Monday Workout 1-21

Monday Afternoon at Calvin College

Yesterday, we had another great effort by our team.  There are more complicated ways of describing the energy systems being used, but I told the team I wanted an hour of fast/ez swimming, two ends of the spectrum, and nothing in between.  I have gone away from traditional lactate sets like the 6 X 100's on 8-10 minutes or 4 X 200 as I have noticed that although the team gives it there all, the last 3 rounds are not very "fast."  They hurt a lot, and people throw up from time to time, but the actual speeds are not close to what we are trying to do in meets.  My goal is to set up the workout so that we can accumulate as much meaningful fast swims as possible where the speed, tempo, and enthusiasm mimic a meet situation.  It is also important to note that you need to give your athletes adaquate time between these type of workouts so the body and mind can respond properly, we will do this type of set twice a week.

To start, we did 10 minutes of dynamic stretching with poles and mats, 10 minutes of boxing with a partner (this could be the best thing we do), and 10 minutes of Med balls both light (10 lbs. and heavy 40 lbs.)  We do some power cleans with a throws that work really well.

About a 1000 yards to warmup after that, nothing fancy:

Main Set:

6 rounds:

4 X 25 @ 20 (1st 25 from dive)

100 EZ @ 2 minutes or there abouts

2 X 50 @ 45 

100 EZ @ 2 minutes or there abouts

1 X 100 @ 1:30 FR with fins & paddles

100 EZ @ 2:30ish

Notes:

* I had my strokes/IM's do the 1st 25 and both 50's stroke as it made sense in their event lineup.

* The 25's were extremely fast, almost everyone was under race pace speeds, this is the 100 that the team said hurt the most as well.

* The 50's were all P200 or better except for a few that were really cooking.

* The 100's swum very well also, most of the team was right near dual meet times.

* 1800 yards of very fast swimming