone recommended the swim-smooth website to me, so I’ve been looking at the Mr Smooth swim console, and subsequently at some elite level swimmers, to look into more advanced techniques. I’m an over glider, according to Swim Smooth, and they recommend increasing my rate, whilst keeping the stroke long, and less patient lead hand. I’ve upped the rate a bit, and I’m trying to change my timing a wee bit. I think what I really need is a session with Graeme so he can see what he thinks about my stroke.

Swim before the swim

Last session of the week before rest day tomorrow, and then the Derwent Sportive.

Slightly disappointing swim. I did Intermediate session 3 again, and certainly felt much better balance half way through the session. Then I did a 400m time trial, and was a bit slow at 6:50. I just didn’t really have the balance right on the odd laps, but was more like it on the even laps. It just wasn’t quite as comfortable as I would have liked. But, they do say that a bad dress rehearsal bodes well for the show. So perhaps it’ll all be lovely on Saturday.

A rest day tomorrow, and a trip to Derwent.

I really should go to bed.

Intermediate Session 3 – Active Streamlining

Back to the pool this evening. I should really have swum in the outdoor pool, but I fancied a longer swim, in the 25 rather than 20 metre pool. Anyway, the lane emptied as soon as I got into it, and I was away.

2x SGF
2x sweetspot
2x sweetspot to skate practice
4x CBP (breathing in CBP sweetspot)
4x skating – relaxed hand
4x skating – wide hand
4x skating – bullseye wrist
2x lengths
2x spear-switch
2x spear-switch – best skate position
2x spear-switch – trip wire
2x spear-switch – hip drive
2x spear-switch – race timing
2x spear-switch – smooth swimming
20x swimming with trip wire focus. All at 12 spl

56 lengths in total. The last 20 lengths felt great: I really felt the wrists pushing through the bullseyes tonight. Keeping the SPL down at 13 throughout, great. Not sure if I’m quick, but I’m feeling efficient.

My new toy arrived.

New Toy

It’s charging…

Swimmmmmmm – Indermediate 2

A very long day at work. I had planned on running to work (It’s 5K ish), but I had to pick up the kids, so had to drive. In the end, ToDrF ended up picking them up, so I could have run after all. So went for a swim. Intermediate session 2, again, but instead of the 16 length swim with bullseye focus, I went with a 400m time trial, easy pace.

SG x2
SGF x2
Swim x2
Sweetspot x2
Skate to sweetspot:
Hands down x2
Laser beam x2
Hand depth x2
Wide track x2
Shoulder just out x2
Bullseye x2
Swim x2
400m time trial – 6:40. That’s 1 metre per second, again. If I can keep up that pace, I can do 750 in 12:30, and 1500m in 25:00. Hmmm. Outdoors, in a wetsuit, I would hope to be quicker…

I’ve entered Allerthorpe Triathlon. 5th June. 750/20/5. Doable. Open water, so should play to my strengths.

Countdown timer….

I’m an intermediate, apparently.

Day off today. Had to stay in for the morning to wait for postie. So, my thumbs got a bit of exercise.

In the afternoon, back to the pool. The outdoor pool is open now, so all drills from now on in the outdoor pool. The pool is shorter, so distances are less, but not by much. And it gives me time to do some more distance later on in each session. Today, Intermediate Freestyle programme session 1. 10 minute warm-up, it said. Then a 300 metre time trial. The pool isn’t 25 metres, so I did 14 lengths instead (that’s 280 metres, I reckon): 4:40. I suppose the absolute speed isn’t that important, more that there’s improvement over time. After the 280m time trial:

4 SG
2x SGF
2x SGF with switches
12x Skating, with hand down/head down/hand depth/hand width/shoulder rotation/bullseye focuses
14x single lengths, with bullseye focus throughout
4x easy swimming

I really started to find more glide as the session went on, which was nice. No-one else in the outdoor pool for the full 40 minutes, either, which was also nice. I should be able to fit in the same session tomorrow, after tennis with Jenny Tennis.

In other news – Lorna from Sweatshop has loaned me a Nike+ GPS watch. It turns out I’ve registered with Nike+ before, and by trying to upload a run from a watch with someone else’s log on in it, basically screwed things up; but I did get to see the output data, which is pretty cool. It tracks very accurately speed, route, distance, the whole 9 yards. It might just be the trigger I need to actually get out and do some running.

And I will cycle to work next week.

Yes.

Session 16

Last go at session 16. The last session of beginner! It went well. The catch exercise is great, and I managed the stroke timing sessions better this time.

N = 15 down, 13 back
N-1 = 14 down, 12 back
N-2 = 13 down, 11 back

I just about managed the N-2, but it’s too slow for me to be efficient. The ‘stream’ is quite strong, evidently.

Session 16; last, but not least.

I didn’t fancy it tonight. I had a very long ward round last night, and a long day made longer by work that’s not really mine to do, so when I left at 5:15, the decision to go to the pool, or just go home for tea was more tricky than it should have been. I went, of course.

Session 16. The last of the beginner sessions. After this, I’m an Intermediate, it says on the drill sheets. This session is about lengthening out the stroke. The instructions make pretty much no sense, so I took the opportunity, once the main drills were over, to use the new tempo trainer to try to get my timing sorted out. The blurb on the packet says to start at about 1.1 seconds as it is hard to take more time than that per stroke. It turns out that my standard rate is 1.4 seconds per stroke. So I set it at 1.4, and did 400m to try to get into a steady rhythm. Next time I think it’ll work on moving it around 1.3 – 1.5. Perhaps look up some of Terry Laughlin’s tempo trainer drill sessions.

I’m still lacking in some fitness, but the swim technique is slowly coming back. I certainly feel the surge when the catch works right, and I was feeling the glide for most of the session. The catch exercise really uses the anterior deltoids a great deal more, and as a consequence, I can feel it this evening….

One more go at session 16, and then I’m an Intermediate.

3 months out? Really?

My last post on here was in November. That’s pretty rubbish. But Winter at work was madness. Then we were away for Xmas, then New Year was madness. And then I got Ophthalmic shingles.

In this time, I’ve been swimming a few times, but I’ve really just been teaching the kids how to swim, rather than doing any actual training. And pottering about in the pool is not the same as a training session, at all.

So today, on the way back from Arbroath clinic I was able to drop in for a swim. Session 14 again, as it was the session in the bag! When I got in, the fast lane was rammed, so I just swam a gentle 800m so I didn’t get in anyone’s way. It felt OK, 14 – 16 SPL, but clearly I’m not fit. HR a good 20 bpm higher than it should be, and more breathless than I really should have been. But, I’ve not trained for months, it seems.

After the 800m (ish) the lane emptied, and I was able to get the session completed. The catch exercises are really very helpful. I can really feel that extra push (or pull, really) when it works. Work in progress, obviously. The catch exercise, and the single arm spearswitch require a snorkel to get the most out of them so I should remember that next time.