Swim Pacing and Sprint Faster: Saturday Swim Workouts

I didn't post last week's Saturday Master's workout so today you get a "two for one" deal and I'll post this weeks as well.

Since we're entering swim meet season for the Master's, you'll notice that I'm working on some very specific stuff in these workouts, namely pacing, starts, turns, and sprinting. Let's start with pacing. Do you know your paces for different speeds? Can you accurately set out to swim a specific pace and nail it within a second or two? A lot of swimmers could use more work on pacing, especially if they want to swim a distance event (whether in a swim meet or a triathlon). There's nothing worse than setting out at too fast a pace for a Looooongggg swim and feeling dead by halfway through. So this first workout puts some very specific work on knowing your exact paces down to the second.

In the main set, you will pick your absolute fastest pace for the given distance, then calculate out your paces from that. For instance, the 9 x 50. If your fastest 50 was going to be 35 seconds, and you have nine 50s at one second increments, that means your 50's will be at 44, 43, 42, 41, 40, 39, 38, 37, 36, & 35 seconds. For the 75's, if your fastest is a :58 and you have seven of them at 2 second increments, your 75's will be at 1:10, 1:08, 1:06, 1:04, 1:02, 1:00, and :58. The first ones will feel VERY slow. The later ones will feel very fast!

WORKOUT #1: Know Your Paces

Warmup:
2 x

(200 Swim
4 x 75--> 50 Drill/25 Kick)

4 x 75 Swim: Build Each

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Main Set:
9 x 50--> Descend in 1 second increments, rest :10
7 x 75--> Descend in 2 second increments, rest 10
5 x 100--> Descend in 3 second increments, rest 10
3 x 125--> Descend in 4 second increments, rest 10
1 x 150--> ALL OUT

Rest 1:00 in between each set
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200 Pull
5 x 50 --> Work starts and turns
5 x 50 ALL OUT @ 1:00
200 EZ

WORKOUT #2: Sprint Fast, Now Sprint Faster

This workout concentrates on getting some yards in the different strokes. At the end, just when you're good and tired, you get a killer sprint set that will knock your socks off.

Warmup:
200 Swim
4 x 50 with good long underwater dolphin kick off the wall
4 x 75 IM kick (dolphin, back, breast by 25s)

200 Swim
4 x 50 backstroke with good long underwater dolphin kick off the wall
300 Pull
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Main Set:
4 x

(50 Fly @ 1:00
100 Free Smooth and steady @ 1:45)

 4x

 (50 Backstroke @ 1:00
100 Free Smooth and steady @ 1:45)

4x

(50 Breaststroke @ 1:00
100 Free Smooth and steady @ 1:45)

Now:

ALL HARD:

25 rest :30
25 r. 10 + 50 r. 45
25 r. 10 + 50 r. 10 + 75  r. 60
25 r. 10 + 50 r. 10 + 75 r. 10 + 100

WOW!

4 x 50 Starts and Turns
200 EZ