I was exceedingly glad I rested hard the last 4 days. I had a lackluster start, but from then on it was fast. 100 free, 58.4, Zones Record This was a mediocre swim. I wasn't jazzed up to really really crank it with a relay soon after. I had a great start (9 SDKs) and took it out very conservatively given my concern with my 100 conditioning (28.0). Unfortunately, I only got a toe on my second wall, which stopped me dead in the water. Mollie said she say me stop dead/look splayed and wondered what happened as she zoomed by. This mistake demotivated me for my second 50, though I finished in 30.3. That botched turn cost me a good second, I'm sure. Definitely slower than my SCM 100 free from Dec. I've been frequently flipping too far from the wall in practice and I think this carried over to the meet. I've also never had fantastic flip turns since I race free infrequently. This is an item I really need to focus on. Mollie did point out to me that this time was a Zones Record, which did make me feel better. Mixed 200 medley relay, 50 back lead off, 27.29 Our medley relay won overall with a 1:42. Our flyer went 22.0. Teen Fort split a 30 in evil and was happy. I was super pleased with my 27.29 leadoff, which is only .03 off my NR. I had a very good start. My only flaws were a bobble in my streamline on the second 25 and I was a bit too shallow (Yes, I hyper-analyze all technique aspects of my races.) I took fewer kicks on the second 25 since I was perilously close to a DQ on the second length at the Albatross meet. I did put in a split request on this swim in case anything goes awry at Nats. 50 fly, 25.90, NR I had almost a 2.5 hour break until this event and two cups of java. I didn't even bother to get back in the pool to re-warm up. I knew it would be a tight race with Fall, Susan and Margaret (who all went sub 27). Fall and Susan didn't have a ton of rest after their 100 back. I was excited to swim, felt energized and just had a great feeling about the race before I swam. I wanted to win; I was dialed in. When I set the NR last spring of 26.3, I wondered if I would ever go faster. But I only took 7-8 SDKs off the wall at Greensboro. At the Albatross meet in March (where I re-set my SCM WR), I opted for 10-11 SDKs off the second wall and I did the same here. That is definitely faster for me, and I'll stick with that. I also hit my walls absolutely perfectly -- so very rare. But I was still shocked when I looked at the timing board. Just over the moon about this swim. It is actually faster than the 45-49 record done in a tech suit. This swim will be hard to ever replicate. I was a little surprised to go so fast in my third swim of the day. But I was rested and I always swim faster in the afternoon, which is when I work out. Womens 200 free relay, 24.86 leadoff, PR/NR Our free relay won too! I was very surprised by my time (put in a split request) because I was feeling tired. 4 events is pretty rare for me. I've been working on taking more SDKs on free too. I took 9-10 off the start; in the past I've done 4-5. My old PR in this event is from 2009 with a tech suit. I've beaten every other 50 tech suit time, but not this one. Adding SDKs was the ticket! I was almost startled when the wall came up so quickly. I will say that I took a good long look at the wall this time. Still felt like my flip turn was subpar. This is under the NR on the books of 24.91, but I saw a spanking new 50 year old swam a 24.80 in a Colorado meet. So I will need to go faster at Nationals. I really wish it wasn't the last event of a 3 day meet. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Thrilled with my day! And pretty pleased that my speed held up so well over 4 events. Feeling very tired now and am clad in compression gear. The couch beckons.
Updated April 20th, 2013 at 11:46 PM by The Fortress
Haven't had the time to blog this last week, so I've just been entering my workouts into the FLOG and got to thinking I should go ahead and put Monday thru Saturday workouts in a single blog entry... that way I can take a look at a whole week at once, maybe see what folks think of this workout schedule. I wish I could say I was more intentional this week, but there were several days when I got to the pool and still had no idea what I was going to do. I did try to keep the hard day-easy day alternation and do have a sense for when I "need" to do 200s or 100s or 50s. MONDAY (3500 SCY/75 mins): 1200 (alt. fr/pull by 200s) 3 x 200 fly on 5:00 (all around 4:00) 1 x 100 fly on 3:00 300 back 200 (100fly/100 bk) 400 fr EZ 200 BK 100 BK 200 BR 200 free TUESDAY (3800 SCY/70 mins): 400 ez swim 4 x 100 on 1:45 4 x 50 on :50 masters minute 20 x 100 on 1:40 (1:28-1:34) masters minute 4 x 50 on 1:00-1:15 (200 IMO) 4 x 100 IM on 2:15 200 ez fr WEDNESDAY (3000 SCY/60 MINS): 400 EZ 4 x 50 spear w/ fins on 1:00 (:45-:46) 4 x 50 pull on 1:00 (:44-:46) 4 x 50 pull w/ paddles on 1:00 (:44-:45) 4 x 50 free on 1:00 (:39-:40) 200 pull on 4:00 200 fr on 4:00 (2:52) 400 recovery swim 12 x 25 kick w. fins on :40 (4IMO: fly, bk, br--no fins on br) 8 x 50 on 1:00 (400 IMO)* 300 recovery/cool-down *Fly: :49, :53; BK: :48, :48; BR: :54, :57; FR: :47, :46 [total time 8:00; swim time: 6:42 for the 400 IM] THURSDAY (4200 SCY/80 mins): 400 EZ 200 spear w/ fins 200 pull 200 fr 200 spear w/ fins 200 pull 200 fr 200 bk spear w/ fins 200 bk pull 200 bk ---[2200] 4 x 200 fr (avg 3:08s) 50 recovery swim ---[1000/16:20--3200] 1 x 200 fr hard (2:50) on 4:00 5 x 100 on 2:00, swum as: -100 fr hard (1:16) -100 fly (1:48) -100 bk (1:48) -100 br (1:54) -100 fr (1:25) 300 EZ recovery/cool-down FRIDAY (2000 SCY/38 Mins): 500 ez fr 20 x 50 on 1:00* 500 ez fr *50s were :42-:44, w/ every 4th at :39 SATURDAY (5600 SCY/110 mins): WU: 600 (200 fr/200 pull/4 x 50 on :50) MS: 3 x thru: 12 x 100 fr on 1:45 (1:26-1:34)* 1:00 rest 400 IM on 8:00 (7:05, 7:08, 7:22) CD: 200 fr EZ *only in the last set did the 100s fall consistently over 1:30-1:31; the last four were in the 1:33 range. The first set was all under 1:30; the second set was right at 1:30-1:31, with a few falling in the 1:27-1:29 range. The whole week was kind of a mess now that I look back on it, but I'm encouraged by today's sets of 12 x 100 on 1:45; times are coming in a lot faster the what they were a few months ago for similar workouts; and back then I was doing 100 or 200 IMs between sets, not 400 IMs.
Lately the Y has been great at 83 degrees. Managed a great distance pace workout. 500 free 500 free kick w/zoomers 40x50@:50 free #1-20 w/strapless paddles, bouy & snorkel holding :45 #21-40 no equipment 21-30 held :44 31-38 held :43 then went :42 and :41 200 free EZ 200 fly w/monofin 50 rt arm/50 lt arm/50 kick/50 swim 200 fly kick streamline w/monofin 200 back 200 free 5x100@1:45 free EZ 500 free kick w/zoomers Total 5000 yards
SCY@Fort Myers Aquatic Center Air temp of 76, pool at 79 Cloudy skies with humidity at 73% Warm up 200 FR as 2(25RA/25LA/50CU) 6x50 FR K on 1:00 desc 1-3,4-6 4x75 FR P on 1:10 desc 1-4 8x25 FR S on :30 desc 1-4,5-8, SPL-6 (cycles) *Set 1* 6x200 FR on 3:00 desc 1-3,4-6 Did 2:15, 2:14, 2:12, 2:16, 2:13, 2:10 *Set 2* 1000 FR Pull w/agility paddles-tube-buoy Steady state technical swim, negative effort second 500 *Set 3* 6x200 K on 3:30 50FR/50BK 3:01 50BK/50FR 3:00 50DK-Bd/50DK-bk 2:56 50DK-Bk/50DK-Bd 2:51 50BR-Bd/50BR-Bk 3:05 50BR-Bk/50BR-Bd 3:03 *Set 4* 4(4x75 FR on 1:15, 1 min rest) Desc 1-4 within each round 51, 49, 48, 46 49, 48, 47, 45 50, 49, 46, 44 49, 48, 46, 44 Warm down 200 EZ Comments: Had to swim SCY at FMAC since FGCU was unavailable due to GCST weekend swim meet. After only LCM last six weeks, SCY felt awkward.
This morning I swam at Riverbank with a friend. The kids team wasn’t there, and it was remarkably uncrowded for abou the first 45 minutes of the session. (Then word must have gotten out). Here’s what I did: 1000 warmup (400s, 200k, 200p, 200 IM d/s) 200 pull with paddles, build 5 x 300: Odds FR pull with paddles Evens ST/FR by 50s, with ST IM order [On the 4th one I tried doing 20 sprint / 30 easy on the stroke park—must have pushed a little too hard, had to get out and do my emergency inhaler.] 200 warmdown + play Tomorrow I’m going to a local meet—the Commissioner’s Trophy Relay meet, which is a free annual event run by the NYC Parks department. It was the first local masters meet I attended when I moved to the city, so I have a soft spot for it and am glad I can attend this year. Back then, in 1994, it was held at Riverbank, which is only 4 ft deep—I can’t believe we were allowed to do dives off blocks into that depth, but we were, and did. Now the meet is held at the lovely Flushing Meadows Aquatic Center, which was built for NYC’s 2012 Olympics bid, and is where I go for diving practice. When I signed several weeks ago, I chose to all four 50s, and I’m so very glad now I did. Then I was thinking sprints because I was excited about developing more strength and power with my lifting and diving, but now after being on a reduced workout schedule for a while I’m just happy I won’t have to swim more than two lengths at a time. It’s been a while since my last meet (since Iceland last May), and I was realizing as I was packing my bag for tomorrow just how out of practice I am at the whole getting-ready-for-a-meet thing. (It’s still far easier than preparing feeds for a multi-hour swim though!)
Todays workout was ahead of my daughters inter squad meet and was only 60mins. The workout was a mix of aerobic and quality sets. I really enjoyed this. The reduction of yardage was great too. Warm up 500 swim with snorkel 10x50 catchup on 45 5x50 kick on 50 5x50 12.5 fast,12.5 easy on 50 Main set 3x100 best avergae on 1.10 200 easy 5x100 kick with fins on 1.30 4x50 AFAP with fins on 1.30 200 easy Warm down 500 with snorkel Total 3400 I went 59,1.00,1.00 on the 100s and then went 22s with the fins on the 50s.
Updated April 20th, 2013 at 03:14 PM by StewartACarroll
300 swim 300 IM (k,dr,sw by 25) 4 x 25 choice (odds build, evens easy) 6 x 75 @ 2:00 AFAP *1-4 50 k w/fins , 25 swim *5&6 same but w/o fins * 25's and 50's focus on speed and form strong swims 100 IM mod r/20 4 x 25 fly r/10 100 IM build each 25 r/20 4 x 25 bk r/10 100 IM mod r/20 4 x 25 br r/10 100 IM build each 25 r/20 4 x 25 fr r/10 Masters min 100 fr mod r/10 50 fly r/15 100 fr build r/10 50 bk r/15 100 fr mod r/10 50 br r/15 100 fr build r/10 50 fr 50 EZ 3 x 50 fr build r/10 3 x 50 stroke fast r/20 3 x 50 fr build down r/10 200 pull , stretch out swim turn work from middle of pool 200 w/d 3450 We had a large crowd (for us) this morning. I am feeling better in the water which is good. What little bit of fly endurance I had before my little break from the pool is slowly coming back. This short stroke w/o was exactly what I needed.
Only time for a short swim tonight. I had to attend my daughter's "Math is Cool" competition. All the 4th grades from the various elementary school in central Washington were there for the competition. They did various individual and team testing first, then I came later and watched the "college bowl" games being played. They were paired up against 3 other schools in our room, and each went against the other schools in a battle of sorts. Needless to say...our school was there...may not have answered many questions ahead of the other teams buzzing in...but they were there, and had fun. Some of the questions were EZ (remember, these are 4th graders), but other questions were like "HUH????" and made me think of the gameshow "Are you smarter than a 5th grader?" w/ Jeff Foxworthy. I'm glad my daughter had fun tonight. ===================================== Quick swim, there were very few kids there tonight with the meet going on this weekend in Spokane. I was able to get my own lane, and also able to just blaze my way through my own workout before I had to get out... Warmup: 500 Free 400 Free Pull 300 IM Drill on the Fly 200 Flutter Kick w/ board 100 Free (1500/1500) 4 x 125 Free Pull @ 1:35 (avg'd 1:23/1:24) (500/2000) 4 x 100 (1 of each stroke IMOrder) @ 1:30 went 1:10/1:20/1:29/1:08 (400/2400) 4 Rounds of: 75 Free Build @ 1:00 (about :53s)25 Free Sprint @ :45 (:14-15s) (400/2800) 100 EZ and gone ----------------------------------------- 2900 Yards Swim meet coming up on Sunday, USAS with the kids. Hopefully I'll keep up with them. Lots of fast ones there this year which is great! I doubt I'll make the podium for the distance pentathlon this time. 400 IM, 200 Back, 200 Breast, 200 Fly, 200 Free
LCM@FGCU Aquatic Center Air temp 78, Water temp 78 Sunny, humidity at 84% Warm Up Dryland bands 400 FR as 4(25RA-25LA-50CU) 400 FR as DPS 4(50 Smooth, 50 Strong) w/snorkel 200 FR as 4(25 CU 25 Fast) *Set 1* 4(4x50 on 1:20, 1:00 rest) *35-34-33-32, 33-32-32-32, 32-32-32-31, 32-32-32-32, 2:00 rest, right into... 6x100 on 2:30, swim as 1st 50 in :38, negative split 2nd 50 *1:15, 1:14, 1:13, 1:14, 1:12 ---200BK ---200 Fly as 2(25RA/25LA/50 DPS) ---100 FR as 2(25 kick/scull, 25 CU) w/snorkel *Set 2* 1000 FR on 15:00 w/agility paddles-buoy-tube *13:38 right into... 4(4x50 FR on 1:00, 1:00 rest) w/fins *32-31-30-30, 31-30-30-30, 31-31-30-30, 30-30-30-29 ---200 Bk ---100 FR DPS *Set 3* 2(5x100 FR on 2:00, 1:00 rest) w/agility paddles-buoy-tube *1:18, 1:17, 1:16, 1:16, 1:16 - 1:18, 1:17, 1:16, 1:16, 1:15 Warm Down 400 FR as 4(50CU/50DPS) w/fins-snorkel Dryland bands Comments Finished the week with quality swimming in preparation for a moderate taper next week leading into the OW 5K swim at Miramar Lakes.
Thursday -- 1400 w/some bursts Friday -- 1000 EZ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Feeling much better and less tired than at the beginning of the week. My wolf pack has arrived and we are about to dine.
Swam w/ Dave and Dave. Got more sleep last night. Maybe I'm finally getting through this sinus infection. Workout today was modified from a workout 3 years ago when I turned 40. It probably made more sense back then. Instead of 3 rounds of 40x25, we did 10 rounds of 3x100. SCY 600 Warm up 5 rounds of: * 100 Stroke - 1:45 (fly,bk,br,fly,bk) * 100 Pull - 1:15 (made 1:05s, 1:00 on last one) * 100 Kick - 2:00 (fly,bk,br,fly,bk) 2:00 rest 5 rounds of: * 100 Stroke - 1:45 (br,fly,bk,br,im) * 100 Pull - 1:15 (made 1:03-1:05, 1:01 on last one) * 100 Kick - 2:00 (br,fly,bk,br,im) 12 x 50 - 1:00 (IM Order x 3) Did these hard. Fly was :33-:35, Bk was about :45 , br was :38-:40 and free was :31s 50 Easy 12 x 50 Kick w/ fins - 1:00 Odds underwater sdk down, easy back Evens Fly,bk,fr 200 Cool down (5050 Total)
My wife's flight was delayed last night and I never got to bed until about 11.30pm and as such I did not get my required sleep, meaning this morning was tough in the pool. I felt sore and sluggish. 400 swim with snorkel 6x50 catchup drill on 45 4x(100 kick on 1.45, 200 free swim on 2.20) 15x100 swum as: 5x100 on 1.20 4x100 on 1.15 3x100 on 1.10 2x100 on 1.05 1x100 on 1min 100 easy 3x(50 AFAP with fins on 2mins, 100 DPS with fins on 1.45, 25 AFAP with fins on 45) Total 4050 I held 2.08-2.10 on the transition 200s, but felt really crappy, just stiff and sluggish. The descending 100s were fine until the 2nd one on 1.05 when it got tough, but I made all of them. The swims with fins were fun and I went 22-23 on the AFAP 50s and 11s othe 25s. I was not on top of the water like Wednesday morning but still fun. My daughter has a meet tomorrow morning and I need to be at the pool at 7am to swim before the meet so another early start tomorrow. I plan on going to bed early tonight!
I have a LCM meet next weekend so this was a good time to try my hand at a strong 1500 swim this morning. 500 free 500 free kick w/zoomers 1500 Free w/paddles & bouy for time went 23:45 I could tell by my splits I back halfed this swim and it felt good 500 free kick w/zoomers 500 free EZ w/snorkle Total 3500 meters
Coach swap day today. Tonight we had the "Splash Group" coach, or the intro level kids coach, who is also the masters coach/swimmer, so she and I know each other well. She's honestly a little to nice to be a coach full time of a senior level/advanced group, and the practice was a bit easy tonight. Though she did give us a good main set that I took advantage of. Warmup: 500 Free (500/500) 10 x 75 w/ fins (I did not use fins due to the blisters on my feet) @ :15 rest 25 Flutter Kick w/ board50 Free Fast using legs to drive I didn't get more than 1 x 75 behind the group, and actually kept 1/2 of the total group even with me, without the use of fins. (750/1250) 5 x 100 Back @ 2:00 (25 Streamline Kick, 25 Left Side Kick (head to ceiling), 25 Right Side Kick, 25 Full Stroke) (500/1750) 10 x 100 @ 2:00 Odds Free/Evens Back 1st 25 - 4 SDKs2nd 25 - 5 SDKs3rd 25 - 6 SDKs4th 25 - 7 SDKs Needless to say, I didn't make many of the 3rd and 4th lengths. Some of the kids do such small fast wimpy SDKs that they somehow "complete" 7 of them before I've begun my first one. I do hold a fairly long streamline glide before initiating a kick though. (1000/2750) Had a bit of break time her as she explained the next set, and waited for the minute hand to get to a good starting point on the clock (30) for time reference... Main Set: Broken 1650 11 lengths :15 rest after 10 lengths :15 rest 9 lengths 8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 lengths She wanted us to start out "EZ", and descend the set as the distances got shorter. I took the opportunity to crank out a good broken 1650 in practice since we only had 2 in the lane tonight. If done correctly, and you actually take the 15 rest like you're supposed to, you can subtract 2:30 from the time to get your broken 1650 time. I pushed it pretty good. A few of the times I remember: 275 - 3:05, 200 - 2:11, 100 - 1:04, My total time was 20:30, so minus 2:30 puts me right about 18:00 for a broken time. I did an 18:03 in my meet back in January when racing with That Guy. Tonight...full beard, drag suit, no cap, minimal lap traffic. 100 EZ (1750/4400) 8 x 50 Kick w/ board 1st 4 no fins @ 1:152nd 4 w/ fins @ 1:00 fast (I did no fins again) (400/4800) 25 EZ to the deep end 3 x Dive 25s and walk around 100 EZ and out -------------------------- 5000 Yards
LCM@FGCU Aquatic Center Air temp 77, Water temp 78 Sunny, humidity at 86% Warm Up Dryland bands 1000 FR as 4(200 CU, 300 DPS) *Set 1* 3x400 FR on 1:00 rest, w/agility paddles-buoy-tube, desc effort by 400 1-3 4x300 FR on 1:00 rest, w/snorkel-fins, each 300 as 3(25RA-25LA-50CU) 6x200 FR on :20 rest, build effort by 50 1-4 each 200 12x100 FR on :10 rest, 50 smooth into 50 FAST ---200BK ---400 Kick w/fins Warm Down 400-300-200-100 FR on 1:00 rest DPS w/fins-snorkel Dryland bands Comments Moderate recovery workout, no times off the clock, just swimming with variable effort, stroke drills, sets with equipment and a stroke form emphasis on EVF balanced by efficient 6-kick swimming.
Updated April 18th, 2013 at 09:02 PM by fdtotten
I swam mid-afternoon today at the Y with a friend. I got some stronger inhalable meds from my asthma doc yesterday, and am hoping that they help improve the lung congestion over the next few days—if not, I’ll have to begin a prednisone course, which I’d really like to avoid doing. So far so good—I was able to push things a little harder in the pool today, and was very grateful for that. Here’s what I did: 1000 scy warmup (400s, 200k, 200p, 200 IM d/s) 6 x 300, FR with a traveling 50 BK (the first 50 BK on the first 300, second 50 on the second 300, etc.) [I wanted to begin really gently on these and push harder as the set went along, provided I was feeling good. So I decided to swim the freestyle before the backstroke 50 strong on each repeat, and that worked well. Those “strong” portions were only at about 1:22 pace today, but I’ll take that—it felt really great to be able to push a bit and still be able to breath. We didn’t do intervals, just enjoyed a short chat break in between.] 7 x 50 or 75, first 3-6 strokes sprint, rest easy [I did 3 FR, 2 BK, 1 BR, 1 FL, just to remind myself there is such a thing as sprinting.] 250 warmdown That was it! This was a very pleasant workout. So glad to be feeling better!
Wednesday 4/17 PM only SCY 500 swim 5x100 @ 1:20 pull w/ buoy + strapless paddles 5x100 @ 1:30 kick w/ board + fins 500 4/6/2 turns 5x100 @ 1:40 k/sw/dr/bld 8x200 3 @ 2:30 D1-3 5 @ 2:25 hold RED HR or lower 8x50 @ 1:00 odd: drill even: build 2x 2x100 @ 1:15 D1-2 4x25 @ :30 V.S. 100 EZ Total: 5200 The past two weeks have been super busy and so I really haven't had much time to swim a normal practice. I have been getting in about 1000 yards every other day. This was my first full practice since 4/6. I also have been experiencing knee pain in my left knee so I am getting it checked out on Friday. It doesn't hurt too much when I swim, but the pain has served to demotivate me.
I was really tired yesterday and despite feeling a little better today with a 6am lay in, I was in need of a recovery day in the pool. Despite having a flat tire on my wifes SUV which delayed my drive to the pool, my wish came true and my coach had a 100% aerobic workout(and who says Christmas only comes once a year). 1000 swim with snorkel 12x75 kick on 1.20 12x225 on 3mins swum alternating two pull(no paddles) with snorkel, and two swim with snorkel. I lost count on a couple and I am pretty sure on one I swam an extra 100 and an other an extra 50. 12x50 overlock on 50 150 easy Total 5350
Swam w/ Dave, Dave and Roger. My allergies have morphed from sniffles to a full blown sinus infection. It isn't impacting my swimming much but the lack of sleep is wearing on me. SCY 500 Warm up 8 x 75 Free on :59, :58, :57, :56, :55, :54, :53, :52 50 Easy By the time I calculated when the next send-off was, it was usually time to go. I did make these but a :51 was going to be a stretch if I had to do more. 400 IM Kick - 8:30 (6:59) 4 x 100 Pull - 1:15 400 IM Kick - 8:30 Faster than last one (6:52) 4 x 100 Pull - 1:10 400 IM Kick - 8:30 Faster than last one (6:48) 100 Easy 400 Timed Pull - Faster than last 4 x 100 (made 4:20) 150 Easy Kicks were good. Until last week, I don't think I had ever broken 7:00 on a 400 IM kick. Dave set a blistering pace for the first 200 of the timed 400. I focused on long strokes and pushed the tempo high enough to stay in contact. @ 300 yards, I shortened my stoke a little and upped the tempo. Wish I had splits to see if that made any difference. 12 x 25 - :30 IM Order 12 x 50 Kick w/ Fins - 1:00 Odds Underwater SDK down, easy back, evens IM Order 200 Cool down (4900 Total)
Updated April 18th, 2013 at 01:20 PM by pmccoy
Had to get gas this morning which always makes me late and cuts into my time. 500 free 500 free kick w/zoomers 10x100@1:40 free w/strapless paddles & bouy holding 1:23's 5x100@1:45 back to free 4bk, 3bk/1fr, 2bk/2fr, 1bk/3fr, 4fr 500 free kick w/zoomers fast 200 free w/snorkle 100 scull drills w/snorkle alternate 25 front scull/25 reverse scull feet first (I float really well for this, most people have a problem feet first) 200 free w/snorkle Total 3500 yards