Wednesday, February 28, 2007

T-10 Seconds and Counting

Coach Mike Ricci of D3 Multisports has a plan to help me cross the finish line at Ironman Louisville in August. A major component of that plan is preparing me for the rigors of completing a 2.4 mile swim and enabling me to finish the swim with plenty of energy for the balance of the race. While it has been voiced by a certain member of the Tri Blog Community that "it's all about the bike," failing to make the swim cutoff and/or being physically exhausted after the swim can make the bike somewhat irrelevant.

The past six weeks have been part of an eight week swim focus designed to improve my ability to complete long swims. Prior to Mike becoming my official coach, I completed a four week session at his suggestion and saw dramatic improvement. Given the success of that program, I was willing to tackle this more intense and more guided eight week plan.

In the first week of the program, I completed a time trial to determine my "T-pace," which is used for setting time requirements during swim workouts. At that time, I was averaging around 2m 11s per 100 yards. While far from Olympic pace, that showed the value of the first four weeks, as earlier in 2006 I averaged around 2m 30s per 100 yards.

The past two days have had interval sets based on that T-pace. In general, I've found the 2:11 pace to be exceedingly slow. Most of the intervals I've been completing in the 2:00 range. While a time trial is needed to get an accurate number, it looks as if my T-pace has dropped by another 10 seconds or so. That would mean an improvement of nearly 30 seconds since the end of October.

For those who have been interested in the results of these exercises, that should provide sufficient motivation to consider your own swim focus. To put that in perspective, if the improvement is only 20 seconds per 100 yards, I'll be able to get out of the water 14 minutes faster. If I can maintain the 30 second improvement over the course, I'll have an extra 21 minutes.

And Mike's real goal is also being realized. I can maintain that pace for longer distances and come out of the water feeling better. This means more energy for the bike and run. And those are disciplines I can rock.

8 comments:

Danielle in Iowa in Ireland said...

Wow, 30 seconds! You give me hope! :-) No, if only I would actually put in the pool hours more regularly :-)

Bigun said...

you do rock - awesome focus there IP - I just wrote a little clip with you partly in mind...

Way to go with breaking 2:00 - that's got to feel good after all that time spend in the pool. You deserve it!

Spokane Al said...

That is an amazing, awesome improvement. Like others have said, you also give me hope as well.

TriDaddy said...

If it were truly about the bike, people would just do duathlons. Triathlon is really ALL ABOUT THE SWIM. It's what makes the sport sexy compared to duathlon, cycling, or running. While its the shortest in time and distance, no one fears the bike or run nearly as much as the first few minutes of the swim. Triathlon is all about the swim.

Iron Pol said...

Oooh, Tri-Daddy! And people think Bolder is going to kill me for saying it isn't ALL about the bike.

Of course, you did your IM swim in, what, like 48 minutes.

That's what I keep telling Bold. A 30 minute lead is pretty major as I see it.

Michelle said...

Rock on! I love the swim.

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