Swim Camp
Swim camp is kicking my butt! Glad to say I didn't lose much on my form but man - starting my day out with 2000+ in the pool has me ready for a nap by noon. Why must I work?
The drills keep it interesting.
How is your swim camp going?
The drills keep it interesting.
How is your swim camp going?
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Comments
Not much volume for me. Been working with a local and knocking out her wko/drills. Volume later.
My under water mantra of "I love swimming" must be working.
??
I got in 5 swims in past 2 weeks, culminating with a short one today with a 1000y TT. Surprisingly, PR'd by 3"!....17:50. Considering that I'm not really in good "swim shape" yet and with such short build, I'm happy with that. I could've gone faster, but I never really kill myself on the swim TTs for some reason. Just hard effort the whole time, and similar to my prior efforts in RPE terms.
I decided to finally force myself to get used to breathing to the left. I've always been a right only breather. As I did this, I repeated a lot of 100's, experimenting with turnover and L vs. R, sort of doing some on-the-fly data collection/comparisons. Interestingly, although I don't feel as balanced or like my pull is as good when breathing left, there is no question that I'm a little faster! Swimming is such a nebulous, touchy-feely thing c/w cycling and running and for a non-competitive swimmer like me, any little thing I find that helps is like finding a $20 in a coat pocket! I'll take it and not ask too many questions.
Planning to try to alternate L & R henceforth to try to balance my rotation and get more comfortable breathing left. Then will let conditions dictate on race day depending on sun, wind, etc.
Other thoughts/advice?
Despite swimming all my life (teams in HS and college), I never really thought about breathing until I became a triathlete. I suspect I always breathed on the left side. Starting to do long slow sessions, I began breathing every third stroke, and that was fairly easy. But when I tried breathing just on the right, I felt like I was fishtailing my rear end. So (this was 12 years ago or more), I started breathing left side on the way down, right side coming back, meaning 25 meters each way. In races, I would go 50-100 strokes, then switch sides. I still after all this time have completely different stroke mechanics breathing on right vs left: my head wants to come up, I don;t want to rotate to my non-breathing side, my right hand wanders in front of me - all things which don't happen (on the opposite side) when I breathe left. My speeds are the same, but my stroke seems stuck unless I pay complete attention to details. But I soldier on, and spend half my time breathing on each side when doing intervals. Warm-ups, cool downs, I breathe every third stroke. Like John says, its a key race day skill for handling wind, sun, and unfriendly competitors, as well as giving me a "mini-rest", as I seem to speed up whenever I switch sides, meaning, (I think), the non-breathing side arm is doing a little less work? or vice versa?
Way to go Jeff! At the very least, learning to bilateral breathe will make you "feel" like a swimmer as will learning a flip turn for pool swimming. Although I knew how to swim, I never did so with "intent" until I started racing triathlons at 26. Training and racing mostly in the Gulf forced me to learn how to bilat breathe so I could deal with the waves, current, etc. but like the other guys mentioned, when racing I usually end up reverting to just right sided so I can get in more air. I do find in a long race though that if I need to calm down and get my wits about me, I'll bilateral breathe to get my HR down.
Congrats to you.
I am NOT a fast swimmer! But I just finished week 2 and thought it was great. Quick question for all you lifetime swimmers: Currently I bilateral breathe every third stroke, and it works just fine. However, by accident I discovered that if I breathe bilateral every 4-5 strokes, I feel smoother. Any thoughts on this? Would you recommend? (I do not want to deplete myself of oxygen and end up as fish food!!
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I am NOT a fast swimmer! But I just finished week 2 and thought it was great. Quick question for all you lifetime swimmers: Currently I bilateral breathe every third stroke, and it works just fine. However, by accident I discovered that if I breathe bilateral every 4-5 strokes, I feel smoother. Any thoughts on this? Would you recommend? (I do not want to deplete myself of oxygen and end up as fish food!!
)
Hi Amy, First, my disclaimer is that I'm not a "life time swimmer." I'm guessing (but please ask Coach Rich or anticipate other replies) that in the pool or training that would be great and a boost for your oxygen uptake however I don't think you'd be able to sustain that rhythm during a race as the HR is higher, adrenaline pumped and the jockeying for position going on. I often switch between every third and every five finding it to be relaxing.
You go girl!
The faster you want to go, the more you'll need to breathe. No awards are given for not breathing frequently. EG, when
"just swimming along" in training, every third stroke is fine, but when going hard on intervals or in a race, breathing every other stroke (Eg, every time your left arm comes of the water) works much better. You need that O2, and don't have gills!
The reason adult onset swimmers tend to avoid breathing frequently is they have not yet learned how to smoothly integrate taking a breath into their stroke mechanics. That's the reason you feel "smoother" when breathing less frequently, and a sure sign you need to improve that element of your mechanics.
Very true! Thanks so much for your input!