The pool temperature had been out of control for four weeks, only dropping below 30°C (86° F.). for four days out of thirty. It was difficult being constantly frustrated by excuses which had already long run their course, the problem having intermittently recurred since the pool fire six months ago. (Remember the pool fire?) Casuals…
Though there are few things as enjoyable to any swimmer as wearing brand new goggles for the first time, finding the right goggles for new and intermediate swimmers is usually a process of trial and error. Most people visit the local sports shop and pick something from the available range. This works to a large extent…
Many swimmers are often confused about how to write a basic pool set. Many experienced but younger swimmers from a club background had become accustomed to having a coach always provide their sets, without ever needing to understand for themselves what the coach is trying to achieve or why a particular set is used on a particular…
We’ve spoken before about the importance of stroke rate in open water swimming, especially in cold water to maintain body temperature through thermogenesis and to help in rough water, where a slower stroke rate can be overwhelmed. It’s also the case that realising that stroke rate was important was something that didn’t happen immediately for…
It’s a long time since I mentioned this subject but we do need to talk about this. Really. Do you shower before swimming in an (indoor)? If not, why not? Do you pee in the pool? In two UK and US studies, 1 in 5 adults admitted they have and in the UK study 70%…
A long time ago I wrote a couple of posts about lane swimming and lane etiquette. They regularly pick up ongoing viewers and have been read and maybe even used by a share of swimmers. Recently Simon Griffiths, editor of H2Open magazine, dropped the links into H2Open’s weekly email newsletter. He shortly received a Mr Angry…
This post is one of a combined series of triathlon swim articles with Evan Morrison. Evan is a top American open water and marathon swimmer who holds several long distance records including Santa Barbara and the Ederle marathon swims. His article considers some common mistakes people make while pool swim training (not technique errors) and how to improve.…
Over the past few years, the first proper long pool swim of the winter usually turns out to be tougher than expected, and almost always with some discovery or other, though I’ve long been of the opinion that every single long swim teaches you something, even if that is only a re-affirmation of the difficulty,…
100 x 100 is probably the most famous of all distance swimming sessions. Metres of course, for my measurementally-challenged American friends. Systéme Internationale anyone?Ten fingers, ten toes, ten …. 🙂 Anyway the elegant variation is 100 x 100 x 100, that is, one hundred metres, one hundred times, each time on one hundred seconds, i.e.…
I’ve mentioned before that regular icing is a great way to address the knots and aches that build up in a swimmer’s body when they are doing regular hard training. For myself these start to occur once I start to regularly go to 25,000 metres a week and over. I’ve also mentioned the tennis ball…
This post and the subsequent Part Two post should not be construed as medical advice. This is another example of how I deal with something related to swimming, in which I have made mistakes and learned and adapted and which may be instructive or useful as advice or warning. Throughout the two articles I will…
Courtesy of another question. Though as Julie Galloway pointed out in her interview yesterday on Daily news of Open Water Source, we (Irish) call them togs not costume or swimsuit. And we never knew we were different! This applies mainly to chlorine, which eats the nylon/lycra mix. We’ve all been there. One day you are…
I know I posted a version of this a year ago (or so). So here’s an updated version with some more information on it. My sister mentioned the other day that it looked like I was writing code occasionally, and I guess I am, but it’s not a secret code. This is the “code” of…
Just thought (since I’ve posted nothing all week) that I’d post this useful training zone chart to follow-up the metabolic energy storage and use stuff that I posted last week. Cross reference your age, to the level of exercise you wish to do (endurance for many of us, with some threshold and maximum effort also). These…
Following a previous rant on the subject of lane swimming, I decided to do a quick explanation of lane swimming etiquette. None of this is original to me, these are the rules that club and lane swimmers around the world follow, but which seem a mystery to everyone else. The result is the site’s most popular article, and since…
by Bill Sweetenham & John Atkinson. Sweetenham is the coach behind the Australian swimming success and the recent edition of this book has a foreword by Ian Thorpe. I bought an older edition but it’s a very good competitive swimming book. The book is in 2 parts, I Techniques & Drills, and II Workouts &…
LoneSwimmer 