For ow swimmers and Red Mist fans

Last Friday did another Gerry Rodrigues set. This was the 5th one in 5 consecutive weeks. This time I managed to hold on to the beep
also for round 6. When I started this 5 weeks ago, I was behind the beep already in the beginning of round 5. Great quantifiable progress
I would say.

Just a reminder what this set is about:

Salvo wrote:
round 1: 100 easy, 100 IronMan effort, 100 easy, 100 fast
round 2: 100 easy, 200 IM effort, 100 easy, 100 fast
round 3: 100 easy, 300 IM effort, 100 easy, 100 fast
...
round 6: 100 easy, 600 IM effort, 100 easy, 100 fast (3.9k so far, like a Red Mist)
round 7: 100 easy, 700 IM effort, 100 easy, 100 fast (4.9k so far)
round 8: 100 easy, 800 IM effort, 100 easy, 100 fast (tot 6k)

All with 10s rests between reps (no additional rest between rounds). Fast is not all out but faster than threshold pace.

I'm doing the IM parts at threshold effort to make it more difficult and interesting .

And these are my numbers for reference:
- long course (50m)
- IM speed: 1:43
- Fast speed: 1:30-1:35
- Recovery: 1:50
- Used the HUUB kick pants
- Beeper set to beep every 25m for better feedback

Adrian

I'm impressed Adrian: so you basically did the IM reps at css pace, the easy 100's at css+7 and the fast 100's at css-13 / css-8? All with 10s rest between the reps?
Well, my current css is 1:33-1:34/100m. If I had to swim the fast 100's at 1:21-1:26, the recovery reps at 1:41 and all the rest at 1:34 I would die before starting

Well done!
Salvo

Most of the times, yes, with 10 sec break. Towards the end the breaks increased a bit, up to 1 beep (26s) as 10 seconds is extremely short . And the last fast 100 was at CSS speed as I was dead already.

My "secret" are those HUUB pants. They allow me to push hard for longer.
Anyway, I adjusted my CSS accordingly. Without the pants, in the 50m pool, CSS would
be 1:52.

Wow, that's a massive difference to CSS with the kickpants. My CSS is about 1:52 at the moment. I am quite a bit faster in a wetsuit, but not anywhere near 1:43!

Is your CSS what you call your IM speed? Assuming this means Iron Man, I'd have thought that's a bit slower than CSS? CSS is meant to be roughly 1500m speed, not 3.8km.

It is 10s in the pool but less in the open water as you don't anymore have the walls to push from and no markings on the bottom to guide you straight ahead.

I have decided to modify the set a bit and swim the IM distances (yes, IM should be the 3.8kM pace) at CSS pace. When I do the 6 rounds, this gives me 2.7km of fast swimming (CSS or above) which is pretty good.

Step backwards today. Was behind already in round 4. I decided to stop it and just swim another 1000m at easy pace.

Adivio wrote:Step backwards today. Was behind already in round 4. I decided to stop it and just swim another 1000m at easy pace.

If I could give you and advice, remember to take an easier week out of 3 or 4 weeks in order to recover, adapt and get ready for more load. With rest comes strength.

Salvo

Thanks Salvo.

I didn't think swimming needs easy weeks as it doesn't feel that heavy in general.
But let this be that easy week for me as I anyway skipped the other heavy swim training from Tuesday. Or is this the reason for the bad performance today? .

Adrian

Well, I as well didn't think swimming needs easy weeks but last season I was stucked in a loooong plateau despite having swam harder and more than the previous year, and I couldn't understand why. I was consistent and diligent, but every time it seemed I was improving and feeling better and stronger, all of a sudden I was back again. I keep a detailed training log and, by looking at it, it turns out that those backward steps typically happened every 4 or 5 weeks. Then I started getting info about periodization. For instance you may like watching this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CoCg-XS2Zs

I guess Swim Smooth's Guru is much about providing the best training prescription to balance fitness and fatigue in order to avoid these backward steps that inevitably lead to a stagnation.

By the way, is there anybody here who subscribed to the Guru?

In the end, training on flat weeks doesn't work. It's better to periodize, at least for me.

Cheers,
Salvo

After Paul's advice I've stuck with a weekly Red mist 10 x400 The last full one I stayed on the beep was 2m05s 31.25 beep. Currently reduced to 2m04s 31s beep but run out of steam after the first 100 of the Eighth by the tenth I was almost a full length off the beep. But a few mins rest and I was able to do a slow 2k to at least have done a 6k total like The Rodriguez swim.
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1481607470
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1481607532
These can be my weekly endurance swims it will probably take me a couple of weeks to hit the beep on the tenth at this pace.
Woody

Yes, Gerry's set is fun but nothing is more true than a classic 10x400.

The first 4 reps are crucial: as in a real race, you can't go out too fast but you can't take it too easy either. And, as in a real race, you have to keep that right pace with little to no warmup. And if that CSS+6 pace once meant easy warmup pace, now it's something faster than that, so more challenges if you're not warmed up. I often like to do those first 4 reps w/o TT to assess my day-shape and understand what to expect from the following reps.

As in a real race (if you choose to do it descending), the 5th rep is right before half the distance, ie a good moment to start increasing pace.

And in the last 3 reps you're in the last quarter of your race: it's when you feel you're almost done and can/should push on the throttle but it's also when you're more fatigued and your form tends to fall apart, so pushing on the throttle could give diminishing returns (or, worse, it's when you think you're going faster when you're actually slowing down). You need a lot of discipline to push on the throttle the right way.

And if you succeed, the reward is great!

Salvo

Another Friday, another set.
This time I had to adjust a bit as the 50m lanes have been changed to 25 for some weekend event.

Firstly I have increased pace by 8s/100 but that proved to be too much as I was slightly behind already at second round. So increased the speed just by 4s/100 and continued strong from there for 6 solid successful rounds. Feels great to be able to pull through the entire set! But set the beeper wrongly (i.e. too fast) and everything can be ruined. At least for me, to be behind the beep is a huge psychological turn down.

IM speed was thus 1:40/100, 25m lane.

It seems you're having good progress, Adrian, well done! So friday is endurance session day. What kind of sessions are you doing in the other days? My typical week is: one endurance session (usually Red Mist or Gerry's set), one css session (favourite sets: Goldilocks, 30x100, 10x200), one usrpt session (where I usually swim at 200-400m pace, not faster). If I get to swim a 4th day, that 4th session is an easier technique session where I experiment different gears or new stuff. The easier weeks are structured like this, same intensity but less yardage (and sometimes a video recording).

Salvo

Thanks Salvo!
Well, I cannot compare the today's session with previous as length changed. But happy that I managed to push through to the end.

I swim 4 times per week:
- Tuesday evening (with the squad): this is another endurance set, we started with 25x100m, then went up in distance to sets of 200m, 300 and now we are doing 3x1000. The breaks are longer (1 min or bit longer) and the purpose is to swim them all at same maximum possible speed.
- Friday morning: Gerry's set or pink/red mist set
- Saturday: I usually try to do a CSS set of 8x200. Lately it felt quite hard and instead of increasing the beep interval, I have replaced it with some easy swimming, focusing on body position.
- Sunday: The second session with the squad: this is a mixed set, technique, some maximum speed 50s, then some longer distances using accessories (paddles, fins etc).

In total 12-15 km per week.

I had a very rewarding Red Mist today. I did it with TT in mode 3 (metronome) to train the ability to hold a steady SR and SPL and steady turns (ie steady pace too) for a given amount of time. Someone calls this neural threshold training.

Given my current css=1:33/100m, a classic Red Mist would be
4x400 at 1:39/100m
3x400 at 1:38/100m
2x400 at 1:37/100m
1x400 at 1:36/100m

I instead designed my set like this:
7x400 at TT=61SPM, committing to 20SPL for a pace of 1:38.3/100m
2x400 at TT=62SPM, committing to 20SPL for a pace of 1:36.7/100m
1x400 w/o TT, just swim by feel and try to finish in 6:24 (ie pace 1:36)

I succeeded by holding steady 20SPL all the time (sometimes 19SPL) including the last rep and finishing slighty ahead of target time on every rep.

TT in mode 3 on Red Mist sets helps a lot: it keeps me more engaged and gives me an instant feedback in case I'm slowing down (any less effective stroke is detected immediately, hard to explain but it is). So if I do the maths beforehand and choose the right TT settings and the right SPL to commit to, I win. Actually I win twice because not only I hit the target times, but I usually do it with a better form (because of the instant feedbacks I never get left too far behind and then have to rush to catch up).

The other way I like to do the Red Mist sets is with TT in lap mode to beep every 100m (not 25). This tests pacing skills, and it's usually harder than the previous version because in 100m you can slow down quite a lot without noticing and then have to catch up.

I find both versions very effective. The "neural threshold" version is better to train good technique and focus, the classic version is better to train pacing skills and it's a more reliable test. The most reliable test would be to swim a full Red Mist w/o TT. I usually got worse results when I tried: in the end I think we all need to be challenged by something (a TT, another swimmer, a shark) in order to give our best.

Salvo

Looks great way of doing a red mist.
For tempo after a warm up in squad we will do with TT sometimes at 25 50 or 100 pace 2x100 at css , 2x200 at CSS then 1x200 without TT to finish at CSS and repeat as time allows.
Woody

Excellent, Salvo. It seems that your swimming is going very well.

Did I understand right? You are also manually counting strokes for each lap
while you try to stay with the beep for every stroke? This is a challenge in itself.

Hi Adrian, yes: I manually count SPL on each lap. I got used to do it long time ago and it became second nature, I always do it automatically. It's a good way to keep track of form in general. SPL should keep quite steady during a set. Actually I also count the number of beeps (5) during turn and pushoff in order to exactly match my target pace. At these slowish rates (61-62SPM) I could turn&pushoff in 4 beeps, but when I have to swim 4k I prefer to take it easier and allow me 5 beeps. Also counting beeps during turn&pushoff becomes natural with some training. And it's a good way to assess the quality of your turns.

Salvo

That's neat. I tried to do it today too, was able to count for the first 2km then I needed to focus on staying with the beep and counting the laps .
Resumed the counting towards the end.
So I was 21-22 most of the time, slipping to 23-24 in the end.

So today it went better than last week. I think this due to the fact that I skipped the weight training from Wed.

My first red mist. Started a bit too fast, needed to adjust the beeper by 1s/100 up after 3rd 400, but after that it went fine. Somewhere in the middle, I started to feel that it's not possible to finish on time but out of nowhere I got this idea that I should focus on the pull, i.e. strong pull, no slippage. And it worked! Was able then to finish all the remaining 400s on time.

Very good Adrian! Same here, the worst enemy in the final stage of a Red Mist (or a 4k ow swim) is water slippage, so the best thing to focus on is keeping DPS and resist the urge to increase SR ineffectly (because tired) to keep the pace.

Salvo

I hope it is not a fad as it usually is for me with sudden swim "discoveries".
I did not dare to count the strokes I must do it next time to make sure that
I was actually able to keep the SPL towards the end of the 4k.

I thought IM was an individual medley part of that set.  But what does Iron Man pace mean?  I'm assuming it is the pace for swim part of an Iron Man race?  Having looked at this thread, I think that you are not putting enough long slow swimming into your swim training.  Not 'sloppy easy' but very very long slow swimming, which is not that easy to do, but is at a low heart rate, this seems to assist with recovery and adaptation.  And adaptation is the key.  Try putting flippers and paddles on, swim 5x400, as slow as you can with longest stroke you can.  Breath with long exhalations.  Don't take long rests, try not to think too much about split times, try to concentrate on long strokes throughout, do a SPL every once in a while to be sure you're doing it right, but get into your zen swim.  Do some contrast therapy in sauna/cold shower.  Stretching in sauna.  Your body will adapt quicker to your very hard swim training that you are doing.

Yes, IM means the pace for a 3.8km swim as part of Iron Man triathlon distance.
I actually also do slow swimming as you describe in some squad trainings. And many times we use paddles and fins, so checked .

This morning did another Gary's set, up to 4k. Went fine but the SPL increased towards the end, still able to keep ahead of beep by increasing SR.

swimcoachingblogger wrote:I thought IM was an individual medley part of that set.  But what does Iron Man pace mean?  I'm assuming it is the pace for swim part of an Iron Man race?  Having looked at this thread, I think that you are not putting enough long slow swimming into your swim training.  Not 'sloppy easy' but very very long slow swimming, which is not that easy to do, but is at a low heart rate, this seems to assist with recovery and adaptation.  And adaptation is the key.  Try putting flippers and paddles on, swim 5x400, as slow as you can with longest stroke you can.  Breath with long exhalations.  Don't take long rests, try not to think too much about split times, try to concentrate on long strokes throughout, do a SPL every once in a while to be sure you're doing it right, but get into your zen swim.  Do some contrast therapy in sauna/cold shower.  Stretching in sauna.  Your body will adapt quicker to your very hard swim training that you are doing.

Pleased to meet you swimcoachingblogger. I really appreciated your blog and it's an honour to have you here (how did you find this small forum by the way??)

So, long slow swimming school vs short fast swimming school (eg USRPT fans). What's better for adult distance wannabe swimmers according to you? Do you agree with this article

http://www.tri-guru.com/art5.htm

or do you believe it's better to first build a solid aerobic basement and then build speed up on it?

Also, you're suggesting to concentrate on long strokes (on these aerobic sets at least) but you also suggested somewhere else that catch-up style is for super human kickers: should the average Joe try to stretch on these long slow sets but revert to a shorter stroke when swimming faster? Is this the contrast therapy (sauna/cold shower)?

Cheers,
Salvo