TECHNIQUE
STRENGTH TRAINING
In 2006, the Korean National Swim Team upped their number of weekly strength training sessions from one
to four, to see what the effect would be on performance. The 12 athletes were assessed for body composition, anaerobic power, agility, maximal strength, and jump height at the start of the experiment and aſter three and six months. The experiment was controversial as popular opinion over the history of swimming training said that weight training slowed swimmers down as muscle mass created negative buoyancy. However, the results of the Korean research were impressive. Aſter their increased sessions – four hours, tapering down to two before competitions – the athletes swept the table at various events. At the Asian Games in the December of that year they set eight personal, four Korean and two pan-Asian records. Clearly the received wisdom was wrong. Strength training could and does help the swimmer to race faster and to win. The Korean swimmers may have been the best in their country, but anyone can make improvements with the same methods. And you don’t have to dedicate four hours a week to pumping iron in a gym like they did. You can achieve many of the same benefits at home using cheap and simple equipment.
BUILDING STRENGTH AND SPEED The types of strength that can be improved by weight training are strength endurance, which is your muscles’ ability to produce force over a prolonged period of time (like in rowing, running and cycling); elastic strength, the muscles’ ability to produce a large force quickly in a short period of time (like in jumping, punching or throwing); and maximum strength, which is the maximum force the muscles can produce in one contraction and is used for strong-man training.
precious training time on land rather than in water is tough, but the pay-off can be huge. Gerald Smith explains how a few simple strength exercises can boost your swim speed and reduce injuries
PUMP Persuading swimmers to spend some of their The important thing to know is what type of change you
want to experience from strength training. The kind of strength you will gain depends on how many repetitions you perform, the intensity and how long you rest for between sets. For instance, if you wanted to train for maximum strength you would liſt 80-90 percent of your maximum strength between three and six times, then rest for three minutes per set, while for strength endurance you might liſt 30 percent of your maximum strength 15- 20 times and rest for 30-45 seconds. As an open water swimmer, you need to improve strength endurance, but you can also use resistance training to reduce injury risk, especially to your shoulders. As consistency in training is so important, reducing time off because of injury can make a significant difference to long-term performance.
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