Muscular Endurance focused workouts are in my opinion some of the best workouts you can do at all levels of swimming training with the exception of a green beginner. Essentially, what these exercises are those that fatigue your arms first through a variety of evil, maniacal and crafty ways and then tells you to swim at race pace or higher for long intervals or repeats.
I like these regardless of whether you are advanced or just a novice because it teaches you to swim while you are not completely fresh. It also forces you to focus on your forms which undoubtedly will break down and thus requires you to focus even harder on keeping it together. Lastly, because of the rigorous demands of these sets, you can complete them in a shorter time frame compared to pure endurance.
Below you will find a few of my favorite muscular endurance exercise sets that you can customize to your current swim level. These are just the main sets so if you want to throw in a warm up and drill set before please do.
Mainset 1:
4-10 x 250 as 50 waterpolo sprint*** then 200 hard on 30s rest
2-5 x 200-500 at race pace on 30s rest.
Other good drills for this include underwater recovery/doggie paddle freestyle or fist drill sprint with tennis balls
Mainset 2:
5-10 x 50 sprint with bound legs*** and no pull buoy on 20s rest
200-500 race pace
100 easy recovery
Repeat for 1-4 rounds
****You can also substitute a drag suit, t shirt, or towel to increase drag
Main set 3:
5 x 200 hard with paddles and buoy on 20s rest
200-500 at race pace
100 easy recovery
Repeat 1-4 rounds
As a side note, be careful on the last main set with the paddles if you have shoulder issues.
Let me know what you think of these.
Coach Chris and Kev
