Open water events are almost exclusively over longer distances where success depends primarily on your aerobic fitness, good swimming technique and pacing. When preparing for these challenges, the bulk of your training should target your aerobic conditioning and improving your stroke. In our February and March issues, we provided training sessions to help build your endurance and pacing skills. However, this month, we want to do something a little different and share some training sets that encourage you to swim faster.
I like to include a speed-based session once per week in my training for a few reasons. Firstly, while they are tough, they are satisfying to complete. You’ll feel good after one of these. Secondly, as well as swimming outdoors, I race in masters pool events where my favourite distances are 200m and 400m front crawl. These onceper- week speed sessions are helpful for those. Thirdly, being able to increase your pace in open water can be useful tactically if racing and especially when sprinting for the finish.