Hey Mike, great post! A lot of good info for IM swim training. I have a few questions if you don't mind. When calculating Tpace it seems there could be a few seconds difference based on which method you use. The EN Tpace is based on a 1000yd TT and the swimsmooth test is a 400 followed by a 200. I would expect the swimsmooth test to give a slightly faster Tpace. Maybe a few seconds per 100. Did you try both as you were in the midst of your training or stick with the swimsmooth Tpace? Also did you ever measure heart rate during your swim training. I use HR for the bike and run but have never tried it for the swim. Was curious if you followed your HR during the swim training and how it compared to run or bike zones. And finally, when you did your 10x400 sets how much rest were you taking between 400s? Thanks.
When I first tested last summer, I used the 1000 and the 400/200 tests, got the same 1:33. But either one is just a snapshot estimate of lactate threshold and is close enough for what we're trying to do. I followed the 400/200 thereafter because (1) I wanted a consistent test, and (2) it was easier to fit into the front end of a WKO (when I did the 1000TT, most times I just cooled down afterwards and said "screw it, call it a day").
Keep in mind, the 400/200 test is really designed to measure the difference between the two paces, i.e., the delta between your anaerobic and aerobic engines. So, you may have solid form and can kill a 200 (2:30), but swim a 6:00 on the 400 (which is a 20% drop off in pace) because you simply don't have the swim specific fitness to carry your good, fast form over that longer distance. The TP # the test generates is designed to grow that 400 engine. Newsome says long distance swimmers should look for a delta of 4% or less (http://www.feelforthewater.com/2013...ngine.html), and you can measure that delta, or drop-off between 400 and 200 paces, here: http://www.swimsmooth.com/dropoff.html
The reason I mention ^^ is because it highlights Coach Rich's point that it's far better to swim short, fast intervals until you develop good form and the swim specific fitness to extend and hold that good form over the longer distances. I didn't even try the 10x400s until I got my drop-off down to 4%. Otherwise, I would have been flailing at the end of the set, reinforcing bad form. So instead, I did a lot of TP work through the summer and fall (some sample WKOs here: http://www.swimsmooth.com/training.html), starting with the shorter-interval sets (100s), then blending in some 200s and 300s. When my drop-off got to 5.1% in November, I did a couple Red Mist swims, but at 10x300. Finally, when my drop-off got down to 3.6%, I started doing the full 10x400s because I knew I had developed the aerobic, swim specific fitness to carry good 200 form across descending 400s. Hope that provides a little more context into what I was trying to do.
No HR in the pool for me.
1 beep rest on the 10x400s, but 2 if 1 would compromise form. When I drop the wetronome time after the 4th, 7th and 9th interval, it gives me an extra 5 or 10 seconds rest. Regardless, you gotta leave on a beep.
For me, the swim has always been a bit of a "black box" in that I have had a hard time quantifying just what to do to get and stay faster. I have looked at many of the same materials that you did but have never been able to fit the pieces together into such a well-thought out plan of action. The wetronome seems like a great tool to help standardize each lap and hold one accountable. The concept of then slowly increasing the tempo is both intuitively obvious and yet something I had never even thought of. My focus last year was to survive the swim and while I am still at my 2 min/100 pace for now, I anticipate that this will serve as a great framework within which to work on steady improvement.
Mike, I read this thread when you first posted it and have been meaning to reply. Obviously, incredible stuff in this post. It’s a great example of what makes this place so awesome. Not just the information, but your willingness to share what worked for you so others can benefit from your experience, not to mention the builds from Rich and the rest of the team.
One question on turnover….I swim with a relatively low stroke rate. For example, today at the pool I was doing 100’s(scy) in 1:27-1:30 and averaging between 48-50 strokes/min. As i have ramped up volume and frequency I have been focused on getting great extension and therefore rotation on each stroke. This approach has been working well and I can’t explain it other than to say that I “feel” fast when I really focus on extension for a split second before beginning my pull. What I find when I try to increase my stroke rate is that I start to compromise that extension. So my arms are moving faster, but I’m not moving faster. Not sure if you had a similar experience when you started to increase your stroke rate, but if so, do you have any focused swim thoughts (like the butt cheeks thing) to keep from shortening your stroke. I know a tempo trainer will help with stroke timing, but I don’t think that addresses what happens during each stroke.
It's funny. We were both working on our swims the last year, we connected several times over that year to gauge progress and provide encouragement/tips, I almost didn't write/post this, but then decided I would do so because it might provide encouragement to keep you working towards your goals. I honestly expected 3 views and a single reply from you. Had no idea it would ignite this great discussion.
Stroke rate. Here's what I learned from an ex-Olympian when I asked how to get my 48smp to the 90 or 100 the Andy Potts of the world are turning. First, stop gliding. Not even a millisecond. As soon as my lead arm is extended, hand is going over the barrel. Stroke has to have constant, rhythmic propulsion. He said, when the tan part of your arm/hand are fully extended, roll. If you feel the pale part of your arm/palm start to extend, you're gliding. That actually made total sense to me, as I can feel when the armpit and other pale-side parts of my arm/palm start to extend. Hope it does for you.
Second, I was informed, quite coldly, that I will never swim effectively at 95-100spm. What? Yep. Never. The swim studs all recover slowly and smoothly on top of the water, but once they grab H2O under water, the time from their catch to their hip and back out of the water is so ridiculously powerful and fast, I have no chance of ever replicating. That's why they wear temporary sponsor tatoos and I start in Wave 14. It's like trying to run like Meb at 10 or so feet per stride and spend 75% of a marathon airborne. Ain't gonna happen. I should be very happy with 65 or 70spm.
Get a wetronome. No brainer. Do a Ramp Test to figure out a fast spm you can do with good form.
Continue to work on technique as I do. I suspect you still have some things you can work on to get those 100s and 200s down in pace before you worry about extending that speed over distance.
Slowly increase your turnover with the wetronome (a couple spm per week) with a focus on developing that strength/speed between the moment you grab water with that high-elbow, vertical catch and pull it past your hip. I added a lot of speed this way, and it's still where much of my my work remains. Hope this helps even a little.
Hey Mike (and others): thank you for taking the time to write your story so others can learn from your experiences and avoid not "reinventing the wheel".
I found a lot of similarities between what you wrote and what I have been experimenting with. I'm just not at sub-60min yet! I did Vineman 70.3 in 2013 and swam 42 min. Knew I had poor swim technique and that if I wanted to get faster I had to start there before the poor technique became engraved in muscle memory. I flew to Kona to have a 3 day mini-camp with Karlyn Pipes. I swam in her Endless Pool for two sessions and one at the local pool while she video taped me and made recorded comments during all the sessions. Some main points from those sessions: 1) Like you commented, most people over-glide. Gliding causes you to slow and decelerate. Then you accelerate during the pull. She said I needed to extend my hand by engaging the scapula and lifting the shoulder and not just sticking my hand out. She said those few extra inches per stroke could improve my speed by 10-20%. 2) As soon as I had extended as far as I could, I was to act like I was reaching over a barrel so my elbow rotated out and up with finger tips straight down. 3) Pull straight back to the hip like swimming over shallow coral reefs. 4) Avoid a "dead spot" at the end of the pull. Quickly rotate the hand out of the water. She said a lot of people hold the hand at their hip (or past it) with the wrist bent after pushing backwards while they are reaching with the lead hand and the hand at the hip acts like a rudder increasing drag. 5) My ankles were way too stiff and were also acting like rudders increasing drag. So I began sitting on my ankles nearly every night before bed. 6) Use a 2-4 beat kick to save my legs for the bike and run.
Two months later, I swam a 37' at Oceanside 70.3. Better but still had a ways to go.
I then took swim lessons every two weeks from a local swim coach focusing on only technique until he felt I had a very good technique (about 5 months). As I tried to increase my cadence count from the 50s to the 70s over a few weeks, I was actually swimming slower and I fatigued quickly. He told me my hand was "slipping" through the water and I was not "holding" the water. He said to not try to consciously increase my cadence so quickly but to focus on 17-20 strokes per length. As my strength/technique/endurance increased, my stroke count per minute would increase. He said that on that day, it might take me 30s to reach the end of the 25yd pool resulting in a cadence of 40. But as my strength & technique improved, I'd be able to swim the length at 20 strokes in say 20s resulting in a cadence of 60 without slipping the water. Then 20 strokes in 15s and so on. In addition to improving my strength, he also recommended the metronome and, like you recommended, to slowly increase the rate over time.
I also started using a snorkel with a pull buoy every swim wko. At IMCDA, I swam 1:10 then 1:08 at IMAZ. Over the winter I added an ankle strap. This past weekend, I swam 32' at Oceanside. I still have a lot of work to do but getting closer. After reading your post, I am working on squeezing the quarter. Wow, what a difference that makes in my core stabilization.
Mike: A few questions: Do you perform any shoulder stretching exercises on a regular basis to improve your flexibility? What about sighting during OWS? Any suggestions on the technique that works best for you? We could both swim 1:20/100yd, but if you swim straight and I zig-zag all over, you will beat me every time. How often do you sight if you don't have someone to draft off and are leading a pack like at the end of your IMNZ swim? I appreciate it is personalized and everyone is different. Do you add an extra little rapid kick when you look up? Any strength training? I found doing single-arm kneeling lat pull downs while simulating a high-elbow technique to be beneficial to replicate the pull. I follow each set with polymetric weighted wall ball toss. Feel like those have improved my strength. I've also just started to use swim cords.
Thanks again for your sharing and congrats on IMNZ.
Great post, Mike. Awesome to get this level of intel from your own experimentation. I knew you were moving quickly in the water JVC in Clermont, but was wowed when I saw the :55 swim time! Congrats again. And THANK YOU for relaying this.
I like your story of dedication and progression better than mine. Great stuff. Congrats. As for your questions, I've always done lots of stretching, including the shoulders. Since reading Sheila's book, I take her advice and extend my arms out front above my head, one hand completely on top of the other, shoulders pronated, at every wall push off. It's a good stretch and puts your lead arm in a great position to make a high-elbow catch.
I've done strength training for every IM until this one. Took RnP's advice and limited it to PUs, SUs, planks and lots of cord work.
Sighting. Could be the subject of its own thread. As for technique, I always try to follow Coach P's great advice, which is here (http://members.endurancenation.us/R...+Swim+Tips). And he's beat the points into my head at every camp and race I've been to with him. The other thing that has really made a difference for me, and I don't recall if it's in P's video: Most people focus on the buoy or landmark when they sight. Don't. Focus requires time you don't have. Just looking for blury contrast - I see fuzzy orange ahead, head down. As for strategy, I have a couple. First, I have to be within 10 feet of the buoy line. If I'm 30ft wide, I could go to 40ft, then 55ft, and not really notice that I'm screwing up until I'm 75ft wide (been there, done that). Second, go out hard and hang with the fast folks if you can. They tend to go much, much straighter than the MOP, with the bonus of no unfriendly breastroke kick breaks. Third, if I notice after a handful of sigthings that current or my stroke is trending me L or R, I adjust my stroke until I have it "straightened out," then sight less often. NZ was the perfect storm: got out fast, good conditions, limitless visibility, fast bubbles to follow right down the buoys, and when it was my turn to lead, I just happened to be having one of my straight days that required very little sighting and steering.
Thanks, Mike. Your swim time is your proof in the pudding. Hopefully by IMAZ I can break the hour mark.
Thanks too for the link to Coach P's OWS advice. I've read Coach R's e-book but hadn't seen Coach P's podcast. Read it earlier but will watch it tonight. And, today during my swim wko, stretched my shoulders during the wall push-offs. How easy to incorporate into the workout! How many times do we push off every wko? I have been pushing off and reaching out, but have not been "stretching". Will do now. Also, like your thoughts on hugging the buoy line. I've been trying to swim the straightest line to the furthest buoy that I can see but I think I have been zig-zagging on my way to that buoy. I like your advice and just following the buoys until I can work on my sighting. The other thing I think that has helped my swim strength are sets of "push-outs" of the deep-end after each swim session.
Again, great stuff from everyone. Bob's comments about pushouts reminded me of dryland stuff I need to get into the habit of doing again .
Pushouts: hands forming a diamond on the deck at the edge of the pool, pull your upper body out of the water as if you were closing a window. Go back down and repeat. Do...many of them . Works best and are way legit in a pool with a deep gutter.
Cordz: you're upper body is already warmed up so bring your stretch cords to the pool with you (you used these during the OS, correct??) Attach them to the ladder, starting block, flag pole, fence, whatever and knock out a few sets. If you have them attached to the pool ladder, you can use the ladder to knock out some dips between sets of cords.
Drop your towel on the deck and bang out some crunches, etc.
Finally, you may have access to a pullup bar-ish thing somewhere at the pool so hop up on that and get some.
You can do all of ^this^ in about 15'. Best part is that you're already warmed up, wet, the shower is just a few steps away and it's totally not creepy to be the middle aged guy in a speedo doing dryland jazz on the side of the pool after a swim...
Good thing I don't wear a speedo! That might actually meet creepy criteria! I already meet wierdo criteria swimming with the snorkel. Creepy weirdo may cause some mothers to grab their kids and run.
@Mike - thanks for your reply. The pale vs tan part of your hand and arm makes sense and i can definitely feel the difference. My last few swims i have been focusing on extending "just enough". Just enough to get to full extension but not too much where i am gliding. I have also been focusing on turnover and when i really looked at the data on my garmin, my stroke rate is closer to 54-56/min. Still room to improve, but not as bad as my original 48-50.
One interesting observation....Over the past 5 weeks i have swam 32 out of 35 days averaging about 16k per week. The bulk of that swimming was between easy and comfortably hard. I decided last Thursday to see what i could do for an all out 100. I swam that 100 in 1:22 which was about 3-4 seconds/100 faster than my previous best. The rest of my hundreds for the day were all under 1:30 averaging 1:26-1:27. Since then every swim i have done it seems like i am 2-3 seconds/100 faster across all distances. Maybe it's the increased turnover, maybe it's better technique finally sinking in, maybe it's better swim fitness, but whatever it is, i seem to be consistently faster. In today's EN swim i did 16x100 all between 1:30-1:27. When i did a similar set a few weeks back, i was swimming 100's between 1:33-1:35 with the same amount of rest and could feel technique starting to fade at the end. For today's set i definitely had to increase my effort level on the last few, but my times stayed consistent. I can't explain it other than to say something has ratcheted up a level and i'm hoping what i'm experiencing now is my new norm. Granted "fast" is a relative term, and i realize i still have a LONG way to go, but it does feel good to see some progress after practically living at the pool during the month of March!
@Mark, congrats on the improvements in your swim! I think it's pretty easy to relate those gains to the fact that you've been swimming a lot / very frequently the last month. No secret that the more you swim, especially with regards to frequency, the faster you'll get. And of course we should all be doing the math on time spent vs time gained vs other opportunities, etc. That is, making our own decision.
Regarding your extension conversation above: think of getting more extension by rotating your shoulders and hips vs necessarily reaching farther forward and certainly not pausing your stroke. For me, I think of it as my hand enters somewhere between the my head and my farthest point of extension, but I get that additional extension through rotation, which then becomes the catch.
@Mark, Awesome that you're feeling the improvement. It will be interesting to see how that translates to your swim time at St. George. And, I recently read your IMC race report (Belated congrats on a well executed race and KQ) where you stated that you have dealt with calf cramps during the swims. FWIW: I too use to get those toward the end of long sets. I talked with my swim coach about it and he asked if I point my toes while kicking. I told him I did to help reduce drag. He said, "There's your problem. Don't point your toes, just let them follow. Work on stretching your ankles on dry land and that will reduce drag without cramping." After months of stretching my ankles by sitting on them, I have noticed while swimming less of a feeling of drag, an decrease in my swim times, and no calf cramping. Good luck at St. George.
@Mike: Also, wanted to thank you for reminding me about Sheila Taormina's book Swim Speed Secrets. I read it a year ago, but decided to pull it out again to re-read it after you recommended it.
And I want to share something about the kick in case others have had the same problem. [I just stood up and raised my hand and said ....] "I have been a poor kicker". During kick sets, it has taken me forever to get to the other side of the pool. Even after working on my ankle flexibility, which I thought was causing the problem, I was still slow. There were times when I felt like I was going backwards! But I didn't worry too much about it since I use a two-beat kick for balance, not propulsion. And since all the races I am now doing allow a wetsuit, the wetsuit helps to raise my legs to improve body position. So I wasn't too concerned about my poor kick, but one day I WILL race in a race that doesn't allow full wetsuits (ok, I can be optimistic).
Then while re-reading Swim Speed Secrets, I came across her comments about "How important is kicking" in Appendix B. After talking about ankle flexibility, she talks about "the only way to get ahold of the water in freestyle kicking is to have the knee slightly bent on the down-kick." I thought, yeah, been doing that. Then in the next paragraph she states, "After finishing the down-kick, keeping the leg straight on the up-kick is extremely important..." I thought, really?! She continued, "if you bend the leg on the up-kick, then you are applying pressure to the water in the opposite direction of what you just did on the down-kick. Although next to impossible to believe [uh, no it isn't for me], a fair number of triathletes and swimmers actually move backward when they kick because of a bent-knee up-kick. The answer for this frustrated crew is to simply focus on not bending the knee on the up-kick. A straight-leg up-kick will, at minimum, keep them from going backward, and if they go one step further and concentrate on holding the water with the foot and leg on the down-kick, they might enjoy forward propulsive kicking for the very first time in their lives. This is always cause for great celebration!" It worked! My kick sets are now not making waves across the pool, but at least I'm getting across the pool before the sun goes down. And I feel it helped this year at Oceanside 70.3 when I switched to a 6-beat kick for a burst of speed to pass this annoying person who kept zig-zagging in front of me. Hope that helps someone as much as it helped me.
@Rich - It feels pretty good to see some progress although my swim this morning was not great.When I look at where I am, swimming is for sure a limiter and to me it’s worth the time investment now, to reap longer terms benefits in the future.I have structured my swims in such a way as to have minimal impact on my bike and run training while also minimizing the impact to family life.I either do quick swims during lunch, or I bring my kids along a couple times a week after work or on weekends.They swim next to me in the same lane while I bang out 1500-1700 yds.The kids are happy, my wife gets some down time and I get time in the water….everyone wins!
I really like your description of reaching by rotation vs reaching by extension. At least on dry land it makes a lot of sense. I will keep this in mind during tomorrows swim and see how it goes.
@Bob – I’m a long time runner, and like many others, I have massively tight ankles. I do ankle stretches, but not consistently enough to see any meaningful improvement. I also try to keep my feet relaxed, but when I swim for long stretches, the more I think about keeping them relaxed the more I can feel them tensing up. I seem to do best when I don’t think about my toes and to your point I try not to focus too much on pointing them.
Mike, as others have said, this is a fab post....thanks a lot.
Question then to all...did my first "red mist" set today. What seems odd is all sets are less than your CSS. It almost feels like there should be short sets above CSS to stretch you. What am I missing? How can you go faster if you are training at less than CSS.
Guess I am missing something however interested in thoughts.
There's an explanation of this at www.swimsmooth.com/training.html. But, in short, Newsome likes LD swimmers working 5% or so below TP because it focuses on the aerobic engine needed for 2.4 miles and, in his opinion, is the best way to jack up that TP/CSS. Made sense to me because my coach seemingly fills my run and bike schedules with a pile of Z4 work done at 95% of TP. And it's worked for me in all 3 disciplines so far.
Appreciate the level of detail here VERY much Mike as a fellow Swim Smooth/CSS thinker. It's been a true pleasure stalking (er... watching) you kick butt on Strava. Thank you - heeding many of your points of advice!
Awesome thread loaded with all sorts of goodies. I have a wetronome but didn't see a great way to use it effectively. Thank you for sharing as I now have a pool accountability partner. Lots to take away from here and I will be sure to continue to stalk.
Mike there is just so much good stuff in this thread.... Most importantly its making us think again... I've gone down most of the same roads, materials, books, and practices in the past .... This thread has rejuvenated those efforts.... I recently had the opportunity to swim with a couple ENer's Satish Punna and Dave Tallo and discussions between us brought us often to this thread....
Most notably for me so far has been re-focussing on my toes... I always focus on my toes and like to tell others to flex their feet while swimming to see how much difference all that drag can make.... Anyway if I really focus on my toes to the point of feeling like I am actually curling them I have actually noticed a pick up in my interval times around 1-2 seconds per 100yd... I think its accomplishing this 2 ways... 1st is a little less drag do to the "more" pointed toes and 2nd I think its keeping my legs stiffer and closer together again reducing drag and almost feeling like my kick may actually have some propulsion to it.... It seems to require zero effort to accomplish this just a focus.... Also need to be careful not to cause an arch cramp....
I am loving this thread! I now have a few things to focus on. I knew my turnover rate was slow as I watch others at the pool. My question is- what is stroke rate per minute- is that each left arm in a minute or both arms? Please tell me it's both- my garmin is only giving me one arm and if I double that (pitiful) number I get a less depressing number than it reads.
Comments
@Jay,
When I first tested last summer, I used the 1000 and the 400/200 tests, got the same 1:33. But either one is just a snapshot estimate of lactate threshold and is close enough for what we're trying to do. I followed the 400/200 thereafter because (1) I wanted a consistent test, and (2) it was easier to fit into the front end of a WKO (when I did the 1000TT, most times I just cooled down afterwards and said "screw it, call it a day").
Keep in mind, the 400/200 test is really designed to measure the difference between the two paces, i.e., the delta between your anaerobic and aerobic engines. So, you may have solid form and can kill a 200 (2:30), but swim a 6:00 on the 400 (which is a 20% drop off in pace) because you simply don't have the swim specific fitness to carry your good, fast form over that longer distance. The TP # the test generates is designed to grow that 400 engine. Newsome says long distance swimmers should look for a delta of 4% or less (http://www.feelforthewater.com/2013...ngine.html), and you can measure that delta, or drop-off between 400 and 200 paces, here: http://www.swimsmooth.com/dropoff.html
The reason I mention ^^ is because it highlights Coach Rich's point that it's far better to swim short, fast intervals until you develop good form and the swim specific fitness to extend and hold that good form over the longer distances. I didn't even try the 10x400s until I got my drop-off down to 4%. Otherwise, I would have been flailing at the end of the set, reinforcing bad form. So instead, I did a lot of TP work through the summer and fall (some sample WKOs here: http://www.swimsmooth.com/training.html), starting with the shorter-interval sets (100s), then blending in some 200s and 300s. When my drop-off got to 5.1% in November, I did a couple Red Mist swims, but at 10x300. Finally, when my drop-off got down to 3.6%, I started doing the full 10x400s because I knew I had developed the aerobic, swim specific fitness to carry good 200 form across descending 400s. Hope that provides a little more context into what I was trying to do.
No HR in the pool for me.
1 beep rest on the 10x400s, but 2 if 1 would compromise form. When I drop the wetronome time after the 4th, 7th and 9th interval, it gives me an extra 5 or 10 seconds rest. Regardless, you gotta leave on a beep.
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When you get the 40point vdot bump, pls write that thread also!
thx!!!
For me, the swim has always been a bit of a "black box" in that I have had a hard time quantifying just what to do to get and stay faster. I have looked at many of the same materials that you did but have never been able to fit the pieces together into such a well-thought out plan of action. The wetronome seems like a great tool to help standardize each lap and hold one accountable. The concept of then slowly increasing the tempo is both intuitively obvious and yet something I had never even thought of. My focus last year was to survive the swim and while I am still at my 2 min/100 pace for now, I anticipate that this will serve as a great framework within which to work on steady improvement.
Really great stuff. Thanks Mike!!
Mike, I read this thread when you first posted it and have been meaning to reply. Obviously, incredible stuff in this post. It’s a great example of what makes this place so awesome. Not just the information, but your willingness to share what worked for you so others can benefit from your experience, not to mention the builds from Rich and the rest of the team.
One question on turnover….I swim with a relatively low stroke rate. For example, today at the pool I was doing 100’s(scy) in 1:27-1:30 and averaging between 48-50 strokes/min. As i have ramped up volume and frequency I have been focused on getting great extension and therefore rotation on each stroke. This approach has been working well and I can’t explain it other than to say that I “feel” fast when I really focus on extension for a split second before beginning my pull. What I find when I try to increase my stroke rate is that I start to compromise that extension. So my arms are moving faster, but I’m not moving faster. Not sure if you had a similar experience when you started to increase your stroke rate, but if so, do you have any focused swim thoughts (like the butt cheeks thing
) to keep from shortening your stroke. I know a tempo trainer will help with stroke timing, but I don’t think that addresses what happens during each stroke.
Again, Mike, great post and thanks for sharing!
It's funny. We were both working on our swims the last year, we connected several times over that year to gauge progress and provide encouragement/tips, I almost didn't write/post this, but then decided I would do so because it might provide encouragement to keep you working towards your goals. I honestly expected 3 views and a single reply from you. Had no idea it would ignite this great discussion.
Stroke rate. Here's what I learned from an ex-Olympian when I asked how to get my 48smp to the 90 or 100 the Andy Potts of the world are turning. First, stop gliding. Not even a millisecond. As soon as my lead arm is extended, hand is going over the barrel. Stroke has to have constant, rhythmic propulsion. He said, when the tan part of your arm/hand are fully extended, roll. If you feel the pale part of your arm/palm start to extend, you're gliding. That actually made total sense to me, as I can feel when the armpit and other pale-side parts of my arm/palm start to extend. Hope it does for you.
Second, I was informed, quite coldly, that I will never swim effectively at 95-100spm. What? Yep. Never. The swim studs all recover slowly and smoothly on top of the water, but once they grab H2O under water, the time from their catch to their hip and back out of the water is so ridiculously powerful and fast, I have no chance of ever replicating. That's why they wear temporary sponsor tatoos and I start in Wave 14. It's like trying to run like Meb at 10 or so feet per stride and spend 75% of a marathon airborne. Ain't gonna happen. I should be very happy with 65 or 70spm.
Get a wetronome. No brainer. Do a Ramp Test to figure out a fast spm you can do with good form.
Continue to work on technique as I do. I suspect you still have some things you can work on to get those 100s and 200s down in pace before you worry about extending that speed over distance.
Slowly increase your turnover with the wetronome (a couple spm per week) with a focus on developing that strength/speed between the moment you grab water with that high-elbow, vertical catch and pull it past your hip. I added a lot of speed this way, and it's still where much of my my work remains. Hope this helps even a little.
Cheers,
Mike
I found a lot of similarities between what you wrote and what I have been experimenting with. I'm just not at sub-60min yet!
I did Vineman 70.3 in 2013 and swam 42 min. Knew I had poor swim technique and that if I wanted to get faster I had to start there before the poor technique became engraved in muscle memory. I flew to Kona to have a 3 day mini-camp with Karlyn Pipes. I swam in her Endless Pool for two sessions and one at the local pool while she video taped me and made recorded comments during all the sessions.
Some main points from those sessions:
1) Like you commented, most people over-glide. Gliding causes you to slow and decelerate. Then you accelerate during the pull. She said I needed to extend my hand by engaging the scapula and lifting the shoulder and not just sticking my hand out. She said those few extra inches per stroke could improve my speed by 10-20%.
2) As soon as I had extended as far as I could, I was to act like I was reaching over a barrel so my elbow rotated out and up with finger tips straight down.
3) Pull straight back to the hip like swimming over shallow coral reefs.
4) Avoid a "dead spot" at the end of the pull. Quickly rotate the hand out of the water. She said a lot of people hold the hand at their hip (or past it) with the wrist bent after pushing backwards while they are reaching with the lead hand and the hand at the hip acts like a rudder increasing drag.
5) My ankles were way too stiff and were also acting like rudders increasing drag. So I began sitting on my ankles nearly every night before bed.
6) Use a 2-4 beat kick to save my legs for the bike and run.
Two months later, I swam a 37' at Oceanside 70.3. Better but still had a ways to go.
I then took swim lessons every two weeks from a local swim coach focusing on only technique until he felt I had a very good technique (about 5 months). As I tried to increase my cadence count from the 50s to the 70s over a few weeks, I was actually swimming slower and I fatigued quickly. He told me my hand was "slipping" through the water and I was not "holding" the water. He said to not try to consciously increase my cadence so quickly but to focus on 17-20 strokes per length. As my strength/technique/endurance increased, my stroke count per minute would increase. He said that on that day, it might take me 30s to reach the end of the 25yd pool resulting in a cadence of 40. But as my strength & technique improved, I'd be able to swim the length at 20 strokes in say 20s resulting in a cadence of 60 without slipping the water. Then 20 strokes in 15s and so on. In addition to improving my strength, he also recommended the metronome and, like you recommended, to slowly increase the rate over time.
I also started using a snorkel with a pull buoy every swim wko. At IMCDA, I swam 1:10 then 1:08 at IMAZ. Over the winter I added an ankle strap. This past weekend, I swam 32' at Oceanside. I still have a lot of work to do but getting closer. After reading your post, I am working on squeezing the quarter. Wow, what a difference that makes in my core stabilization.
Mike: A few questions: Do you perform any shoulder stretching exercises on a regular basis to improve your flexibility?
What about sighting during OWS? Any suggestions on the technique that works best for you? We could both swim 1:20/100yd, but if you swim straight and I zig-zag all over, you will beat me every time. How often do you sight if you don't have someone to draft off and are leading a pack like at the end of your IMNZ swim? I appreciate it is personalized and everyone is different. Do you add an extra little rapid kick when you look up?
Any strength training? I found doing single-arm kneeling lat pull downs while simulating a high-elbow technique to be beneficial to replicate the pull. I follow each set with polymetric weighted wall ball toss. Feel like those have improved my strength. I've also just started to use swim cords.
Thanks again for your sharing and congrats on IMNZ.
Thanks for sharing!
Hey Bob,
I like your story of dedication and progression better than mine. Great stuff. Congrats. As for your questions, I've always done lots of stretching, including the shoulders. Since reading Sheila's book, I take her advice and extend my arms out front above my head, one hand completely on top of the other, shoulders pronated, at every wall push off. It's a good stretch and puts your lead arm in a great position to make a high-elbow catch.
I've done strength training for every IM until this one. Took RnP's advice and limited it to PUs, SUs, planks and lots of cord work.
Sighting. Could be the subject of its own thread. As for technique, I always try to follow Coach P's great advice, which is here (http://members.endurancenation.us/R...+Swim+Tips). And he's beat the points into my head at every camp and race I've been to with him. The other thing that has really made a difference for me, and I don't recall if it's in P's video: Most people focus on the buoy or landmark when they sight. Don't. Focus requires time you don't have. Just looking for blury contrast - I see fuzzy orange ahead, head down. As for strategy, I have a couple. First, I have to be within 10 feet of the buoy line. If I'm 30ft wide, I could go to 40ft, then 55ft, and not really notice that I'm screwing up until I'm 75ft wide (been there, done that). Second, go out hard and hang with the fast folks if you can. They tend to go much, much straighter than the MOP, with the bonus of no unfriendly breastroke kick breaks. Third, if I notice after a handful of sigthings that current or my stroke is trending me L or R, I adjust my stroke until I have it "straightened out," then sight less often. NZ was the perfect storm: got out fast, good conditions, limitless visibility, fast bubbles to follow right down the buoys, and when it was my turn to lead, I just happened to be having one of my straight days that required very little sighting and steering.
Thanks too for the link to Coach P's OWS advice. I've read Coach R's e-book but hadn't seen Coach P's podcast. Read it earlier but will watch it tonight. And, today during my swim wko, stretched my shoulders during the wall push-offs. How easy to incorporate into the workout! How many times do we push off every wko? I have been pushing off and reaching out, but have not been "stretching". Will do now. Also, like your thoughts on hugging the buoy line. I've been trying to swim the straightest line to the furthest buoy that I can see but I think I have been zig-zagging on my way to that buoy. I like your advice and just following the buoys until I can work on my sighting. The other thing I think that has helped my swim strength are sets of "push-outs" of the deep-end after each swim session.
Again, great stuff from everyone. Bob's comments about pushouts reminded me of dryland stuff I need to get into the habit of doing again
.
You can do all of ^this^ in about 15'. Best part is that you're already warmed up, wet, the shower is just a few steps away and it's totally not creepy to be the middle aged guy in a speedo doing dryland jazz on the side of the pool after a swim...
@Mike - thanks for your reply. The pale vs tan part of your hand and arm makes sense and i can definitely feel the difference. My last few swims i have been focusing on extending "just enough". Just enough to get to full extension but not too much where i am gliding. I have also been focusing on turnover and when i really looked at the data on my garmin, my stroke rate is closer to 54-56/min. Still room to improve, but not as bad as my original 48-50.
One interesting observation....Over the past 5 weeks i have swam 32 out of 35 days averaging about 16k per week. The bulk of that swimming was between easy and comfortably hard. I decided last Thursday to see what i could do for an all out 100. I swam that 100 in 1:22 which was about 3-4 seconds/100 faster than my previous best. The rest of my hundreds for the day were all under 1:30 averaging 1:26-1:27. Since then every swim i have done it seems like i am 2-3 seconds/100 faster across all distances. Maybe it's the increased turnover, maybe it's better technique finally sinking in, maybe it's better swim fitness, but whatever it is, i seem to be consistently faster. In today's EN swim i did 16x100 all between 1:30-1:27. When i did a similar set a few weeks back, i was swimming 100's between 1:33-1:35 with the same amount of rest and could feel technique starting to fade at the end. For today's set i definitely had to increase my effort level on the last few, but my times stayed consistent. I can't explain it other than to say something has ratcheted up a level and i'm hoping what i'm experiencing now is my new norm. Granted "fast" is a relative term, and i realize i still have a LONG way to go, but it does feel good to see some progress after practically living at the pool during the month of March!
Thanks again for all the great advice!
@Mark, congrats on the improvements in your swim! I think it's pretty easy to relate those gains to the fact that you've been swimming a lot / very frequently the last month. No secret that the more you swim, especially with regards to frequency, the faster you'll get. And of course we should all be doing the math on time spent vs time gained vs other opportunities, etc. That is, making our own decision.
Regarding your extension conversation above: think of getting more extension by rotating your shoulders and hips vs necessarily reaching farther forward and certainly not pausing your stroke. For me, I think of it as my hand enters somewhere between the my head and my farthest point of extension, but I get that additional extension through rotation, which then becomes the catch.
And I want to share something about the kick in case others have had the same problem. [I just stood up and raised my hand and said ....] "I have been a poor kicker". During kick sets, it has taken me forever to get to the other side of the pool. Even after working on my ankle flexibility, which I thought was causing the problem, I was still slow. There were times when I felt like I was going backwards! But I didn't worry too much about it since I use a two-beat kick for balance, not propulsion. And since all the races I am now doing allow a wetsuit, the wetsuit helps to raise my legs to improve body position. So I wasn't too concerned about my poor kick, but one day I WILL race in a race that doesn't allow full wetsuits (ok, I can be optimistic).
Then while re-reading Swim Speed Secrets, I came across her comments about "How important is kicking" in Appendix B. After talking about ankle flexibility, she talks about "the only way to get ahold of the water in freestyle kicking is to have the knee slightly bent on the down-kick." I thought, yeah, been doing that. Then in the next paragraph she states, "After finishing the down-kick, keeping the leg straight on the up-kick is extremely important..." I thought, really?!
She continued, "if you bend the leg on the up-kick, then you are applying pressure to the water in the opposite direction of what you just did on the down-kick. Although next to impossible to believe [uh, no it isn't for me], a fair number of triathletes and swimmers actually move backward when they kick because of a bent-knee up-kick. The answer for this frustrated crew is to simply focus on not bending the knee on the up-kick. A straight-leg up-kick will, at minimum, keep them from going backward, and if they go one step further and concentrate on holding the water with the foot and leg on the down-kick, they might enjoy forward propulsive kicking for the very first time in their lives. This is always cause for great celebration!" It worked! My kick sets are now not making waves across the pool, but at least I'm getting across the pool before the sun goes down. And I feel it helped this year at Oceanside 70.3 when I switched to a 6-beat kick for a burst of speed to pass this annoying person who kept zig-zagging in front of me.
Hope that helps someone as much as it helped me.
@Rich - It feels pretty good to see some progress although my swim this morning was not great. When I look at where I am, swimming is for sure a limiter and to me it’s worth the time investment now, to reap longer terms benefits in the future. I have structured my swims in such a way as to have minimal impact on my bike and run training while also minimizing the impact to family life. I either do quick swims during lunch, or I bring my kids along a couple times a week after work or on weekends. They swim next to me in the same lane while I bang out 1500-1700 yds. The kids are happy, my wife gets some down time and I get time in the water….everyone wins!
I really like your description of reaching by rotation vs reaching by extension. At least on dry land it makes a lot of sense. I will keep this in mind during tomorrows swim and see how it goes.
@Bob – I’m a long time runner, and like many others, I have massively tight ankles. I do ankle stretches, but not consistently enough to see any meaningful improvement. I also try to keep my feet relaxed, but when I swim for long stretches, the more I think about keeping them relaxed the more I can feel them tensing up. I seem to do best when I don’t think about my toes and to your point I try not to focus too much on pointing them.
Question then to all...did my first "red mist" set today. What seems odd is all sets are less than your CSS. It almost feels like there should be short sets above CSS to stretch you. What am I missing? How can you go faster if you are training at less than CSS.
Guess I am missing something however interested in thoughts.
There's an explanation of this at www.swimsmooth.com/training.html. But, in short, Newsome likes LD swimmers working 5% or so below TP because it focuses on the aerobic engine needed for 2.4 miles and, in his opinion, is the best way to jack up that TP/CSS. Made sense to me because my coach seemingly fills my run and bike schedules with a pile of Z4 work done at 95% of TP. And it's worked for me in all 3 disciplines so far.
Enjoy the Mist.
Dawn
Appreciate the level of detail here VERY much Mike as a fellow Swim Smooth/CSS thinker. It's been a true pleasure stalking (er... watching) you kick butt on Strava. Thank you - heeding many of your points of advice!
Most notably for me so far has been re-focussing on my toes... I always focus on my toes and like to tell others to flex their feet while swimming to see how much difference all that drag can make.... Anyway if I really focus on my toes to the point of feeling like I am actually curling them I have actually noticed a pick up in my interval times around 1-2 seconds per 100yd... I think its accomplishing this 2 ways... 1st is a little less drag do to the "more" pointed toes and 2nd I think its keeping my legs stiffer and closer together again reducing drag and almost feeling like my kick may actually have some propulsion to it.... It seems to require zero effort to accomplish this just a focus.... Also need to be careful not to cause an arch cramp....
Thanks again for the thread!