Swimming

I don't see any reason why you shouldn't swim. Doing different activities and working different muscles I believe are one of the keys to staying healthy, injury free and variety is good for training motivation. Alan Webb was a swimmer and remember hearing him saying in a podcast something along the lines of that's one of the things he wish he would've kept doing.

Swimming works great for me, although I usually combine it with water running (without the belt of course) in the same session. I have all kinds of injury problems when running anything over 50mpw, so I try to get in the water as much as possible.

I would say maybe you should also be doing longer swims that are not workouts, but remember, swimming will “feel” harder than running, and your heart rate won’t get quite as high in the water, even if the perceived effort is greater.

For me personally, my heart rate doesn’t get high enough for me to really benifit unless I’m going “hard” in the water.

Some workouts I like to do are

25 min water jog followed by 10x100 freestyle w/ 30 sec rest,

10min water run-800 m freestyle-10 min water run,

4-6x400 w/ 1-2 minute rest

Cheers.

Competitive swimmers actually can handle more "workouts" than runners, because of the low impact and full body nature of the sport. So I wouldn't worry too much about that aspect. That doesn't necessarily imply you "should" do a hard workout every time you're in the pool cross training, just that you probably "could".

Swimmers also do a ton of form work that is crucial for competitive swimming but will be basically useless for your running, so don't do any of that.

If you're going 3x in the pool, I would suggest maybe 1x per week long and easy, 1x per week as a tempo, and 1x per week as a fartlek equivalent like you've been doing.

Your goal of xtraining is basically just adding to your aerobic base and to a small extent, raisingnlactate threshhold.

I am pretty sure that I am aerobically developed enough to handle swimming at a beginner's level, but the form and use of muscles have caused me to tire out quicker than I should. So would a good place for me to start be 10 minutes of straight swimming without stopping? The reason I have been doing fartleks every time is that I am slowly building up the number of laps I can do before having to stop for rest. If the 10 minutes is a good amount of swimming to start with, what should I do after? I have considered doing this before where I go for a set amount of time and then stop after, but I feel that a 10-minute session would be lacking in intensity and that I could do way more, but I am limited by my inefficiencies with the technicality of the movements.

dritius wrote:

I am pretty sure that I am aerobically developed enough to handle swimming at a beginner's level, but the form and use of muscles have caused me to tire out quicker than I should. So would a good place for me to start be 10 minutes of straight swimming without stopping? The reason I have been doing fartleks every time is that I am slowly building up the number of laps I can do before having to stop for rest. If the 10 minutes is a good amount of swimming to start with, what should I do after? I have considered doing this before where I go for a set amount of time and then stop after, but I feel that a 10-minute session would be lacking in intensity and that I could do way more, but I am limited by my inefficiencies with the technicality of the movements.

If you can, get a swim coach to work on your form.

For aerobic work, instead of swimming non-stop for 10 minutes, do a set of 6x100 yards at an easy-medium effort where you rest for 10-15 seconds in between each repetition. As you get stronger, add more repetitions or do longer repetitions but maintain the same 10-15 seconds of rest between swims.

If you want to work on speed, do a set like 8x50 yards at a strong-sprint effort, but rest anywhere from 30 seconds to a minute or more in between reps, depending on the effort level (more rest the harder the effort). Add more reps as you get stronger.

Cross-trainer here, my thoughts on swimming:

1) Yes, HR is lower, but that is due to the cooling effect of the water. So if your max HR is 180, and you do 1k repeats at 170 HR usually on the track, reaching 160-165 HR while swimming is perfectly fine. That's why it feels similar, one reason heart rate goes up is the overheating that occurs during running. If you were to measure lactate levels, they go just as high as during running, and you don't wanna exceed your threshold too often.

2) Don't do any all-out sprints or "speed" in the water. Adds unnecessary muscle mass. Ever seen the body of a Phelps? You don't wanna run a 5k with that amount of upper body muscle mass. You want to train between easy pace, maximal up to threshold.

3) Do some anaerobic conditioning. One workout some pro runners use is 10x100, with each 100 being divided in 25 with breathing 3 strokes, 25 breathing 5 strokes, 25 breathing 7 strokes, and 25 very quick at end. That will help your breathing while running so much, as the body learns to use oxygen.

I would do one easy/recovery swim day, one for longer threshold repeats (15x100, or 8x200 something like that) and one for the anaerobic session.

Your base fitness from running is enough to make you a decent swimmer after a few sessions. Don't spend time optimizing your technique, you want to be a bit inefficient so you can push your HR higher with ease. For triathletes it's totally the opposite, they would need to focus on form first for a very long time before doing anything else in the water.

LateRunnerPhil wrote:

Yes, HR is lower, but that is due to the cooling effect of the water.

A little that , but for the most being horizontal (so the blood does not need to be pumped from ypur legs).

yes swimming great at reducing injuries, it's also perfect at the end of the day after the run, as you actually feel looser and better after the swim workout. I certainly was never in the pool for more than an hour, and I could get a great workout in even 20 minutes.

Typical workout

10 minute warmup swim - easy pace focusing on being able to keep swimming the whole distance

15 minutes - from work/drills - as a poster above pointed out swimming is a technique sport, so doing drills to improve form, gliding, breathing etc. is really important and especially at beginner level, can improve your results more than pounding away with bad technique - getting a coach, joining a masters swim team, of finding some books, can give you a list of drills to work on. Using a kick board, float, gloves etc. works here too.

15 minutes - intervals - a variety of intervals from 200 to 50 or even 25m sprints, works here. The longer ones help with your endurance swimming, breathing technique etc. and the shorter ones can really raise your heart rate.

10 minute cool down swim - same as start except I really focus here on stretching my body and stroke to the absolute fullest length.

If I have a certain distance in mind that I'm training for, I might just do that distance for the warm up or cool down, and then compress the rest of the workout.

The 20 minute workout, when pool is closing might be 5min warmup, 5 min drills, 5 min intervals, 5 min cool, but I usually keep same structure.

I also usually go right from pool to sauna, and do my stretching routine in the heat. I can't really tell you if this improves your running, but over the years I've been amazingly injury free, and my swim has consistently improved, especially breathing effectiveness and turns in the pool, blah, blah, blah. Now if I could just stop crashing my bike.

Loving these runner-takes on how to swim. Definitely deserves an LOL.

Solid supplement. Came out of the pool and off the bike in very good shape aerobically after 6 weeks of no running with a stress fracture. Speed was there for the 1500. My strength for doubling and running the 800 or 5K took quite a hit tho.

I said in my earlier response not to waste time working on form, because you're just interested in running as cross training. I didnt realize you were struggling this much, your first post alluding to improving quite a bit at swimming, so I assumed you were comfortable and confident in the water.

Since it appears you arent, a few sessions with a coach definitely would help you. If you cant find a coach, at least find a friend to watch some youtube videos of proper form with you who can then go to the pool with you and help you improve your form. You're not going to get much benefit if your technique is so bad that you cant get through 10 minutes of continuous swimming, even if your only goal is adding some fitness through cross training. If you're fighting yourself the whole time, you won't be able to focus on the workout.

Those who said get a few coaching sessions are dead on. It's better to get your technique down before doing much distance or you will become a really good bad swimmer.

Once you are swimming correctly, it's actually good to start with short sprints. They allow you to hold your form and you aren't going to look like phelps unless you are swimming 100k per week.

I like following up a long run with a swim. It's hard to motivate to get in the water but it loosens me up. If i'm too trashed and my butt is sinking, i use a pull buoy or flippers.

I learned to swim all strokes in my early 20s and 30 years later, it's the best think i've done. of all of the injuries i've had, i could always swim through them and maintain some fitness.

Not being able to swim 10 minutes straight means your technique is very poor.

Until you improve your technique, your are plowing through the water like a tractor. You want to be a sail boat.

1. Get a coach

2. Work on technique.