Swim III, Spring 2013, Class 1

Swim III

Spring 2013

Class 1

I want to welcome all of you to the new quarter of Swim III. It was great seeing each of you this week and getting starting with the spring season.

Every quarter we have a new focus as we work to build our swim fitness to a high level. This time we’ll rotate through the weeks as follows:

1)      Stroke length focus

2)      Stroke rate focus

3)      Distance focus

Within each, there are points of form that are crucial to maintain so as to avoid breakdowns as you fatigue. We’ll cover something new each week.

This first class, one of my goals was to meet all of you and get a feel for how you swim and what you personally need to work on. I’ll try to catch up with each person in the class at least once every couple of weeks to give pointers one-on-one.

I also wanted to get you back into the routine of swimming sets and a variety of distances and intensities. This particular workout was about a mile, and we’ll extend that as we go forward.

Focus - Stroke Length

Warm-up:

5x50 descending, 15sec rest, each 50 is 1-2sec faster than the last

3x50 done as 25 dolphin kick / 25 swim

100 easy

Main Set:

6-7 x 100, 20sec rest

Build effort from easy to hard within each swim

Reduce stroke count by slowing down your catch motion out front a little more each 100. This allows your body to move farther forward as you shape your catch downward, lengthening your stroke.

6-7 x 50, 10sec rest

Build effort from easy to hard within each swim

Reduce stroke count by pushing harder with each stroke to accelerate forward and move farther over your catch.

Note: if this is what you were doing for the 100s, go the other way. Use your kick, either by kicking harder (but narrow) each time, or by kicking faster and adding kicks per armstroke.

Cool Down:

250-350 easy

Total: ~1800yds