Swimming Isn't Hard

Agree good write up. Thanks

How about pool tools? My local pool started having a coached Master's Swim team. The team idea fell through but the coach was still organizing workouts so I joined them. I'll back track a bit - I started swimming regularly (2 or 3 days  week) for fitness back in 2001. In that time I have had beginning swim classes, joined a swim for fitness for triathlete's class that was coached, took American Red Cross Swim Instructor Training. I never competed as a child. The current Coach uses pool tools in every workout - snorkel, pull buoy, paddles and fins. In my head I'm thinking I've been swimming all these years without all this stuff now I join this group and I feel like I "need" all this stuff. I have everything so far except the snorkel. I'm holding out refusing to buy a snorkel, why? No real reason except I've swam all these years with no snorkel so why do I need one now?! 

I do see value in a long swim if an athlete needs the psychological confidence they can go the race distance.  Once they've done that, I see no value in doing it again - it's just a poor utilization of your available workout time.

You mention you use a 2-3k swim each month to work on pacing and form as you fatigue.  That reinforces my argument against long continuous swims.  Over the duration of a long continuous swim, you are going to fatigue.  As you fatigue, your technique is going to degrade.  Each stroke you take with less than perfect technique is storing improper technique to muscle memory.  When your technique breaks down because of fatigue, it's going to break down to what is stored in muscle memory.  If perfect technique is stored in muscle memory, then your stroke will "break down" to perfect technique.  On the other hand, if you are regularly storing improper technique to muscle memory, when fatigue causes your technique to degrade, it will break down to improper technique.

A much better way to perfect pacing then long continuous swims is to build workouts around your Swim Threshold Pace (STP, aka CSS).  Let's say for the sake of discussion that your threshold pace is 1:30/100 yards.  Doing your 3,000 continuous swim at IM race pace would be an achievable challenge although your technique would undoubtedly break down.  However, if you were to do your 3,000 as 15 x 200 at IM race pace with 10-seconds rest, you'd have a really good workout that would do more for your pacing than any long swim ever could.  IM race pace is ~ STP + 3-seconds/100y = 1:33/100y.  200's would be double that = 3:06.  Add your rest interval of 10-seconds = a send-off interval of 3:15 (rounded to the nearest 0:05 for simplicity).  If you aren't hitting your target pace of 1:33/100 you won't be getting any rest.  In this example, every 200 you would have confirmation of your pacing.  More importantly, that brief rest interval will allow you to maintain proper technique and store that proper technique to muscle memory.

You mention you don't understand how an athlete is going to prepare themselves for a 1.2 or 2.4 mile swim without doing long continuous swims.  Let me ask you a question - how many triathletes do you know that complete an entire marathon in their training for an IM marathon?  I venture to say the answer is none.  Indeed, I don't like to see the athlete's I work with do long runs of more than 90-minutes which is well short of a full marathon for even the fastest runners.  You don't need to go the full distance in training in order to go the full distance on race day.  Endurance doesn't work that way.  If you need the psychological confidence instilled by completing the distance, that's a different question.  I think you'd find if you did that 15 x 200 workout I talked about earlier that it would be much more challenging than a 3,000 continuous swim.  You could repeat that workout multiple times in a week and if you add volume over time would properly prepare you for your race distance.

I agree that sighting work is important.  I didn't mention it because that's one of those "detail" things.  We could easily spend the next week talking about all the minute details that go into being a good swimmer, cyclist, or runner.  I was trying to point out the most common mistakes.

I didn't talk about toys because using them, in and of itself, isn't necessarily a mistake.  That said, I question the value of most of the toys being used today.  Admittedly I haven't worked with competitive swimmers in a long time.  However, most of the arguments I hear in favor of all the toys don't pass the "smell test."  Back when I was swimming we used paddles and ankle bands.  The band to isolate the pull and the paddles to identify technique deficiencies.  My coach was the guy that designed and marketed the original paddles (he licensed those paddles to Speedo and you can still purchase that original design - those ugly rectangular paddles with the tubing at the middle finger and wrist).  Contrary to popular belief, paddles aren't a strength tool, rather they are a technique tool and as such, aren't used frequently.  At the height of my swimming career I was swimming 400-450,000 meters/month.  Maybe 500 of those meters were using paddles.

One of the technique deficiencies that paddles regularly highlighted was improper balance - sinking legs.  My coach was a purest (so it's no wonder I share the sentiment) and demanded we learn proper technique.  However some enterprising individual came along and recognized he could "fix" the problem of sinking legs - and the pull buoy was born.  Another individual came along and said, "Let's use fins so we can simulate fast swimming."  Which makes absolutely no sense because as soon as you take the fins off, you're back to swimming at your original slow pace.  I figured out one time I swam well in excess of 50-million meters during my swimming career.  Not one of those meters was with fins on - so take that for what it's worth.

Don't even get me started on snorkels.  Many of the most glaring technique deficiencies center around breathing.  How then, is it beneficial to remove breathing from the equation?

At the end of the day, if you want to swim fast, you need to swim; then you need to swim some more, and when you think you've swum enough, you need to swim some more.  If using the toys gets you into the pool and swimming, then they're a good thing - even though it goes against every purest fiber in my body.

Congratulations on your first triathlon!  You're now officially a part of this crazy sport.  Enjoy the journey.

I have a similar problem to you - lack of a convenient pool.  I can train with the local tri-team in the high-school pool at 7:00pm.  The problem is at 7:00pm I'm starting to think about a pillow, not a pool.  The next closest pool is 65-miles away - meaning 90-minutes in the water is really 4-hours when you include driving and a shower.  It happens there's an incredible mixed use trail adjacent to the pool.  It's close to 60-miles of trail that's lightly used and closed to vehicular traffic.  That gives me the opportunity to do swim/run orswim/bike bricks that let me mitigate the collateral time.  Having someplace safe to ride is worth the drive all by itself.  You might see if there's a way you can do likewise and double up a couple workouts so you can get a bigger bang for your time buck.

To your question - Your comment about being humbled coming out of the water this morning implies to me you are somewhat new to swimming with a purpose.  With that in mind, everything you do should be done with an eye towards developing proper stroke technique.  On the one hand, the swim cords might marginally be able to help you improve swim specific strength.  On the other hand, as a new swimmer, they could easily introduce technique deficiencies.  I get it, you want to maximize your training.  In my humble opinion though, your long term swimming development will be better served holding off on the swim bands until you've developed good technique.  As I said in an earlier response, if you want to swim fast, you need to swim, then you need to swim some more.  When you think you've swum enough, you need to swim some more.

I think you missed my point.  You'd said you didn't understand how an athlete could prepare for a HIM or IM swim without doing a long continuous swim.  I pointed out that in the same way nobody does a full marathon while preparing for an Ironman, an athlete doesn't need to do a long continuous swim to prepare for a long race day swim.  I made no reference whatsoever to run training beyond that.  That is another discussion for another time.

I contend if you are suffering during a triathlon swim you are doing it wrong.  The goal of a triathlon swim is to remain aerobic.  Aerobic and suffer don't often collide in the same sentence.

I further contend if you are only swimming 36,000 meters per month you are woefully under-prepared for anything longer than an Olympic triathlon.

You achieve excellence by striving for excellence - all the time.  During the swim that means striving for 100% perfect stroke technique 100% of the time.

Finally, if you structure your training properly you will never face anything on race day you haven't already faced and conquered in training.

By all means, if you see value in doing long continuous swims in training, then do long continuous swims in training.  I'm sure the experts internationally that are in near unanimous agreement that long continuous swims are an inefficient and ineffective form of training simply don't fully understand your situation.

Hey Marc,

I absolutely agree there are people who do long continuous swims in training.  I'd expect someone who is top 10 in the world for long distance OWS events to have excellent technique and to have sufficient meters in their swim bank that jumping in the water and doing a 5k continuous swim is absolutely no challenge.  That isn't the athlete I was referring to in my original comments.  In my original comment I pretty clearly said I was referring to age-group triathletes.  More specifically, when I made my comments I had in mind the age-group triathlete that came off the couch a year or two ago, an athlete that 6-12 months ago had a hard time swimming two continuous lengths of a short course pool.  That's an athlete that likely still has some technique deficiencies; an athlete that doesn't have the meters in their swim bank to rely upon.  That's an athlete that will be doing them self a disservice swimming long continuous swims in training.

There is absolutely no doubt that an athlete can reach a point of diminishing returns in training.  For you, it's in swimming.  For others, it might be running or cycling.  It's up to each individual athlete to determine where that point occurs for them.

Good point about specificity of training.  I nearly put that in my original post as a common mistake.  Can't tell you how many times I've seen or heard of an athlete whose never had a wetsuit on or swam in open water, but there they are on race day with their shiny new wetsuit, ready to head out on a 2.4 mile open water swim.

I don't have personal experience with swim tethers.  I wonder how much being tethered at the ankles will impede the kick.  Beyond that, you'll be in the water "swimming" which is preferable to some of the other alternatives.

One thing you'll have to do differently is interval management.  Typically a swim set might look like 10 x 100 @ x:xx.  That will be kind of hard since you won't be moving.  You'll have to base your intervals on duration - something like 10 x 60" (as an example).

Good luck

I agree with some of this article but disagree with quite a bit

• A 1:03:00 IM swim is beyond most ... at IM Vichy last year for example Only 41 athletes equalled or bettered this time .. so for most 1:03 is a step 2 far.
• Most AG IM athletes work full time and simply dont have the time to knock out 6000+yds 3 times per week ... they would be better off using there time on the bike
• The bigest limiter for many AG IM athletes is technique and strength endurance ... the best way to solve the latter, if you cant get in the water the magic 3 times, is with long continuous swim. The best way to solve the former is a couple of 1-2-1 with an instructor then staring the long swims 'slowly'

I dont swim in the winter at all ... i start swimming in Mid-May OW (with my tempo trainer set at 52) -  I swim Long continuous swim (on average) once per week. This week just over 5500yds (with my tempo trainer set at 57)... I passed the the IM distance in 1:10:03.

Could I improve my time changing my swim approach .. yes possibly ... maybe 5 mins. But instead of swimming I've spent more time on the bike and Bricking ... and my bike has improved by much more than 5 mins

Time limited AG IM athleted need to take a leaf out of Channel Swimmers Books - Sort the strengthe endurance out and get used to swimming long

With all due respect - opinions vary.

One of the things I enjoy the most about coaching is having the opportunity to show athlete's what they can be; rather than reflect what they are.  That includes introducing them to coaching methods that have been proven over time.

With that said, I will agree to disagree with pretty much everything you said.  I wish you luck with your methods.

Here's my experience, as someone who took up swimming in order to do an IM, and for no other reason.  It's just my experience.  I was serious about it, hired a swim coach (which was hugely beneficial to me), swam a lot [EDIT: 'a lot' for an average triathlete, not a real swimmer] (at one time), etc.

1. The swim is scary enough that if you cannot comfortably cover the distance, including in the presence of other flailing arms and legs, in open water, needing to sight, etc., then you need to pay serious attention to the swim.
2. In addition, it is very important to exit the swim feeling good.  So you cannot 'mightily struggle' to get through the race distance on the swim.  It really needs to be comfortable, or the bike and run will suffer.  Experience in open water is important, here, as is some experience, prior to race day, of swimming the full distance (even more), preferably in open water (assuming the race is open water).
3. On the other hand, return on investment (in the sense of time gained on the swim, per hour spent in the pool training) is pretty low, compared with running and biking.  Once you can comfortably cover the distance of your race, probably bigger time gains are available elsewhere, unless you are doing an oddball race that really emphasizes the swim.
4. On the other other hand, once you get near the front of the pack, especially in shorter races, the swim becomes far more important, because you just cannot afford to give up minutes on the swim to the best athletes.  You can afford to give up minutes to the 'swim experts', whom you will pass on the bike, but not to the people who can bike and run as fast as you, or nearly so.  At this point in your tri career, you can cover the distance comfortably.  You need to find people to train with who are faster than you, or be very good at pushing yourself.
5. Swimming the full distance of a race (even an IM) is absolutely nothing like running (or even biking) the full distance of the race.  That's a silly comparison.  Just speaking in IM terms (but the same applies for other distances), if you are well trained, you can easily do a 4K swim and come back and do it again the next day and probably be better off for it.  Doing back to back (or indeed any) marathons in training would be suicidal for most, and even back to back century rides would be a bad idea for most.  A person who is doing reasonable swim training and does a weekly 'long swim' the length of his or her goal race is almost definitely doing no harm, and might well be doing some good.  The other swims in the week will sufficiently reinforce good form (assuming that they are swimming with good form at all, which is, in my personal case, a generous assumption...).

My 2c.

[EDIT 2:] Oh dangit and I almost forgot.  In my experience, swimming is HARD!  I took up swimming as a 40-year old.  I worked hard at it and continued to be horrible,  For years.  I never got particularly good at it.  I can do an IM swim in around 1:10, but the work that would be required to take 5-8 minutes off that time is daunting to say the least.  In contrast, I also took up running at about the same time.  A few years later I was winning races.  Swimming is HARD!!!!

First of all, I'd characterize myself as a swim coach, turned triathlon coach. I agree, there are many triathlon coaches that lack a true swimming background and in my opinion that occasionally leads "Triathlon Swim Coaches" to pursue what I would characterize as less than optimal training methods.  I will acknowledge there is more than one way to do just about anything so I don't for a moment believe my way is the only way or even necessarily the best way.  I do believe however that the methods I use and advocate are proven over time.  Sorry to any triathlon coaches that don't have a 20-year swimming career as the foundation for their athletic career.  I'm not trying to offend, just making an observation based on over 4-decades of experience.

To your specific comment about 15 x 100 being irrelevant to a triathlon swim.  I strongly disagree.  Katie Ledeckey is by almost any standard one of the best swimmers of her generation and arguably one of the greatest swimmers of all time.  She is the current World Record holder in the 400m, 800m, and 1500m freestyle.  Two of those events are VERY close to three different triathlon swims - specifically a Sprint - 750m, an Olympic - 1500m, and a 70.3 - 1900m.  While Katie does shorter swims, her specialty is longer "endurance" events.  I don't advocate age-group triathletes do "Olympic Caliber" swimmer's workouts.  Indeed, very few age group triathlete's could complete one of Katie's workouts.  However, it is instructive to look at what she does and see what conclusions we might be able to draw from her workouts.  Katie RARELY does intervals longer than 200m in training.  A very large percentage of her workouts is spent doing 25's, 50's, and 100's.  She does admittedly occasionally do a 5,000m continuous swim for time - however the qualification I would offer is that her time is typically right at 50:00 (by the way, that would work out to a 38:00 Ironman swim).  I venture to say you can count on one hand the number of people on Beginner Triathlete that can swim 5000m without experiencing stroke degradation due to fatigue.

My point is, when you understand the technical aspect of swimming, it's much easier to see how doing intervals - where you can maintain proper technique and store that proper technique to muscle memory - can not only prepare you for a longer swim, but help you become a faster swimmer in the process.

https://www.yourswimlog.com/katie-ledecky-sets-training/

http://www.svensksimidrott.se/globalassets/svenska-simforbundet/utbildning/kurs-o-konferens/tranarkonferens-2016/bruce-gemmell---sept-2016-training-kgl.pdf

Hey Barry,

Let me start by saying I'm going to share my personal opinion on this.  As sure as I write it, there will be people that want to call me out and tell me I'm nuts.  That's fine.  We all have an opinion.  Mine is based on nearly a 50-year association with competitive and triathlon swimming.  Also, I look at swimming through the prism of having well in excess of 50-million meters in my personal swim bank.  So take it for what it's worth.

Yes, I agree there are a number of different opinions on "the best way" to train for a triathlon swim.  The first thing to understand is there is no "BEST WAY."  There are just different ways.  My personal opinion is the root of the differences boils down to the experience the person advocating one way or another brings to the conversation.  On the one hand, you have those that come from swimming backgrounds.  I fall into this category.  I'd characterize myself as a "swimming purist with old-fashioned training values and methods."  Also from the swimming background side are coaches/swimmers that have a bit less "time in the saddle" and you'll likely find those individuals more willing to consider the use of "pool toys."  On the other hand, you have triathletes and triathlon coaches that may not have the swim background or picked up swimming in the express context of triathlon.  Those individuals may be more willing to look at the swim as a "necessary evil" and be willing to consider methods that will reduce time in the water "so you can devote the time to the bike where it will do more good."

Those from the swimming side tend to be more focused on technique while those from the triathlon side tend to be more focused on just muscling through the swim.  At the end of the day, swimming is swimming.  Yes, there are some subtle differences between "swim-meet swimming" and "triathlon swimming" but when you look closely, both types of swimming are doing the same thing.  You are attempting to reduce frontal drag in the water while applying propulsive force to move yourself through the water.

Which approach is the "best?"  That's a question each athlete has to answer for themselves.  If you want to become a better swimmer, I submit you might consider doing what swimmers do.  If you merely want to survive the triathlon swim, then you have all the options that swimmers typically pursue plus the options advocated by those with less of a swim background.

Hope that helps.