While the majority of your off-season training will be in the pool, that shouldn’t limit you to hundreds of repetitive lengths up and down. There are many sessions and scenarios we can create to help you stay focused on open water competitions, despite your surroundings [see the box opposite for how to structure a session]. Within your pool sessions you can also incorporate regular testing
so you can gauge your progress more scientifically than comparing a certain race year-on-year, where conditions differ and race courses may be longer or shorter. I usually put in a few benchmarks for swimmers to help them
evaluate: these guides provide markers as to whether more fitness can be accommodated or if more technique should be incorporated. If progress is not being made, knowing what each session brings to your plan allows for analysis and changes can be made. Perhaps the volume of fitness training you are doing isn’t suitable and needs to increase or decrease, be made easier or harder.
During a particular training phase you may, for example, have one session per week dedicated to technique. If you are not making progress then maybe we would adjust the weekly schedule to promote two sessions that included a lot more technique or at least what I refer to as technical-endurance sessions. These are long swims at a speed that enables you to maintain good technique. We also punctuate the swims with frequent reminders about good technique between lengths, at the start of the length and maybe at the end. Using the lane rope is very useful as a technical zone: as you hit the red section focus on working a few skills, breaking up the monotony of the lengths. As to how many sessions you do or plan to undertake, this depends a litle on what you plan to race, your background as an athlete, family, work and social commitments. For example, if you plan to swim the Channel next year then you really need to explore with your family and your boss if this is the right time. Are you ready for the high demands on your time needed to build up to swimming the 21 miles needed to get you to France?
ALLOW THE BODY TO ADAPT TO A SUITABLE OVERLOAD OF TRAINING AND BUILD
TOWARDS GETTING FITTER 37
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