Masters swimming has put distances into perspective (Page 2)

Back in my swim days 6000-7000 metres was an average session and we swam 10-11/week. During hard training we did 8000+ per session and 100km was not unheard of. In the 80's some of the distance guys in Edmonton did 200 km\week during peak training.

My "swim team" instructor's sessions are set to a minimum of 3500m of swimming. I rarely ever hit that in the 1.5 hours we get with him, but the actual swimmers do. He pushes me to try everything, but he knows my limits and will shave some laps off for me so I can hit all parts of the training. He knoooows that if we're doing kick drills I'm gonna be at it all day long if he doesn't limit me, haha!

I rejoined swimming last June. I already knew the basics of swimming but had no efficiency. I had trouble swimming 400, and I had an Oly in July. I improved through some help from others at the pool, but major gains when I joined my Masters group in September and quickly ramped up my distance. We swim 3 times a week a total of 5 hrs. Monday/Wednesday are 1.5 hour workouts of 3500 or so, I usually only get 3000. Saturdays are 2 hours and total distance is around 4k, I usually get 3500. I have started to do flip turns, dropped my swim time by about 20seconds per 100 and feel lazy when I only get 1000-1500 in. I am looking forward to rocking some Olys this year.

Jonathan

When I swam with a masters group, 3000 meters in an hour and a bit was typical.  With the group of kids I'm swimming with now, it is more like 3500 - 5000 in the hour to 1.5 hrs range.  Before I started with this group, the 3k seemed like lots but not so much now.