I have something wrong with my achilles and I am not sure what it is. I have been to the doctor and they didn't really know. My coach thinks it is tendonitis. If worst comes to worst and I need to swim to stay in shape and keep some sort of fitness up, what should I do?
I was injured a lot in college and turned to swimming as my cross training. Generally speaking, swimming distances equate to running distances on a 1:4 ratio, i.e. a 50m swim (freestyle stroke) equates roughly to a 200m run.
As such, I generally replicated what was done in the given track or cross country workout for the day in the pool. Additionally, since swimming with an achilles problem will cause you to use more of your upper body during the swim workout, aqua jogging is also an important and beneficial exercise to include. 30 minutes of aqua jogging, especially without the flotation belt, will certainly help the legs and give a good cardio workout.
Best of luck.
I agree with the first response. About everything you do in the pool is going to be like a track workout. If you normally warm up for 2 miles, do an 800 warmup. A 12x400 will be a 12X100. That cover you for a bit. Once you get bored surf the Triathlon section on active.com as they have quite a few variations you can try.
One caution; watch the kicking particularly with a board or fins. If you really do have tendinitis attempting to flop your ankles around like what's required for vigorous kicking may irritate it. If you're trying to get an leg workout you may want to stick to aquajogging.
Here's a site I've found helpful:
You enter distances, past times (if available), and they give you workouts based on information you provide.