RunningAHEAD - Topic: new group member introductions

ironTriKev

IronMan ;)

posted: 5/6/2009 at 6:54 PM

Hey Chris, I'm glad you found this forum. Thanks for the link to the 0-1 mile swim plan. If anyone is interested I have been using the swimplan.com website. It is free and helps me with new swim workouts keeps thing fresh Wink

Tri-Kev Here are my favorite links:
My "kick @ss" running club ;)

Swim 2.4 miles.
Ride 112 miles.
Run 26.2 miles.
Then brag for the rest of your life.
-Commander John Collins, Ironman Triathlon creator

wyerock

posted: 5/18/2009 at 10:10 PM

I just started swimming in January so I could do triathlons. I have easy access to a pool so I also thought it would help maintain fitness and give me something to do in addition to running. I knew how to swim before, but other than jumping in the water, the most I swam was when I was 10 (20 years ago) and the lifeguard made us swim across the pool before letting us use the diving board. So in my adult life, I started out struggling to swim 25 yards, coughing and inhaling water the whole way. Now I can swim a good distance, but its slow and inefficient, and I can't find an instructor or class (I should probably look harder though). I watched a TI video (Freestyle made easy), but without feedback, it hasn't helped enough. I'm doing about 2:15/100 yards, although I can sprint 100 in 1:40 (and then suck wind). I probably stroke 30-40 times in 25 yards, and just a little less when I sprint. Still working on efficiently incorporating my legs into the swim. I'll be swimming MWF for a while, since I have foolishly signed up for Ironman 70.3 Augusta. I can do the distance in the pool (along with touching the sides every 25 yards for an extra big breath), but have never done open water. Any tips or suggestions on training are greatly appreciated!

Slo

posted: 5/19/2009 at 9:10 AM

Cory Welocme to the world of Triathlon. If you watched the TI swimming DVD then you know swimming is about technique. I think the video and book says something like 20% fitness, 80% technique. No 1 Peice of advice........if you can get any instructuion at all get it! There has got to be a high school swim coach or someone around......a neigboring town....a tri-club.....it's worth a drive or two to get a couple of lessons. - Work on the drills. Forget about distance or speed. DRILLS DRILLS DRILLS and when your tired of Drills......then you can move onto more drills. I'll give some more on this in a later post. - You Tube has some great video of solid swimming techniques. -TI preaches balance......if your as new as you say......then work on the balance drills first. After 4 years of swimming I feel like I'm just now beginning to realize my swimming self. The improvements I have made this year are astounding. As you continue to work on your form you will have "Break Thru" moments that will propell you into the next phase of becoming a swimmer. It ain't like running or biking. It ain't intuitive. Everything about swimming effieciently is counter intutive to our survival instincts. And finally.....open water swimming is nothing like swimming in a pool. And open water swimming in a Triathlon.......well, I hope your comfortable in the water Wink

Good Luck, buckle down, train hard !

wyerock

posted: 5/19/2009 at 12:54 PM

Yeah, I've got a sprint tri (750m swim) May 30, so I'll be finding out real soon if open water is going to drown me! Really, I think I'll survive any swim, its just a matter of optimizing it so I have energy for the rest of the race. As for an instructor, I was hoping to find a class, because I "learn" a lot better if I can be shown something and then left alone to try it and practice. Working one-on-one with someone is going to stress me out, but it may be my only option here.

Slo

posted: 5/20/2009 at 9:28 AM
modified: 5/20/2009 at 9:29 AM

Cory There were two things I wanted to get back you on. Your stroke count and Drills. Your stroke count is way off. You should be around 18 - 22 for 25 yards. This is due, most likely to two things, your catch and your effiency. Do you know if your pulling with a straight arm or a bent arm ? Anyway........I have a ZIP file of an E-Book that Endurance Nation was giving out for free last year. Incorporated into the book are video clip examples of the drills they talk about. Personally I have had great success by following the first set of drills. I checked at Endurance Nation and this book is no longer available......some others are......anyway.....I'm not sure how to get a 25 meg file in your hands. Maybe another reader can help. (My email limits the size I can send)

ironTriKev

IronMan ;)

posted: 5/20/2009 at 10:41 AM
modified: 5/20/2009 at 10:53 AM

could you maybe post it to Google docs? I'd love to see this as well Smile

MTA: I found this online for $19.00 if this is the same one and Slo_Hand recommends I'm going to get it: http://www.endurancenation.us/store/resources/ebooks_swim.php

Tri-Kev Here are my favorite links:
My "kick @ss" running club ;)

Swim 2.4 miles.
Ride 112 miles.
Run 26.2 miles.
Then brag for the rest of your life.
-Commander John Collins, Ironman Triathlon creator

Slo

posted: 5/20/2009 at 11:00 AM

Tri-Kev Looks like the new and improved version of what I got. I checked google docs....I don't have an account an have a busy week so I'm not sure when I could get it uploaded. I didn't see where they had a size limitation.

ironTriKev

IronMan ;)

posted: 5/20/2009 at 11:11 AM

Thanks, for $19 I think I'll by the latest version, man I could use the help Roll eyes

Tri-Kev Here are my favorite links:
My "kick @ss" running club ;)

Swim 2.4 miles.
Ride 112 miles.
Run 26.2 miles.
Then brag for the rest of your life.
-Commander John Collins, Ironman Triathlon creator

Slo

posted: 5/20/2009 at 11:32 AM

I'm a bull headed SOB at times and doing the drills as recommended just didn't seem worth while so I continued to hammer out lap after lap. I finally decided to follow the plan. I went from swimming a 1 mile TT last year in 36 mins to swimming a casual 1 mile last week in 32 mins. I've taken 9 - 10 secs off my 100yd sprints. Let me know your thoughts. I may follow suit as I'm sure the free version is just fodder. The description you linked to covers more material than what I have.

wyerock

posted: 5/20/2009 at 8:27 PM
modified: 5/20/2009 at 8:29 PM

I'd really like to see the first version of their e-book. If its good, I can I always pay for the new version. A casual mile in 32 minutes would be awesome. I checked Google Docs and they have limits on PDFs of 10MB and other file types are smaller. Gmail is limited to 20MB. I found a reference to sharing sites, but I've never tried them: http://www.divshare.com/ http://mihd.net/ http://www.quicksharing.com/ If you have WinZip or WinRAR, you could try splitting it in two files. I started checking out some of the drills at http://GoSwim.tv, but I think I'm going to need feedback from a person. The lifeguards at the pool are all 18 year old girls that talk on the phone constantly (nice to look at, but no help on swim technique). I found out that "Masters" swimming is not like running--its for 19+ years old. They meet during work hours, but I may look into it to see if its an environment that would help (but would mean $38/yr dues + $25/month for a small window of swimming time (5:45-7:15 MW/1:00-2:00M-R)). I also know I need to go back to the TI video and repeat all the balance stuff. I worked on a bunch today and was shocked that I managed to put in 1300 yards--when I started in January a 15 min workout of 250 yards was my limit.

ironTriKev

IronMan ;)

posted: 5/21/2009 at 8:40 AM

Since the PDF file has imbedded video, I don't think you can split it up into multiple files. the new version of the ebook is a whopping ~114MB!. I'm finding it fairly useful, and think it might just be worth the $19.99 I paid. the video quality is not exactly HD but is sufficient to get the message across.

Tri-Kev Here are my favorite links:
My "kick @ss" running club ;)

Swim 2.4 miles.
Ride 112 miles.
Run 26.2 miles.
Then brag for the rest of your life.
-Commander John Collins, Ironman Triathlon creator

Slo

posted: 5/21/2009 at 9:02 AM

Yep, I'm not saavy enough to split it up. 25M to 114M.....Yep, betcha I'm missing some stuff. $20 bucks is a cheap price to pay if you get anything at all from it.

Batensmack

Beware, batbear...

posted: 5/27/2009 at 1:36 PM

Hi there. I'm Batensmack. I am a theatre artist and educator trying to get into serious shape. I was running for a few months but went at it too hard and broke down. Now I'm swimming and loving it. I will introduce running again to my regime in a week or two, but for now (5/27) just swimming. I really like the Running Ahead forums better than anything I've found on swimming, so I'm hoping this discussion group can help me stay motivated to swim as much as the running forum motivated me to run!

2014 Goal -- Run 5X per week, pain-free (relatively) by end of summer.

Slo

posted: 5/27/2009 at 3:40 PM

Hey Batensmack,

Welcome......

This is a pretty quiet forum. Sorry to hear about your injury.......they say there are two types of runners, those that have been injured and those that will be injured.......luckily for me, any injuries I may have had have never been serious and never kept me away for two long.

I took up swimming close to 4 years ago and fell in love with it. It was quite a battle at first but I was determined to get the stroke down. I'm still learning and still making improvements. Generally I swim 3 days a week.

Don't hesitate to start a new thread if you have questions or comments about anything....I'd love to see a little more activity here.

Carl A

posted: 5/27/2009 at 4:42 PM

Welcome, Josh. Good job in switching to swimming instead of sitting around waiting for the injury to heal.

Although I've enjoyed increasing my running mileage this spring, I've missed swimming. I need to find a way to do both.

Steve, E7sus4 is a beautiful chord. Did you pick it for a reason?

Speed my steps along your path, according to your will.

Swimmers

new group member introductions (Read 506 times)