Intermediate/Advanced - Swim Workout

This workout is primarily for competitive Sprint distance triathletes who are looking to increase their speed on the swim. It can be adjusted to anyone's speed, but the effort should be consistent with what is described.

Yesterday, I got hit with a nasty distance swim workout while at practice. My coach explained that an effective way to get faster at the 500m (or mile as well) is to do broken sets. This is the set based off of what I was given. This is a set that should be taken lightly before modified, and a good starting time for the 1st 500 splits would be to go a 2:20 - 2:00 min pace, and decrease five seconds each set of 5x100s. Complete once a week as a speed workout, and modify times each week depending on the success of a prior workout.

Warm-up
-500 swim
-300 kick
5 x 500 (Broken into 100s)
-1st 500 (5x100s): Complete on the 1:30 (Meaning leave on each 1:30, should be little rest depending on speed... 80%)
-2nd 500: Complete on the 1:25 (80-85%)
-3rd 500: Complete on the 1:20 (85-90%)
-4th 500: Complete on the 1:15 (90-95%)
-5th 500: Complete on the 1:10 (95-100%)
Cooldown (800-1600m easy)

This is completely opinionated, in terms of effectiveness, but personally, I have seen incredible improvement in my OWS times. I just thought I would put this out there for anyone to use in their routines.

Good luck to everyone out there in your training! Happy swimming (and the other "less" important parts as well ).