Workout Wednesday: First One Ever!
Photo: Helen Cogan Photography
Welcome to the inaugural workout Wednesday and also who doesn't love alliteration! Every Wednesday I will post a swim workout for you to try. These are workouts that I have either tried myself or have given to my athletes. Some weeks the workout will be for the open water, others will be for the pool and some will even be for both! Please share these with your swimmer and triathlete friends! Be sure to leave your thoughts on the workouts in the comments section if you give them a try. I would love to hear your thoughts on each workout along with any modifications, variations or improvements that you made to them! Enough talk, let's swim!
Open Water Fartlek Session!
Today’s workout is designed to help you learn how to swim at various paces throughout a swim. This is a very important skill to have in both open water races and triathlon swims. Swims are not done at the same pace from start to finish. At different points in the race you may pick up the pace to try to drop a swimmer or to catch up to a faster swimmer to draft off. This is the perfect workout to help you improve this skill and really understand how to pick up the pace, recover briefly and then jump back into that fast pace. When swimming open water, please remember to never go alone and always wear a bright cap or buoy to tow so boats and people can see you. It doesn’t matter how good you are, always be cautious and never go alone!
Don't forget to have fun!
Warm Up:
10 minutes to 15 minutes of swimming. You should try to do the warm up you plan to do on race day.
*This is a great opportunity to really hone in on a race day warm up routine that works for you and gets you ready to swim fast!
Main Set:
30 minutes of continuous swimming following the pattern of 2:00 hard then 1:00 cruise.
For the first 2 cycles of 2:00 hard/1:00 cruise the hard should be the same effort you start your race at.
After the first 2 cycles, the 2:00 hard will become 2:00 at goal race effort followed by 1:00 cruise. Follow this pattern for the remainder of the 30 minutes.
1:00-2:00 rest
10x: 30 strokes all out/30 strokes easy or drill
Cool Down
5 minutes to 10 minutes of light swimming focusing on technique.
Please leave your questions, comments and suggestions to modify the workout in the comments below and don’t forget to share the fun with your friends!