Nationals in a few days...all about pacing and them splits

All right, in two days I'll be on the plane to Arizona for USMS Spring Nationals!

One of the key themes this season in the NCAP senior prep practices that I go to has been pacing, primarily 200 pacing with some 500 pacing thrown in there. The idea is that you figure out what that pacing feels like in practice, so you can then turn around and swim that pace in a meet, rather than just showing up to race and having no idea what pace you’ll go.

Sure, you can have two swimmers who go a 2:00 in the 200 free, for example, but they might split their races very differently. In practice, Swimmer A would figure out how they’d need to pace their race and what their splits should be for each 50. Ditto for Swimmer B. Let’s say Swimmer A splits his 2:00 200 free as 28.0, 29.5, 31.0, 31.5. In practice, se should know what that 28.0 feels like, what the 29.5 feels like, and so on. And not only know what it feels like, but be able to consistently swim that time in practice when he’s supposed to be swimming that pace. Before his race at a meet, he knows exactly how he’s going to swim the race; during the race, he knows approximately how it’s going as he’s swimming it, since he knows what his desired splits feel like.

That’s the whole idea behind the pace work we’ve been doing all season and it’s a concept I wholeheartedly support both as a swimmer and as a coach!

Like I mentioned earlier, we’ve been working on pacing a lot in practice, and I’m mostly pretty happy with how I’ve done with 200 pacing for the various strokes. Here’s how I’m hoping to split my races by 50, in order, at Nationals barring any injuries or meltdowns. These are all ballpark target times, so if I've got a 37.5 listed, for example, but actually go a 37.1 or a 37.9, I won't mind. If I go a 38.5, on the other hand...

200 Breast

33.0, 37.5, 38.5, 40.5 for a target time of 2:29.5. As points of reference, here are my two most recent fast 200 breast splits:

• 2018 Spring Nationals: 32.7, 37.4, 39.5, 41.3 for a 2:31.0
• March 2019 meet: 33.5, 37.9, 40.3, 41.4 for a 2:33.3 

I’ve been working on my middle 100 pacing for this and last Thursday I did two of ‘em (I did 2 x (1 x 100 at pace and a 50 easy, together on 3:00) and was 1:19 on the first one and 1:18 on the second one. Given that I’m aiming for a 1:16 on the middle 100, a 1:18 in practice is right there, given that I’ll be shaved, suited, and amped up during the race itself compared to practice.

I also think I’ll be able to swim it smarter than I have in the past—I get my speed in breaststroke from the underwater pullout, but up until the past few weeks, I consistently stayed underwater too long in the 200, which brought up lots of oxygen deprivation issues on the back half of the race. I’ve been working the past few weeks on shortening my pullout a bit for the 200, which has paid off in not dying as bad in practice.

100 Free

25.8, 28.5 for a target time of 54.3. As a point of comparison, the last time I did this shaved and tapered was back in 2017, I split 26.0 and 28.6 for a 54.6. As another point of comparison, my real* lifetime PR is a 54.4 from when I was an age grouper. My official lifetime PR is a 52.8 as an age grouper, but I’m pretty sure that was a timing glitch since I never broke 54.4 before or after that errant 52.8.

I haven’t been doing any real 100 free training this season, I only entered this event because Nathan Adrian had said he was going to swim at USMS Nationals prior to his cancer diagnosis and I wanted to “race” him. I also haven’t been doing any 100 pace training during my taper and don’t plan to over these last few days before I swim it on Friday, so who knows how I’ll actually split it! 😊

200 Fly

30.7, 36.0, 36.5, 36.5 for a 2:19.7. As a point of comparison, my Masters PR, and the last time I actually raced the 200 fly, was from 2017 (noticeably, not a shaved and tapered meet with splits of 31.4, 36.0, 37.4, 37.7 for a 2:22.6.

I’ve actually been having issues in practice during my taper so far with going too fast on my fly pace work. Last Thursday I did 3 pace 50s fly and then the same 100 pace/50 easy set I did for breast. I was :35, :34, :35 for the 50s, then 1:13 on both 100s. I would love to be able to hold those paces at the meet, but since I haven’t really done any 200 fly training until the last month or so, I don’t know if I have the aerobic base to do that without having one of my more epic meltdowns on the last 50. I did two more pace 50s on Saturday at the end of practice and way waaaay too fast on the first one with a :32, but managed to slow it down to a :35 on the second one. Frankly, it feels like I'm holding way too far back to go a :35, so I really don't know what to really expect at the meet.

200 Back

31.2, 34.2, 34.5, 34.5 for a 2:14.6. As a point of comparison, my 200 back from Nationals last year had splits of 31.4, 34.6, 35.0, 35.4 for a 2:16.6.

My backstroke is a big question mark right now. The stroke feels pretty good in the water, but my times aren’t there. I’ve been holding anywhere from :34-:36 on pace 50s during my taper, and my pace 100s have been from 1:09-1:12. Unlike with any of my other strokes, I haven’t been able to nail down a consistent pace. I’m hoping it’ll iron itself out over the last few practices of my taper, but so far, meh.

200 IM

29.0, 34.2, 38.7, 32.1 for a 1:14.0. As a point of reference, my last shaved and tapered 200 IM was in 2017 with splits of 29.3, 35.0, 38.7, 32.1 for a 2:15.2.

I haven’t done any 200 IM pacing per se during my taper, but we did some great 200 IM sets a couple months ago. My big problem has historically been primarily that I go too slow on the backstroke leg. The 200 IM set we did a few times was a number of 150 IMs, dropping the fly, with the goal of swimming around the same time as the equivalent 150 split in your meet 200 IM. For me, my best meet split is a 1:46 for the back-breast-free portion. During the set, I was holding 1:43s and 1:44s, so I *should* be able to actually swim faster than my target splits listed above if I can get it through my head to hammer the backstroke leg instead of hold back a bit like I habitually do.

200 Free

27.5, 30.0, 31.0, 31.5 for a 2:00.0. As a point of comparison, my last shaved and tapered 200 free was in 2017 and I had splits of 28.5, 31.0, 32.0, 32.8 for a 2:04.5.

Ok, this one is pretty ambitious, especially for being the last of 6 events at the meet, but *should* be theoretically feasible. My problem in the past with this race has been holding back too much on the front half. I did the same set of 50s and 100s in practice on Thursday and was holding :30s and :31s on the 50s, and a 1:02 and 1:03 on the 100s.

Even more ambitious, looking up my results from back in the day, my lifetime PR is a 2:00.3. I know I generally swim much smarter these days than I did as an age grouper, but I’ll be pretty amused if I set a lifetime PR in freestyle, of all strokes, in my 30s! :-D

2019 Zones recap--last meet before Nationals!

I swam at the local Masters championship meet this past weekend, the 2019 Colonies Zone SCY Championship at George Mason University.

Since I've been doing my focus events (all the 200s) at meets throughout the season, I only signed up to race non-focus events at this meet to change it up and help me not set unrealistic standards a few weeks out from Nats. I've done that before, when I used to swim the same lineup at Zones that I was going to do at Nationals a few weeks later, and had some performances that got in my head when I didn't swim as well as I wanted, so by not doing *any* of the same events at both meets, I nicely side stepped that issue entirely!

I'll get into the event recaps next, but first I want to go over the major fiasco of the meet, the tech suit situation.

For some context, every year before Nationals (except for this one), I've ordered a bunch of different tech suits, tried 'em all on, then kept the one that fit the best to wear for Nats and returned the rest. Last year, out of the 8 I tried on, I really liked how two of them fit, so I kept both, wore one for Nats, and decided to save the other one to wear for Zones this year and next year. In case anyone is interested, the two suits I kept last year were the A3 Performance VICI and the Finis Rival. I wore the VICI at Nats last year and it was my in-season suit this year, and I broke out the Rival for this meet.

For the first time in 8+ years, I've been consistently lifting in the weight room for the past 5 months or so, and as a result, I've put on a noticeable amount of muscle mass in my legs. That came back to bit me in the heinie, more on that below...

I also didn't taper at all besides dropping a 50 here and there my last practice before the meet, and still kept with heavy workouts in the weight room on Monday and Wednesday. I've been swimming pretty tired and heavy in the water lately, which is right where I want to be before starting my 1.5 week taper for Nats, but I wasn't sure how that'd affect me for the meet.

Friday

1000 Free

I swam the 1000 on Friday. I'd swam it for the first time as a Masters swimmer in 2017, when Zones was my shave/taper meet. I'd gone a 12:10 then and wanted to be around that time now. In warmup, I'd noticed that the Rival was pretty tight on my legs, especially the bottom 4" or so above my knees, but didn't think much of it because I don't drive a hard kick during the 1000. The race started off pretty well, but I felt pretty low in the water. Bizzarely, around the halfway point of the race, my eyes went out of focus, with one eye feeling like it was focusing on an entirely different focal point than the other. It was super disconcerting and quickly became nausea inducing with both eyes open, so for the rest of the race I alternated between half a lap with only one eye open, then half a lap with the other eye open. At that point, I decided to not worry about my time, and only worry about finishing the race without hurling. I managed to finish without puking, but was seriously dizzy with a pretty pounding headache by the end of the race and didn't swim fast at all.

I ended up going a 12:26, 16 seconds slower than in 2017. All that said, it could have been much worse. From a purely physical standpoint, I still felt pretty fresh at the end of the swim. Well, relatively speaking--I was still feeling tired and heavy in general, but compared to how I felt before starting the 1000, I felt pretty fresh.

It ended up taking another 8-10 minutes for my eyes to go back to being in focus after I finished the 1000. I was still alternating which eye was open during my cooldown, then they just switched back to normal, and the headache faded away after another 30 minutes or so. This is the first time this has ever happened to me, so I don't know if it's something I should be worried about in the future, or if it was just some fluke. It didn't happen again the rest of the meet.

Saturday

I started to think something might be amiss with the Rival suit during warmup. My thighs felt quite fatigued and they didn't get any better over the course of my ~35 minute warmup, which usually isn't an issue. I also noticed while doing some fast kicking during the warmup that the band at the bottom of the leg right above the knee was almost painfully tight, and the few inches above that were also abnormally tight.

Mixed 400 Free Relay

I anchored our mixed 400 free relay and it was rough. First 50 felt pretty good, though my legs felt really fatigued, and everything just hurt on the 2nd 50, along with me feeling more like I was finishing a 200 than finishing a 100, and felt like a lead balloon, to boot. My time was actually quite good, though, with a 55.22 split. As a point of reference, last year at Zones I was a 56.64 on the same relay, and looking back over the past few years, I'm usually between a high 55 and high 56 in this relay. Getting out of the pool after the relay, my legs really freaking hurt, though.

Mixed 200 Medley Relay

This was about 5 minutes after the 400 free relay, with one heat of the 200 medley between the two relays. I led off with backstroke and not only had a bad start and way too long turn, but I was gassed--I went a 30.69 and really had nothing in the tank that soon after the 400 free relay. On top of that, my legs were excruciating coming off the turn and I don't know if I had any legs at all on the second lap. Looks like I was even slower last year, though, with a 31.39, but was much faster in 2017, with a 28.83.

50 Fly

I'd warmed down for a solid 500 after the two relays but my legs were still painful. Getting up on the blocks for this race was a slow and painful process. I went a 27.67, which is a bit better than the 27.79 I went at this meet last year, but a far cry from the mid 26 I regularly went when I actually trained for sprint fly several years ago. After both my quads cramped up while climbing out of the pool, I decided I had to ditch the suit.

500 Free

I scratched this race. I was scheduled to swim about 45 minutes after the 50 fly, but even after taking the suit off and using the roller on my legs for a solid 10 minutes, I was still cramping and didn't want to potentially make things worse if there was actually something wrong with my legs beyond the suit issues.

50 Back

By this point, I'd been out of the Rival for about an hour and a half and had swum around a 450 in the warmup pool in a borrowed speedo and my drag suit. Still felt tired and heavy in the water, but my legs weren't nearly as painful as they'd been earlier.

I had a much better start than I did on the relay and ended up with a 30.06. I'd been a 29.64 at Zones last year, but that was with me wearing an actual tech suit, so I figure a .4 deficit with a drag suit on isn't too shabby!

Going off on a bit of a tangent here...notwithstanding the too-tight issue, there's a definite difference between wearing a tech suit and a brief (or drag suit in my case). With a properly fitted tech suit, the jammer's compression locks your muscles into place, provides a bit of buoyancy, and helps lift your legs into a more optimal position, along with varying degrees of water impermeability from one tech suit to the next. With a brief/drag suit, you have none of that and it's a very clear difference going from one to the other. Throw in the amount of extra drag a drag suit provides and it's a night and day difference between the two types of suits.

Men's 200 Free Relay

I anchored our men's 200 free relay at the end of the day. I pulled a 25.23 out of my kiester, which I was quite happy with, all things considered. Even being fatigued and rocking a drag suit, that's faster than I usually am at Zones with a relay start--I'm normally in the mid-upper 25 range. I'd gone into the meet hoping to break 25, but I will definitely settle for this time with everything going on!

Sunday

I had a lighter lineup on paper than what I actually swam on Saturday, but it ended up being pretty much just as rough. During warmup I felt really, really tired and heavy in the water, but my legs felt no more fatigued than they should've been after two days of swimming, so at least the cramping/pain issues were resolved! I stayed with the drag suit for all my races on Sunday. I figured that since I was training through Zones, I'd *really* train through it and deprive myself of the benefits of a tech suit.

50 breast

Ugh, this was a sloppy race. I really can't figure out sprint breaststroke. Increasing my tempo to anything faster than my 100 pace makes it feel like everything is falling apart--my kick feels like both my feet and knees are getting all wonky, I feel like I'm losing water on my catch, and my body perpetually feels out of place since I'm not getting a good glide between strokes. On top of all that, my left hand was out of place on the turn and it slipped down the wall, making my turn off balance and jerky. I went a 32.52 which isn't a great time, especially compared to the 31.49 I went last month, but could've been worse. All things considered, I wasn't happy with the time, but also wasn't disappointed with it, just meh.

400 IM

Hey, I won my age group in this! :-D
As far as time is concerned, this was pretty bad. I went a 5:14, which is 14 seconds off my Masters best. With how everything was going, I decided I just wanted to make it through the event while hopefully not completely dying. First 50 of fly felt good, though I felt really, really low in the water, and my back locked up on the 4th lap of the fly, with that last lap feeling like the closing lap of some of my more painful 200 flys in memory; in addition, both goggles had almost completely filled up during the fly. That pretty much set the tone for the rest of the swim. I couldn't really see anything on the backstroke leg except during the flip, when the water would move away from my eyes, so I did that 100 based solely on stroke count. Surprisingly, I nailed 3 of the backstroke walls going off stroke count with only the 150 turn being long! My legs were pretty long gone by the time I got through the breast and started on the free portion, and my back muscles had long since atrophied and turned into fossils, too, but I made it through the free with less pain than I've had other times I've swam the 400.
Also surprisingly, with the exception of the 2nd 50 fly, my splits were surprisingly consistent. Slooow but consistent. 32-39 for fly, 41-40 back, 43-43 breast, and 37-36 free. You can call me Eeyore!

Bonus points if you can figure out if the video is of my race or that chick's butt... 😂

Men's 400 Free Relay

I led off this relay, but was dragging by this point. First 50 felt great, my legs very quickly died after the 50 turn, and the rest of my body shut down after the 75 turn. I was a BLAZING 58.01...which is surprisingly only the 2nd slowest relay 100 free I can find, after an absolute stinker of a 1:03.4 I did at Zones in 2015. Fun fact, the dude leading off the relay in the lane to my right is Katie Ledecky's older brother. I can say I got to race Ledecky! :-D

Men's 200 Medley Relay

This was another 5 minute double, like the two relays Saturday morning. I did the breast leg this time and actually pulled out a 34.01, which really surprised me. Still dirt slow, but with a relay start that was pretty much me just exhaustedly falling off the block and little energy on the swim (side note--my tired tempo on this race felt much better than my too-quick tempo from the individual 50 breast, and I nailed the turn, to boot), I'm pretty happy with it. Back in 2013, which is the last time I can find me doing the 50 breast on a relay at Zones, I was a suited 33.36. It's not really an apples to apples comparison, though, since my breaststroke all around was markedly worse in 2013 than it is now (my best times then vs now for the 50, 100, and 200: 33.34-31.49, 1:11.74-1:07.99, and 2:47.61-2:31.00).

Overall thoughts

With everything taken into account, I'm pretty happy with how this meet turned out. Dizziness and suit induced leg issues aside, my times were surprisingly solid for racing in a drag suit. I touched on it earlier, but there is a HUGE difference in my opinion between swimming in a properly fitted tech suit and a drag suit. Even taking that into account, my times were surprisingly good (for me, anyways).

This week will be my last of heavy training before starting my taper for Nats--5 practices and 1 lifting workouts with medium weights (I'm stepping the weights down this week, up till now I've alternated between 2 and 3 lifting sessions per week and they've all been heavy), then I start tapering in the pool and I'm out of the weight room till after Nats.

I'm usually a big shave and taper swimmer, but this is the first time as a Masters swimmer that I've been lifting heading into the end of the season, so I'm hoping two weeks is enough for my body, especially my legs, to recover from lifting and put me in my normal tapered state ready for traveling to Arizona on April 24th for Nats!

Heading into 2019 Nationals on the right foot!

I've got the 2019 USMS Spring National Championship coming up in just over a month (April 25th-28th) in Mesa, AZ. After a long season of training and competing, I'm down to one final meet before Nats, the local Masters Zone championship April 5th-7th.

I think I'm in the best shape I've been as a Masters swimmer right now! All season, I've been swimming with the senior prep group of the age group team I coach. I've been averaging 4-6 practices a week, usually most of 'em with the kids and one a week with my Masters team every now and then. It's definitely paying off--my aerobic base in practice is better than it's been in recent memory and I've been able to hold intervals I haven't hit since being a teenager. That's translated to meets this season, too, in that even when I've swum a race with a poor strategy and paid for it at the finish, I haven't been absolutely wrecked like has been all too common in the past few years (I'm looking at you, 200 fly and 200 breast).

So far this season, I've swum in 10 meets--5 age group and 5 Masters, with 2 Masters meets to go. Couldn't tell you the last time, if ever, that I swam 12 meets in a season! I came into the season with the goal to swim every event from the 1000 on down at least once. Through Zones in a couple weeks, I'll have doubled that and swum some of those events 3-4 times, to boot!

I'm a firm believer of the idea that the way to race better is to race more. I've had some absolutely atrocious races at various meets this season, but each one has been a learning moment and I'm happy to say that for the most part, I haven't repeated the errors that made the bad races so bad. Uh, I was informed in November that my approach to the wall in backstroke is too slow, thought I fixed it in practice, then was told by the same coach that, nope, my approach was still slow in February...but I fixed the other issues!

From a preparation standpoint, swimming at the age group meets has been fantastic. I generally swam on both Saturday and Sunday of those meets, and that's where I regularly had some of my worst races from a time standpoint. I discovered that being at the pool racing and coaching for 12 hours on Saturday completely wrecks me for doing that all over again on Sunday, but it's phenomenal preparation for being mentally ready to race through fatigue and pain. There were a couple times this season where I swam a particular event at an age group meet one weekend and put up an ok to middling time in the midst of being on deck for 20+ hours, then swam that same race the next weekend fresh at a Masters meet and dropped a substantial amount of time even if the race itself was sloppy or otherwise unoptimal.

****

All that background out of the way, I've got my heaviest event lineup yet in place for Nats. I'm doing all five 200s (200 fly, 200 back, 200 breast, 200 free, and 200 IM) and have the 100 free as my optional 6th event. I've swum all of 'em except the 200 back at least twice this season and am quite happy with where I'm at right now. I'm a big taper swimmer, so me being at in-season PRs in most of those events right now is hopefully a great sign of things to come!

Here's the list of where I'm currently at for each of those events, along with how they compare in the grand scheme of things and what my Nationals targets are for 'em.

Event	Best in-season time this season	Best in-season time last 3 seasons	Best tapered time last 3 seasons	Masters PR	Goal time at 2019 Nats
200 fly	2:30.42	2:22.68	2:23.94	2:22.68	2:22.50
200 back	2:26.20*	2:18.18	2:16.60	2:12.90	2:14.50
200 breast	2:33.34	2:38.60	2:31.00	2:31.00	2:29.50
200 free	2:06.03	2:07.17	2:04.36	2:04.36	2:02.50
200 IM	2:19.54	2:19.94	2:15.27	2:15.27	2:14.50
100 free	56.62	57.10	54.65	54.65	54.50

Here's my breakdown event by event, in the order I'll swim them at Nationals.

Friday, April 26th

200 breast

I think the key for me to break 2:30 in this race is to be strategic. I know my underwaters are by far my strongest suit in breaststroke, but every time I hammer the underwaters in the 200, I pay the price on the back half. After the first 50, I want to shorten the underwaters a bit and try to not get into oxygen deprivation. I've been training in practice this season to hit 7 strokes per lap, but for the next month I'm going to aim for 8 strokes with a shortened pullout.

Two other things that will help me hit my goal:

• Better outsweep on my kick: Due to somewhat limited lateral mobility in my knees and especially in my ankles (I'm definitely not a natural breaststroker), I've naturally got a narrow kick that doesn't give much propulsion. I've been working on it for the past month or so and think I can continue to improve it through Nationals. I've gone to two private lessons for my kick and have another lesson coming up this weekend working on it, so hopefully it'll pay off! Side note--the lessons have identified *what* I need to do to fix the kick, it's a matter of actually doing it while I swim, since it feels really weird and is something that goes against what I assume is 20+ years of bad habits as a competitive swimmer.
• Attacking it on the 2nd 50: In the past I've tended to ride the pullout too long on the 2nd 50 and have given up valuable speed. Gonna try tightening that up and get that 2nd 50 split down. I think if I can do that and keep myself out of the ox dep zone, I should hopefully keep the last 50 under :40.

100 free

Frankly, I don't train speed work for anything, especially not for free. This is going to be a crapshoot, but if I hit my turns, I should be able to go a Masters PR. 

200 fly

I haven't trained for the 200 fly for several seasons now, but since my aerobic base is much better than it was when I last trained for that race in the 2015-2016 season, I think I've got a real shot at hitting my goal time. I've swum the 200 twice this season, both times in the last month or so, and both times simply cruised through the 200 without a race strategy, just doing it as a morale booster. I have a complicated history with the 200 fly. I love the race in general, but as a Masters swimmer it's almost always had my number and treated me as its red headed stepchild...and I've had a tendency to really melt down on the last 50.

A few key focus areas for me:

• Technique: Up until this past summer, I had a tendency to have my hands enter too narrow, and correspondingly sweep my hands outward before pulling back. That's, uh, pretty inefficient and wastes time, and I've been working on it in practice this season. I still tend to do it in the 50 and sometimes in the 200, but I think I've eradicated that habit in the 200, so I'm hoping I can carry that through this race.
• Underwater kicks and stroke count: Like with breaststroke, I've historically tended to stay underwater too long and it's bit me in the booty with severe oxygen deprivation in the last 50-75 of the race. While I haven't been working on 200 fly training in practice, per se, I have been working on my kick and stroke count. Before, I was focused on 6 kicks and 7 strokes per lap, now I'm working on 5 kicks and 8 strokes per lap. I did that for both of the 200s I've done this season and didn't feel the piano until the last 5-10 yards of both swims, so I'm hoping that will carry through to Nationals when I actually *race* the 200.

Saturday, April 27th

200 back

Ok, I've only done this once so far this season, and just cruised it since I had the 200 fly coming up about 15 minutes later. I went the 2:26 listed in the above table, but I was barely even breathing hard at the end of the race--I've got a number of 2:23s and 2:24 in-season races in the past, and those were all ones where I hammered it to go those times, in comparison to now where I more or less loafed it and still came within a few seconds of those times. I've gone pretty decent in-season times in the 50 and 100, so I'm overall pretty optimistic for this race.

As is a common refrain with the underwater-heavy races, my key focus area is being more strategic with my underwaters in this race. In the past I've gone 14 kicks off the start (that gets me breaking out right at the 15m marker), 10-11 kicks off the first turn, 8-9 off the 2nd turn, 6-7 off the next few turns, then 4-5 kicks off the last turn, and have always run into major oxygen deprivation by the end of the race. The clearest example of that was the race at 2013 Nats where I went my Masters PR--I fully blacked out on the 2nd to last lap--I remember turning at the 150 and then coming out of the turn at the 175, no clue what happened in between those two turns.

I've been working in practice to hit 12 kicks off the start, 8 off the next turn, 7 off the next, then 6 kicks after that. There will inherently be ox dep in the 200 back, but if I can keep out of the worst of that zone, I should be all right.

200 IM

I've been a victim of self inflicted poor race strategy in this race, primarily around swimming too slow on the fly and back legs--I think I've always been subconsciously afraid of taking it out too fast and then having an epic crash and burn on the back half, but I've got the aerobic base now that unless I truly sprinted the fly and back, I'll be able to handle a back half pain train, so this is a mental issue rather than a physical limitation. 

We've done some great 200 IM pacing sets in the age group practices this season, so if I can actually carry those lessons learned through to this race, I should be able to knock it out of the park.

Side note--the 2:19 I did this season in January is .5 faster than my next fastest in-season time as a Masters swimmer (and is my 2nd fastest Masters time, to boot!), and I had the double whammy handicap of swimming the front half too slow and having my back foot slip off the block on the start and effectively just falling into the pool. Subtracting the start handicap, I should've been on track for a 2:17 high or 2:18 low, which would have been a phenomenal in-season time, since my fly split was about 1.25 seconds slower than it should have been and my back split was about .5 seconds slower than it should have been.

Sunday, April 28th

200 free

Almost verbatim, this is the same issue as the 200 IM. I swam it most recently at a Masters meet in January...and took it out noticeably too slow and had far too much left in the tank at the end of the race. If I can get over that subconscious hurdle of holding back on the front half, I should be able to throw down a (for me, anyways) great time.

2018 USMS Spring Nationals...best Masters meet of my career!

Actually, on second thought, I think that might have been the best meet of my entire swimming career!

I came out of the meet with 3 lifetime best times, 1 Masters best time, and 4 Masters second best times. I can't recall any meet, either as a Masters swimmer or as an age grouper, where I swam so consistently well across that large a variety of events.

I swam 8 races over my 3 days of competition (the meet is 4 days long, but I didn't do the 1000 or the 1650 that were on the first day):

• Friday: 100 back, 50 free leading off our mixed 200 free relay
• Saturday: 200 breast, 100 IM, 50 back leading off our men's 200 medley relay
• Sunday: 100 breast, 50 free on our men's 200 free relay, 200 back

Side note--the video quality is pretty terrible, I have a defective camcorder that I'm sending in for a warranty repair/replacement.

Friday events

100 back

This was a pretty good race! I went a 1:01.19, my 2nd fastest Masters time and my fastest since 2013 Nationals, which was at IUPUI, too. My backstroke start wasn't terrible, but I definitely need to keep working on using the bars. My 50 and 75 turns were a bit long, but all things considered, I was very happy with the race! I haven't done any real backstroke speed work since the 2012-2013 season, when all I trained for was the 50/100/200 back, so this was a really good time. I'd gone into the race just hoping to break 1:02, so I'll take it! Side note--I've perfected the art of coming up right at the 15m mark off the start! :-)

Mixed 200 free relay

Another great race! I went a 24.95, just .03 off my Masters PR set at 2012 Nationals, and my fastest since then (my next fastest was a 25.44 from 2013). I had a bad turn...started the turn stroke almost a full stroke too far away from the wall, so I tried to salvage it by lengthening the turn. Looks like I managed it!

Saturday events

200 breast

Thankfully no video of this one... :-)

I set a new lifetime PR with a 2:31.00, which dropped my former PR of 2:32.50 that I set at Zones last year! That being said, technique-wise it was a sloppy race. I made the utterly boneheaded decision to try to pace the guy next to me for the first 75 after we were even at the first turn, which came back to bite me in the behind on the last 50--I'm pretty sure I looked like a little kid sprinting, taking 50 strokes, and barely making forward progress by that point (my stroke count for the 25-150 of the 200 is usually 7 strokes...I took 14 on the last lap...). I probably should have taken it out about .75 slower for the first 100, but it was still a new LPR, so I'll take it and count it as a lesson learned.

100 IM

This was my most ideal race of the whole meet! I went a 1:00.59, crushing my former lifetime PR of 1:01.42 from Zones last year. There was only one technical error, I was about a half stroke too close to the wall on my back-breast turn, so I lost some time and air trying to recover from it. Besides that, I can't think of anything else I'd have done differently!

Men's 200 medley relay

I led off the relay and went a 28.65, my 2nd fastest Masters time and fastest since 2013 Nationals. My start was again only ok, but hey, this meet was my first time using either the bars or the backstroke wedge, so I'm not complaining! Felt like I was spinning a bit, but the race as a whole was good, so no complaints from me!

Sunday events

100 breast

This one was a bit of a mixed bag. I went a 1:08.38, .4 off the lifetime PR I set at Zones last year, but my 50 split was a 31.47...which is a lifetime PR by .4! I just took this race out too fast and was hurting at the end, and also was really long on the 75 turn. Probably should have been out around a 31.8 or so, but it was all in all a decent swim. As a side note, it's really apparent in this video that I'm not a natural breaststroker. I've got a weak kick and my underwaters being better than most people I race is the only thing that keeps me from getting trounced by my competition.

Men's 200 free relay

Whoo boy! I went 2nd on the relay and went a new Masters relay split PR with a 24.63, despite a glacially slow relay start. Despite having never jumped and DQed a relay in my life, I've got a deep seated and utterly irrational fear of doing so, so I've got sloooooow relay starts. Conservatively, I'd say I probably left half a second on the block. Ya know, that means I'm like Caeleb Dressel! Both of our relay starts are only marginally faster, or no faster, than our flat starts! 'Course, the time difference in his is just because his flat start is that good, not because he's slow off the blocks on relays, but whatever... :-D

200 back

This was my last event of the meet and I was tired! I still went a 2:16.60, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time and fastest since 2013 Nationals. Frankly, I'm surprised I swam it that well. I've apparently forgotten how to swim back without a beard, since I had water washing into my mouth pretty much the entire time. I swam the race with 8 full breaths, the breath on the start and then the turn stroke breath at the end of each lap, every stinkin' single other breath I took resulted in at least a partial mouth full of water! I had to cut my underwater butterfly kicks down during the race--I've spent all season training to be able to hit 6 kicks consistently off every wall, but had to drop down to 5 and then 4 during this race. All that said, I'll take it!

Thoughts and path ahead

This was all in all a fantastic meet, very possibly the best meet I've had in my 20+ years of competing! I've had meets in the past where I've done better in a few events, but never had a meet that I can remember where I've done so consistently well across every event I swam.

Looking forward, I want to keep expanding my repertoire of events. Up till 2 years ago, I would not have expected to do anywhere near as well in the breast events as I've done over the past two seasons, setting lifetime PRs in all three distances. Over the next 5 years, I plan to spend at least one season focusing on each event from the 1000 on down (for example, this season I focused primarily on the 100 and 200 breast, with the 100 and 200 back as a very secondary focus...probably an 80/20 split between my breast and back training focus this season).

To help achieve those goals, I want to keep training with the NCAP senior prep group in the fall-spring season! I started swimming with them in late January/early February this year and it really paid off, so I plan to swim Monday/Tuesday/Thursday evenings with them again, starting at the beginning of the fall season this time instead of waiting till past the midway point of the season. I'll also aim to hit 1-3 Masters practices a week, possibly Thursday/Friday/Saturday mornings, or Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday mornings. On top of that, there is a free gym at my office, so I plan to start lifting twice a week over my lunch breaks this summer and maintain that moving forward. I'll focus primarily on legs and core, since that's where my strengths are as a swimmer and I'll want to capitalize on those strengths as much as possible, and then upper body for the rest, maybe a 75/25 split.

Most importantly, looking at my training plan moving forward, that is all actually reasonable! The NCAP practices are sandwiched between the practices I coach, so I don't have to add anything to my schedule to continue swimming with them. Same with weights, I'm already at the office and it doesn't add any time to my day, so those should be feasible. I've consistently been hitting 2-3 Masters morning practices each week since February, so I'd like to think I can maintain that moving forward, as well.

If I can maintain this kind of schedule starting from the beginning of the fall season in September, I think it will pay off much larger dividends than the abbreviated training schedule did this season, and I was quite happy with how this season turned out!

Zones last weekend...wow, what a meet!!!

At the age of 30, and about ~50 pounds heavier than I was at the peak of my swimming career in high school, I had my best meet ever last weekend!

I wasn't able to go to Nationals this spring, so Zones became my shave/taper meet of the season. Since January, I've averaged 6-7 practices a week (3-4 in the morning, 3 in the evenings on my own), which is a level of training I haven't hit since my first season on the team back in '11-'12. It's definitely paid off! I've been able to hit intervals in practice I haven't hit since high school, and my overall endurance and speed is way up from the past few years.

During the 7 meets I did this season before Zones, my swims were overall trending quite positive. I had a few less-than-satisfactory swims, but by and large, I was hitting typical shaved/tapered end-of-season times at random in season meets.

Going into Zones, I wanted to make sure I didn't do what I've tended to do in the past, which is overload myself with individual events and max out on relays. A perfect example of that was Zones a few years ago--over the course of Saturday and Sunday, I swam a total of 9 individual events and 8 relays, which was an epic disaster! This time around, I swam 7 individual events (counting the 1000 on Friday) and 7 relays. With the combination of spreading the event load over three days and my being in significantly better shape, I didn't crash and burn at all! I had a couple swims that weren't as stellar as I was hoping for, but this still stands as my best meet ever.

Friday

1000 free

I haven't done the 1000 since I was 16 or 17. Just to make it clear up front, I don't like distance. I *can* do distance, but I don't have the patience for it and it bores me, and I don't train for it in practice. That being said, this was a complete throwaway event. My three goals were to break 12:30 (that's a 1:15 pace per 100), not embarrass myself, and not kill myself for the rest of the meet. It was a surprisingly good swim! I stayed in cruise control till the last 50, only doing flutter kick off the walls and pretty much not kicking on the surface, and I finished the race without feeling tired in the slightest, feeling like I'd just finished a 1000 pull. I went a 12:10 and think I could easily shave off another 15-20 seconds, if not more, if I ever decide to swim it again.

Saturday

100 free

I'd set my flat start MPR of 56.51 in this event last spring, leading off the 400 free relay at Nationals. I usually only do the 100 free a couple times a season, and have usually been in the 56-57 range. Last month, I did the 100 at a short course meters meet and my time converted to a high 55. After that swim, I decided to see what I could do at Zones. I don't train for free in general, and definitely don't train for sprint free (or sprints of any stroke, for that matter), so I just wanted to see what I could go. It was great! I was about 6 inches too far from the wall on two of the three turns, but everything else was about as good as I can remember ever doing in the 100. I went a 54.65, which blows my previous MPR out of the record and puts me in contention with my lifetime PR of 54.4! I'm very happy with how my first "real" event of the meet turned out, and am considering adding it to my event rotation for next year.

200 mixed medley relay

I swam the fly leg on this relay. Remember what I said earlier about not training sprint free? Well, I hadn't done the 50 fly in well over a year and haven't done a lick of fly speed training in practice in probably 2 years. As soon as I started swimming, I could tell! Stroke tempo felt awful, I felt completely out of whack compared to the slower tempo I'm used to in the 100 and 200 fly. That being said, I split a 26.3, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time. I'll take it!

200 IM

IMs in general are another event I don't train for--I train for the individual strokes (well, fly, back, and breast, not so much when it comes to free). The 200 IM has been a bit of a nemesis over the past few years--I went a 2:19 at my first Zones in 2012, but didn't get back under 2:20 till January, when I went a 2:19.9. In fact, my most recent 200 IM prior to January was a 2:25 I did in January 2015. My one goal was to beat the 2:19 from 2012. I did it quite well! I went a 2:15.2, and almost all of the time improvement came on the back half. My breast and free were both a bit over 2 seconds faster than on both of my 2:19 performances, which is great, since that's historically where my IMs have fallen apart, even back in the day.

200 breast

This was the first of the two events I was most looking forward to at this meet. I've spent the past two years improving my breaststroke, putting lots of time and effort into it in practice to try and have it not be such a drag like it used to be back in the day. I had a great 200 breast last spring at Nationals and got to within 4 seconds of my LPR of 2:32.51, so my goal this time was to try and go sub-3:35. I blew that goal out of the water! I crashed and burned pretty bad on the last 35 yards or so, but I broke my LPR and went a 2:32.50! Only a .01 drop, but that's the first "real" LPR I've broken as a Masters swimmer! I broke my 50 fly LPR in 2012, but I don't really count that one, since I only swam the 50 fly a handful of times as a teenager, always at one of the first meets of the season, coming off the break after long course. I was ecstatic with how this turned out! My goal for next year is to aim for 2:30. I think if I can clean up that last 50, it's definitely within reach.

800 free relay

This was about 20-25 minutes after the 200 breast and I was still hurting. Energy level was low and my left bicep and pec were really tight from the 200 breast, so I didn't expect much going in. I still went a 2:04.5, which is only .2 off my flat start MPR from last Nationals. I'm now very interested to see what I can do in the 200 free without all the other stuff going on, and think I could hit a 2:02 or better. My LPR is a 2:00 and change, so I'm not that far off!

400 medley relay

This was about 10-15 minutes after the 800 free relay and I was dragging by this point. I wasn't in pain at all, but man, I was tired! I led off the relay and knew I wouldn't be able to throw down a great 100 time, so rather than crashing and burning, I decided to swim it like the first 100 of the 200 back. In that aspect, it wasn't bad at all--I went a 1:05.2, which is right at what I wanted to take the 200 out in.

Sunday

100 IM

My MPR going into this meet was a 1:01.5 from 2012 Nationals, and besides going a 1:01.7 at 2013 Nationals, I hadn't broken a 1:02.7 since then. Back in January, I went a 1:02.9, so my goal for this meet was just to break 1:02. I went a 1:01.42, a new MPR! My back to breast crossover turn was too long (I was about half a stroke too far out at the flags, so I had to lengthen my last couple of strokes to be able to execute it), but the rest was good. I'll take it!

400 mixed medley relay

I swam the fly leg on this relay. My goal was just to put up a respectable time, I still had two individual events and three relays to go after this one. I put up a 1:01.2, which isn't a bad time at all, in my top 5 Masters times. I cruised it and bungled the finish pretty badly (thought I was about a stroke closer to the wall than I actually was...which led the next swimmer to dive early, DQing us...oops).

200 mixed free relay

This was 5-10 minutes after the 400 medley relay, and I'd had all of a 75 to warm down. Wasn't feeling great, but threw down a 25.00 with a bad relay start and a slightly off-target turn. As a flat start, that would've put it as my second fastest Masters 50 (just behind my 24.9 from 2012 Nationals), and I think it's my fastest relay start, back to back with another relay, to boot!

100 breast

This was my other main focus event, besides Saturday's 200 breast. I really, really wanted to do well on it and see if my 1:09.1 relay split from a 400 medley relay in February was a fluke, since my fastest Masters flat start was a 1:11.3 (and my 5 fastest Masters times were all 1:11s!). I had some trouble on the first 50 getting my stroke rate up, but ironed it out for the second 50. I was utterly shocked when I saw the time! 1:07.99, nearly 3.5 seconds faster than my MPR, and almost .75 faster than my LPR of 1:08.6! I was completely flabbergasted, my highest hope had been to break 1:10 going into the meet! The biggest improvement came on the back half--while my first 50 was about a second faster than usual, the second 50 was almost 2.5 seconds faster than the norm. I'll absolutely take it!

200 back

This was my last individual event of the meet and one that I was totally unsure of how'd I'd do in. I haven't trained much back at all this year, and haven't really done so in 2 years. I'd thrown down a 2:19 in the 200 in January, which was my fastest in-season, non-2013-backstroke-season time, and threw down a 1:01 in the 100 back in March, which was my fastest in-season time, so I was just curious to see how I'd do. I paced the race poorly, started with too strong a kick and paid for it on the back half, but pulled out a 2:17.7, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time. All that said, my splits weren't terrible, out in a high 1:05, back in a high 1:11.

400 free relay

Despite being 20-30 minutes after the 200 back, my legs were still toast. I went second on the relay and gave it my best shot, but I didn't have much left to give right then. Still, I busted out a 55.8, which was still well under my previous MPR, so it wasn't a bad swim at all.

200 medley relay

Less than 10 minutes after the previous relay, I got back up to lead off our relay. I threw down a 28.8 in the 50 back, which is my 3rd fastest 50 back as a Masters swimmer, with the two faster times coming from Nationals in 2013 and 2016, when I hadn't swum 13 events in the previous 48 hours. I'll take it, I thought I would've been lucky to crack 29.5 with how I was feeling!

Overall

All in all, this was a phenomenal meet! While I wish some swims had been even better than they were, I didn't have a single bad event, and managed to take down two LPRs that I hadn't thought were even close to within reach this year, one of which I hadn't thought was in reach at all. Definitely the best meet I've ever had, either as an age group swimmer or as an adult.

Looking forward to next season

Looking forward to next year, I really want to hammer the breaststroke training! I'm in uncharted territory now, and know I still have plenty to work on in breast. Who knows where I will finally top out, but my next goals are 31.5/1:06.5/2:30. I also want to get back to working on backstroke--it's still my favorite stroke, but I've neglected it the past few years to focus on fly and, to a much lesser extent, breast. I'd like to get back down to the 2:12 I went in the 200 in 2013. For fly, I'm not going to focus exclusively on the 200 anymore. I've swum it 13 times in the past few years and have topped out at a 2:22. I'll continue to swim it at meets from time to time, but I'm going to be spending too much time on other strokes in training to really devote myself to that event. I'd also like to actually add the 50/100/200 into my event lineup rotations at meets. I'm quite pleased with how I did in them this season and think I could get down to my LPRs if I spend more time working on them at practice. I will be doing the 200 free at a meet in May to see what I can do when I'm rested, and would love to hit a 2:02. Beyond that, I'd like to hit 24.5/54.0/2:00.

Beyond all of that, I want to continue training the amount I am. I don't want to go through this cycle any more where I get in shape for Nationals, then stop swimming more than 1-2 times per week during the summer and fall and pack on the pounds, then cut (most of) the weight in the spring. I cut down from 211 to 188 as of last week, and want to stay in the 180-190 range. And I really want to keep the time in the pool. During the summer, sure, I'll cut down a bit, but my goal is 4 practices a week. Once we go back indoors in the fall, I want to kick it back up to the 6-7 practices per week from the start, and really put the work in to have next season capitalize on this season's many successes.

Great last meet before Nationals!

All in all, I had a great last meet of the season before Nationals yesterday! I swam the 200 fly, 50 free on the 200 free relay, 50 breast, and 200 back. Except for the 50 free, they were all very solid swims.

200 fly

This was great! I wanted to take it out hard and just try to hold on, and I did much better than I expected! The official splits aren't out yet, but watch splits had me at 31, 35, 37, 39. That's only about a second faster than my front half at Nationals last spring, but 4 seconds faster on the back half, including the first time I've been under 41 on the last 50, haha.

I've been really pushing hard in practice the last month or so to maintain 6 kicks off the wall all the time. While my brain reallllllly wants me to come up after 3-4 kicks towards the end of the race, my back and shoulders feel much, much better at the end of the race when I stay underwater for those extra kicks. It paid off! I did 7 kicks off the start, then 6 off every other wall, putting me past the near 15m marker on the lane rope each time! Tried to keep it to 7 strokes per lap, too, but slid to 8 each on the last 50. Gonna try to tighten that up for Nationals.

Anyways, onto the race itself. Before the race, I'm guessing I drank too much water and swallowed some air in the process, because my stomach was seriously unsettled. Bending down on the start, I was legitimately worried I was going to throw up because it did not feel good at all. Pretty much just fell off the block at the start, because I didn't trust my stomach. It was sloshing around on the first 75, and I did big, sloppy turns in an attempt to keep pressure off my stomach and to not do an imitation of Old Faithful. It settled down a bit around the 100 mark, but definitely had me worried for the first half of the race!

My stroke felt good! I think I could have taken it out 1-2 seconds faster on the front half without killing myself. I felt long and relaxed through the 150. Started to tighten up a little bit on the last 50, and kept expecting to feel the piano land on my back, but I never reached that point! Definitely tightened up at the 190, but nowhere near as bad as I normally tighten up during the race.

I figure through the lack of a jump on the start, the slow and sloppy turns, and not taking it out quite as fast as I wanted, I left about 3-4 seconds in the water in this race. That would have put me right at the Nationals cut. My goal for Nationals is to go out in a sub-1:05 and hold on for a 1:10/1:11 on the back half, while keeping to only 7 strokes per lap. I think it's an achievable goal!

50 free on the 200 free relay

Ok, this was the stinker of the meet for me. The block was really wobbly and I went too deep on the start (I led off the relay). I then managed to turn too far out from the wall and hit almost straight legged...and hit with my feet too high on the wall in the process, resulting in me going really deep off the turn. Took forever to get back up to the surface, and I ended up splitting something like a 26.2. Nothing about that race was good!

50 breast

I had 2 heats of the 50 breast between our 200 free relay and my heat, so I had enough time to stretch out for about 1.5 minutes, then was up again. All in all, it was better than I expected! My pullout off the start and turn felt disjointed, and I just felt odd doing sprint breaststroke, given that all my breast training this year has been for the 200. I was long on the turn, too. I went a 32.6, which is my second fastest Masters time behind the 32.07 I went at Nationals last spring.

200 back

This was about 10 minutes after the 50 breast, and about 12 minutes after the 50 free. I'd warmed down a 150, but was definitely feeling the back to back races. My left foot cramped off the start, and was stuck curled inwards until it stretched out on the 75 turn. So not fun! I was really long on the first four turns, then ended up jamming the last turn. Just felt out of sync for most of the race, although the last 50, jammed turn aside, felt pretty darn good. Legs were burning by the 125, but that's normal in the 200 back. I can definitely tell I have done zero backstroke training this year--from the turns being all over the place to the pacing feeling off, those are all things I don't have to deal with when I train backstroke! I'll be interested to see how my splits were, since my last 50 felt like the best one. I wouldn't be surprised if it was faster than the middle two 50s.

Still, I went a 2:22 and change, which is right around the fastest I've been in season since 2013. I went a 2:19 at Nationals last year, and I think I could go under that fairly easily if I were to swim it at Nationals in Greensboro...which I'm not going to. Since I'm not coaching the kids next season, I'll have more time to train, so maybe I'll be able to add in backstroke to my training regimen again.

All in all, this was a pretty darn good meet! Abysmal 50 free aside, I am very happy with how I swam, and this just reinforces the good vibes I'm getting for Nationals in 5.5 weeks!

I'm baaaaaack!

All in all, I've been swimming better at meets this year than I expected, but didn't have any resounding races at meets to prove that point. Until this past weekend, anyways!

Last weekend was the Albatross Open, a short course meters meet held annually in Bethesda. I don't particularly like doing short course meters--since I don't train SCM, the shift from the flags being 5Y to 5M from the wall is jarring on backstroke. That's really the only problem I have with it besides having to do the conversions to figure out what my yards times would be on each race. Except for the flags issue, I don't mind the extra stroke or two I have to take on each lap. *Long* course meters...well, that's a whole 'nuther story!

Anyways, I had decided that I wanted to do a meet this season that wasn't almost solely comprised of my focus events, so I signed up for only events I haven't trained for: 200 IM, 100 back, and 50 free. I ended up swimming the 200 IM, 100 back, 50 free twice on 200 free relays, and then a 50 fly instead of my planned individual 50 free.

My thought process was that I wanted to race (I love racing!), but I wanted a meet of just throwaway events that wouldn't bum me out if I didn't do as well as I'd hoped. And with this meet being SCM, the stars aligned and let me just have fun. In addition, I set out with the goal this season of doing every event from the 400 IM on down at least once, so it gave me a chance to knock off most of the backlog with no impact on my overall training/racing plan.

200 IM

Not only have I not trained for the 200 IM this year, I haven't trained IM period, and for the past couple of months, have only trained for fly. I went in with very low expectations and was very pleasantly surprised!

Fly felt pretty good. Could have pushed it a bit harder, but pacing felt pretty good. Back felt decent, nothing spectacular, although I was a bit long on the flipturn (and didn't get a full breath going into the turn, so came up a bit early), and was a full stroke too long on the transition turn. I totally dropped an F bomb when I reached for the wall and saw how far away I was, haha! Started running low on oxygen on the breast leg, and had probably the two shortest pullouts I've had in a loooong time. Free was very tight, but it felt much less like a dumpster fire than it normally does in my 200 IM, so I'll take it!

I went a 2:37.21, which converts to a 2:21.63 yards. That would be my third fastest Masters time and the fastest I've been since Zones in 2013, when I was 15 pounds lighter than I am now (had a beard then, it just wasn't quite as Poseidon-esque as it is now). I'd also been training IM that year, so I'm very pleased with this swim! I'm not going to be doing the 200 IM again till next season (only have two meets left this season and will not be swimming it at either), but it gives me hope that I could dip back down below 2:20, which I've only done once as a Masters swimmer!

100 back

I was very surprised with how this one turned out! I have done absolutely zero backstroke training this year, and have probably swum less backstroke in the last five months than I did in a single week during the 2013 season, which I spent focused primarily on backstroke. I had very low expectations and just didn't want to embarrass myself too much.

During the race, I thought it wasn't going very well. My underwaters weren't up to my normal backstroke snuff besides the start, and my turnover felt even slower than it normally is. On top of that, I was long on the first two turns and the finish, and started running out of steam around the 70m mark.

I was shocked when I saw my time! 1:10.35, which converts to a 1:03.37 yards! I was half a second faster than that at an in-season meet in February 2013, but haven't been faster than a 1:03.3 since Nationals 2013. I was quite surprised that even with no backstroke training and all the handicaps of a SCM meet, I was right in the mix with my times from three years ago, my best season as a Masters swimmer!

I'm doing the 200 back on 3/20, so now I'm quite intrigued by what I might do in it. It was originally just going to be a throwaway event, the last of my sub-400 IM events left to check off the list, but me being able to throw down a converted low 1:03 here makes me wonder if I'll be able to dip below 2:20 at the next meet. I was a 2:19.03 at 2015 Nationals (and haven't broken 2:20 besides that swim since 2013 Nationals), so I'd love it if I could come in under that in a few weeks!

200 free relays

I swam on two 200 free relays, anchored the mixed relay, and went third on the men's relay. I decided to play around with how I swam the two 50s. On the first relay, I galloped. It's a slower, lopsided stroke, but I get a really powerful pull on my left side, which is the dominant side when I gallop (despite me being a righty). On the second relay, I stayed pretty flat and went for a high turnover. The second relay was three heats after the first relay, so I wasn't at 100% for it. Didn't feel nearly as terrible as I have in the past when I've done relays back to back, so that points to substantially improved conditioning than in the past! :-)

Neither of my starts were quick. Really slow reaction time on the first one and marginally quicker reaction on the second, but definitely nothing to write home about. Despite leaving so much time on the block, I was quite happy with my splits! I was a 27.49 on the first one (probably would have been right around 27 flat with a good reaction time!), which converts to 24.76. That is a Masters best for a relay start, and my Masters best flat start is a 24.92 (and that was me shaved/tapered/178 lb at 2012 Nationals!). I'd like to think I'd have a realistic shot at dropping below 25 on a flat start again, which I haven't done since that 2012 relay! I was a 28.48 on the second relay, which converts to a 25.65 yards. Even not being at 100%, that's still right in the mix with my best flat start times from the past few years, so I also find it promising!

I thought the first one was a better overall race for me. I've been experimenting with staying underwater longer off the dive and turn, and I think it really paid off. Totally geeking out with numbers, I looked at the videos of that 200 free relay from 2012 and these two relays, and despite the difference in length of the two courses, found some interesting stroke count numbers.

-2012: 12 out, 18 back

-2016 #1: 13 out, 17 back

-2016 #2: 13 out, 19 back

I swam flat on both the 2012 and 2016 #2 relays, and think the extra stroke on both laps to be pretty self explanatory with the extra distance of the SCM pool. For 2016 #1, though, I find it interesting that I took one stroke less coming back despite going a further distance. I think that's primarily due to my underwater off the turn! If I can cover that much extra ground underwater, despite being 27 pounds heavier and not shaved/tapered, and be *right there* with my time, I'm hoping to throw down some good times on the relays at Nationals!

50 fly

I had planned on swimming free for my individual 50 free, but completely on a whim I decided to swim fly, instead. I'd already done the 50 free twice on the relays and was quite happy with my times on both, so decided I'd give fly a shot. I haven't trained any speed work for fly yet (switching to speed work in April, up till now it's all been distance and 200 pace work), so wanted to see how it'd go. Even with being my 5th race of the day, it went pretty well! I went a 31.01, which converts to a 27.93. That would tie the time I went at a meet in January 2014, and is the fastest since then. To give some more context, the fastest I've been since 2013 Nationals was a 27.76 in October 2013, and that's when I was still training speed work. I'm not doing the 50 fly again this season, so it doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things, but is a nice data point to have.

All in all, this was a great meet, much better than I expected! My in-season success in non-focus events has now got me quite optimistic for Nationals!

Thoughts and rumination on the 200 butterfly

Me and the 200 fly very much have a love-hate relationship. I love to hate it and it loves to torture me, and in return I love to swim it some more.

As a Masters swimmer, it is my own personal 200th circle of hell. At times, I've been this guy. I've blacked out during the race and managed to get DQd not once, but twice. I've had a 31 second gap between my front half and back half of the race. I've choked on water when deep into oxygen deprivation and gone into survival mode.

I've had all those terrible things happen to me in that race, yet I keep coming back for more. That last 50 is usually sheer hell on earth, but the entire race itself is something I just love. That might say something about me, but I don't know if it's good or bad.

I've picked three things as being vital to a good 200 fly for me, based on the last three years of evidence:

1. Conditioning. My closest 200 split to date was a 12 second gap between the first and second halves. Over the past few years, I've been training enough to have the speed necessary to take the 200 out well...but haven't had near the conditioning to bring it back well.
2. Underwaters. The 200 fly is a cold blooded killer when it comes to my back and shoulder muscles. That last 50 usually is so painful because those muscles are knotted up, on fire, and screaming for relief. The more time I can spend underwater, the less stress I have on those muscle groups, and theoretically the less abysmal that last 50 is going to be.
3. Mental fortitude. The 200 fly is a daunting race, no matter how good at it or in shape you are. Some of my races, I've fallen victim to my own mind games and not attacked it as I should. I need to attack the race and stick with it, no matter how much pain I'm in, rather than taking the easy way out and half assing the race. If you're gonna swim the 200 fly, you need to full ass it!

With that in mind, I compared my most recent 200 fly from a few weeks ago with my Masters best 200 fly, from Nationals in San Antonio last spring.

Timewise, I was a 2:28 last year, out in a 1:08 and back in a 1:20. A few weeks ago, I was out in a 1:11 and back in something like a 1:23. There was a timing snafu, so I'm not actually sure what my real splits were. At Nationals I was rested, shaved, tapered, and had a brand new meet suit. At this recent meet, I was none of those, and had a bunch of cramping problems. That said, my splits, while slower, were right in line with my Nationals splits! I'm also swimming much more than I was last year, so I'm hoping to bring that back half split down quite a bit over the remaining two months till this spring's Nationals.

I watched the videos of both races and did some analysis on stroke and underwater dolphin kick count per lap. The first set of numbers is the number of underwater kicks and strokes per lap last year, second set is the kick/stroke count for the meet a few weeks ago.

1. 6/6 - 6/6
2. 3/9 - 5/8
3. 3/9 - 5/7
4. 3/9 - 5/8
5. 3/9 - 4/8
6. 2/9 - 4/9
7. 3/9 - 4/8
8. 3/8 - 3/8

All in all, I did 10 more dolphin kicks and took 6 fewer strokes a few weeks ago than I did last spring. My goal by Nationals is to be able to take at least 5 dolphin kicks on each lap and no more than 8 strokes each lap. I'd love to get it to 5 kicks and 7 strokes per lap, but I don't know if that will be feasible within 2 months, but definitely think it will be achievable for next year.

I'm racing the 200 fly at two more meets before Nationals--one this weekend and one on March 20th. By the March 20th meet, I should be down below 200 pounds (I'm at ~206 right now and was at about the same weight last spring at Nationals). By Nationals, I should be around 190ish, and will have the full shave, taper, rest, and new suit. Combining that with 2 months of heavy butterfly training, and I hope to have a quite successful 200 fly at Nationals!

Goal time is sub-2:19.30. Hope I can make it happen!

Update on 2015/2016 training plan and progress so far

I'm doubling down this season and really striving to have it be my best (training) season since my first Masters season, the 2011/2012 one. During that season, I was getting in shape in the water again and losing weight. I was swimming 5 practices a week on average, and managed 7 a week during that winter, although I hit less during the fall and spring.

I went from weighing around 215 to 178 from October-April of that season, with the 178 being the weight I clocked when I hopped on the scale after doing the full shave for Nationals that spring.

Unfortunately, since then, I averaged about 2.5 practices a week during the '12/'13, '13/'14, and '14/'15 seasons, and it showed in two main ways: performance at meets and weight.

My meet performance has been all over the place. 2013 spring Nationals, my backstroke was lights out, my fly had regressed a bit from 2012 spring Nationals, and my IM was right there with 2012. 2014 summer Nationals was largely a disappointment, and 2015 spring Nationals was only a success in my breaststroke events and the 200 fly, and the latter was only a success because I set a pretty darn low bar for it. During in season meets, I've laid some real stinkers, but also a random smattering of good swims. I attribute that to low yardage and lack of time spent on training the strokes I want to focus on.

My weight has gone up and down in the 3.5 years since April 2012, with my weight at 2013 spring Nationals coming in at 187, my weight at 2014 summer Nationals (didn't do spring Nationals) coming in around 195, and my weight at 2015 spring Nationals right around 200. My weight peaked this summer/early fall at around 215. Over the last month, it has dropped to the 207-210 range (depending on how accurate my scale is--it varies a couple of pounds day to day).

My goal weight for April is 185-190. Unlike in 2012, I'm also doing dryland, so I expect I'll be putting on muscle mass which will counteract some of the weight loss.

Okay, all that aside, now that I'm two months into the season, here's my training plan. Unlike how I've set my training plan before the season in years past and failed miserably to actually execute on the plan, I've been making solid progress towards it for the past 3-4 weeks, and don't foresee any issues with it moving forward.

Weekly training plan

• Monday: 45-60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice if work permits
• Tuesday: 60 minute morning Masters practice, 45-60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice, (solo practice if work permit)
• Wednesday: 60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice
• Thursday: 60 minute morning Masters practice, 60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice, (solo practice if work permits)
• Friday: Rest day
• Saturday: 60 minute morning Masters practice
• Sunday: Rest day

So far I've been consistently doing the Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday portions of the training plan, and added in the Tuesday evening practice this week. That's a total of 5 practices a week. I plan to add in the Tuesday morning practice next week, which will put me up to 6 per week. Monday is probably going to be the iffiest practice to make, since I coach from 6:00-8:30 in the evening, and that really cuts it close as far as my potential work schedule goes. It'll be a stretch goal--if I can get my work schedule to permit it, it'll be a great additional practice that'll let me train for another stroke.

To date, I've been using my solo practices to do fly training, specifically focused on bulk fly yardage to get my endurance up. I've been doing a lot of fly yardage with fins on, specifically focused on approximate 200 pacing, underwater kicks off the wall, and distance per stroke. Besides doing general fly yardage, there have been three fly fin sets I've used as my target sets to see how I'm doing from practice to practice (I rotate through the sets, don't do them all every time I swim on my own):

Set #1

4 x 50 on 1:00, trying to hold 200 effort level/pace

3 x 100 on 2:00, trying to hold within 1 second of 50 pace

2 x 150 on 3:00, trying to hold within 2 seconds of 50 pace

1 x 200 on 4:00, trying to hold within 3 seconds of 50 pace

Set #2

6 times through

1 x 100 on 2:00, aiming for 200 effort level/pace

1 x 50 on 1:00, aiming for 3 seconds faster than pace on 100

Set #3

6 x 150 on 3:00, aiming for 200 effort level/pace

I've failed both times I've attempted Set #3 so far. The first time, I made it through number 5, then physically was unable to complete the last 150 without breaking stroke. I'd held a pretty consistent pace on the first 3, with the third one being about 5 seconds slower than the first one, then added about 5 seconds on number 4, about 10 seconds on number 5, and didn't make the last one.

The second time I failed was last night, when it was my third practice in 24 hours. I did the first 150 and was just so sluggish in the water that I knew I wouldn't be able to make it past the third 150, so I switched to doing Set #2, instead (only did 5 rounds, though, instead of 6)

I did pretty well on it! I went 1:05, 1:06, 1:06, 1:06, 1:06 on the 100s, and was :30, :31, :30, :29, :29 on the 50s. I've really been working on the underwaters and distance per stroke the past few weeks. Of course, when the fins come off, I'll have to work on it all over again, but building that muscle endurance base with fins works pretty well for me. Anyways, my 100s were consistently 5, 5, 5, and 6 strokes per lap, with 8, 8, 7, and 6 underwater kicks per wall. 

If I can get the DPS and underwaters to where I'd like them (no more than 7 strokes per lap, and at least 5 underwater kicks, all without fins), that should go a long ways towards getting me to the point where I no longer feel like I have an entire cargo train's load worth of pianos falling on my back on the last 50 of the 200 fly.

If I can maintain the practice schedule going forward, I intend to keep the solo Wednesday and Thursday practices fly focused, and rotate between back, breast, and fly on the Monday and Tuesday solo practices.

Pending my work schedule (tentatively start at the new job next week), I feel like the training plan is definitely achievable if I can keep my motivation up.

With all that said, here are my focus events this year, along with my recent best time (from spring 2013 through the most recent meet), goal time for this season, and stretch goal time for this season. I'm standing by the goal time, and have set stretch goal times in case my training goes even better than I expect and I blow the doors off in the spring. The bolded goal times are the events whose goal times are the Nationals cuts. The 400 IM is a stretch goal for me this season. I'm not going to do it in a meet till January or February. If it's a bad swim at that meet, I'm not going to go for it this season; if it's a good swim, I'll try to fit it into my training regimen, although I won't do it at Nationals.

Realistically, the 200 fly is my primary focus event this season. I'm not doing much backstroke training (at least compared to the lead up to the '13 spring Nationals when I went lights out in my backstroke events and spent that entire season almost solely training backstroke), so the backstroke goal times for this season are off my best times. I really like the breast events, but it's a matter of devoting time to training for them, time that will be taken away from my fly training. The IM training is primarily my training for the individual strokes and building up my aerobic base, not doing much specific IM training.

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Event	Recent Best Time	Goal Time	Stretch Goal Time
200 fly	2:28.71	2:19.30	2:15.00
100 fly	1:00.18	59.75	59.50
200 back	2:12.90	2:15.00	2:12.90
100 back	1:00.40	1:01.00	1:00.40
200 breast	2:43.20	2:40.00	2:38.50
100 breast	1:11.41	1:11.00	1:10.50
50 breast	32.07	32.00	31.75
200 IM	2:20.25	2:19.30	2:17.00
100 IM	1:01.56	1:01.16	1:01.00
400 IM*	5:09.40	4:59.93	4:55.00

I've got my work cut out for me!