Triathlon swimming made easy (16 page)

Chapter 12

Learning to Move Efficiently

You've undoubtedly succumbed to the temptation to get in the pool and start churning out laps; after all it's what
everyone
does. But until you learn balance — or
unlearn
your struggling skills — almost any whole-stroke swimming is likely to reinforce bad habits and delay progress toward fluency and efficiency. So your first step is to replace whole-stroke laps with
whatever allows you to practice fluent movement
and to avoid practicing struggle. For most of you, that means drills.

Your primary goal during the Learning Stage is to learn to do your drills impeccably. Part 3 provided exhaustive guidance on how to learn and practice drills. This chapter organizes that information into a training-and-development program. First a couple of rules for success in the Learning Stage:

1. When practicing drills, 100% right is 100% right; 95% right is
100% wrong.
As you progress through the four lessons — and particularly during the first two — you'll experience moments where you feel uncomfortable or lack coordination. Often it takes only a tiny adjustment, say in your body or head position, to make you feel
dramatically
better. Anytime you feel even a little bit uncomfortable, your natural reaction will be for some kind of compensation — craning your neck, using an arm as an "outrigger" for support, kicking too hard. The problem with these seemingly innocent reactions is tha
t they imprint energy-wasting movements on your nervous system. So your constant goal is effortlessness and flow.

2. 100% right takes time and attention. Patience in mastering subtle movement skills may be natural to martial artists and dancers, but is an odd notion to most endurance athletes. I only came to appreciate its value after beginning yoga practice (see page 113). So here is your one goal for the next 10 to 20 hours of pool time: Simply learn to make mindful, examined movement a habit. Don't count laps or watch the pace clock; focus purely on reducing effort and increasing flow.

3. 95% of the 100% right will be determined by how well you master balance drills. Prioritize Lessons One and Two until balance becomes nearly effortless.

Organizing Your Practice

Successful drilling is your sole goal. Do whatever it takes to practice controlled, fluent movement and avoid struggle.
Everything else is secondary.
These practice-design tips will help.

Short repeats. At TI workshops, we teach Lessons I and II crosspool, not lengthwise. Because you move more slowly in static balance drills, even a trip of 10 to 12 yards can take time and be fatiguing, especially if you have a weak kick. Experience tells us that longer repeats mean 10 yards of reasonably good form followed by 15 yards of progressive struggle. We don't want that part imprinted on the nervous system so we stop at 10 yards. Your Learning Stage repeats should mainly be 25s and 50s. Your rule for how far is: Every lap should feel as good or better than the first. If it doesn't, stop
and rest — even mid-lap.

Short sets. Once you've gotten past learning the drills and have begun assembling a number of 25s or 50s into sets, limit yourself mainly to sets that last about 10 minutes. Beyond that, mental acuity is usually not as good, so take a break or work on something that requires a bit less concentration or simply shift to another drill or focal point to renew your attention.

Super-slow movement. Crawl before walking and walk before running. Do all swimming movements well
slowly
before trying to do them faster. Go no faster at any time than your ability to maintain complete control of the movement. If you find yourself, because of better balance or sleeker body positions, seeming to move a little faster, you should mainly be marveling at how little effort it takes to do so.

Do one thing well. Avoid paralysis by analysis. Use the focal points listed for each drill in Lessons One to Four. Give all of your attention to just one point on each pool length. On the next length, either focus on the same point again, or shift to a new one, but think about doing just one thing well and trust your body to use the imprinting you've done at other times of other focal points. Over time, they will all harmonize and integrate smoothly.

Super Silent. Quieter drilling is
always
better. Once you've mastered the mechanics of a drill, one of the simplest things you can do to improve your drill quality is to do it more quietly.

Give yourself enough rest. When you take a break at the wall, you're not on a "schedule" to push off again. Listen to your body. It has a pretty good sense of the difficulty of what you're asking it to do. Just ask: "Am I ready to do that a little better than last time?" Begin again when you feel prepared to do the drill well. And use 'Yoga breaths" or bobs to set your intervals.

Training Happens

You can make training as complicated or as simple as you like. I have all the "authoritative" swimming tomes that describe aerobic training effects in terms like "concentrates muscle enzymes such as succinate dehydrogenase," but I can't recall an instance when one of my swimmers approached a race more confidently because their enzymes were concentrated. On the other hand, when they master a balance drill and can feel that their hips and legs are lighter than ever before, they
know
something has happened that will help them swim faster.

But be assured that, as you practice things that make you feel lighter in the water, training
does
happen. Your physiology receives essential benefits in the Learning Stage and in every form of Total Immersion training, both drills and whole-stroke swimming. I prefer to use terms such as "super-slow, cruise, brisk, and race-effort" to describe the physiological goal of a set because they are more easily grasped than a term like "anaerobic threshold." But aerobic capacity
will
be increased in specific ways by each efficiency-building exercise I prescribe. The main difference betwe
en TI training and conventional training is that we make the goal of building and imprinting efficiency the central focus, while physiologic gains happen
in the background. Conventional training makes "concentration of enzymes" the central goal while "technique practice" becomes an afterthought — something you do for 10 minutes at the end of your workout. Because you can add speed by subtracting drag or energy cost far more quickly than you can do it by adding fitness or strength, it makes far more sense to put efficiency-training at the heart of what you do in the pool while the physiology becomes incidental.

The TI/RPE Scale

Swedish physiologist Dr. Gunnar Borg developed a scale of training intensities to help cardiac-rehab patients monitor the intensity of their exercise. This scale, known as Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE), has proven effective for athletes as well. Though various versions of his scale have 10 to 20 levels, I find that for most athletes, six divisions allow you to cut it as finely as you need. Here is the Total Immersion RPE Scale, which assigns a number between one and six to your perception of how hard you are working, as well as what your Tl-training emphasis will be:

1. Literally effortless. Super slow. Very examined. Best for learning new skills. Approximately 50% of Maximum Heart Rate.

2. Warmup/warmdown speed. Easy and slow. Good for recovery/restoration... and for imprinting good stroke habits. 60% of MHR.

3. Cruise speed. A level of effort you could maintain for a set of 20 to 30 minutes in training or perhaps up to 2.4 miles in an Ironman race if your stroke efficiency is well developed. If you were running, this would be called "conversational pace".. .though your sentences might be brief. Only a moderate challenge to maintain SL and fluency. A good level for swim-leg race rehearsal. 70% of MHR.

4. Brisk. Moderately hard. You could maintain this effort level for repeats of 100 to 200 yards in training, for a sprint distance swim leg, or for occasional bursts — say, to pass someone — in a 1-kilometer or longer swim leg. But you need to concentrate to avoid struggle. A more important training pace for swim-only races than for tri-swim races. 80% of MHR.

5. Fast. Working hard enough to become breathless and to experience a degree of discomfort. Requires intense concentration to maintain good
form. An advanced swimmer might work this hard while swimming 25s or 50s or well-rested 100s in training, but few triathletes would ever swim this hard in a race. On the other hand, if you do Masters swimming (200 to 500 yards), you could find yourself racing at this level. 90% of MHR.

6. Absolute Maximum. Triathletes have no need to ever swim at this level, unless you plan to race short sprints (100 or shorter) in Masters swimming. 100% of MHR.

While in the Learning Stage, you'll do all of your training in Levels 1 and 2 of TI/RPE. Your efforts will be more mental than physical as your drill practice will benefit most from keen concentration and complete comfort. You are trying to become effortless in your movements.

The purely physiological benefits in this stage will be twofold:

1. Aerobic Base Building. If you're a budding triathlete, you probably aim to train five to 10 hours a week. If you're a serious one, you probably train 10 to 20 hours a week. Simply being able to sustain a weekly volume like that takes a foundation of aerobic fitness. That kind of foundation is developed through exercise that's
extensive,
not intensive — gentle enough to be sustained, without fatigue, for an hour or more. If you are a beginning athlete, that means really,
really
easy. If you are an experienced athlete, but an
inexperienced
swimmer, that means
swimming
really, really easily
. Even if you are an experienced swimmer, but inexperienced in these new techniques, the same thing applies as you learn them. If you're not making yourself tired, you can stay in the pool for longer periods, giving yourself more time to imprint good skills. The extensive, low-effort exercise prescribed in the learning Stage helps develop the cardiovascular foundation for efforts of greater duration — the 10-hour training week, the 2- to 3-hour race — and eventually for efforts of higher intensity.

2. Restoration. Because you're a triathlete, you'll train in at least three sports and possibly weightlifting or other cross-training. At times, you'll be over-trained — tired, sore, or heavy-legged. Only one form of training has the potential for truly assisting in your recovery. That's swimming, because of the absence of gravity, the massaging effect of moving gently in water, and because maintaining blood flow through sore, tired limbs helps to flush them out. Thus, recovery often happens more quickly and
completely with gentle swimming than with simple inactivity. Learning Stage practice thus affords three benefits at the same time: recovery for sore or tired muscles, maintenance of the aerobic base, and skill improvement. That's a lot of value to pack into an hour.

Advancing to Practice

There's no hard and fast rule for earning promotion from Learning to Practice Stage nor any firewall between one stage and another. Common sense is the only rule. Focus on activities you do well and easily. Minimize or avoid those you find difficult until you learn to do them with more ease. You may advance from Learning to Practice fairly quickly in basic skills, such as balance, while finding yourself in Learning mode two or three years down the road for advanced skills such as maintaining impeccable balance while breathing or staying fluent while swimming briskly. Most likely you'll be doing
85% Learning, 10% Practice, and 5% Effective Swimming over the first few months on the TI program. Six months later, that mix may shift to 60% Learning, 25% Practice and 15% Effective Swimming. My own program, after many years of teaching and practice, is about 5% Learning (there will always be
some
aspect of technique that requires intense concentration), 45% Practice, and 50% Effective Swimming.

You can do whole-stroke swimming at the Practice Stage, but use the same guidelines as for drills: short repeats (25 to 50 yards), slow speeds, and focus purely on ease and control. Think about doing just one thing really well when you swim. Refer to the menu of Sensory Skill Practice focal points in the next chapter for suggestions.

Effort and Surrender

It was the poster that got my attention. The one that appeared in New Paltz store windows announcing a new yoga center. It pictured an 85-year old woman in the Warrior position, showing more grace, strength, and suppleness than all but the most athletic teenager. It said that she had not begun practicing yoga until age 65.1 thought of myself as rather athletic for age 48, but there was no way I could have done that position that impressively. In fact, for a month or two I had been feeling almost crippled by a recurring back problem. Swimming is supposed to be good for your back but
it was doing nothing for mine.

So I purchased a membership that allowed me three months of unlimited classes and began attending classes almost daily. Within a month my back problem — which, for five years had resisted every high-tech solution short of surgery — was history. Within three months I felt taller and straighter than I had in 25 years. And, when I recently turned 50,1 was more supple than at any time I can recall.

Two years of yoga practice have also yielded several dividends I never expected. Though I signed on for the physical benefits, yoga practice has taught me countless lessons about how to teach and practice swimming skills more effectively. The penetrating attention that one learns in practicing the
asanas
is an incredibly valuable habit for practicing stroke drills. As I gradually realized, the point of doing asanas is not to touch your toes more easily, but to learn concentration, self-awareness, self discipline and how to "balance effort and surrender." Though I realize I have only
scratched the surface, I still have learned more than I expected about how to use my body more intelligently.

I also continue to discover opportunity for refining movements that I had thought were pretty good already. Though I've done the triangle pose nearly a thousand times, I still manage to improve a bit each time I twist into it. Perhaps pressing the outer heel of my back foot into the floor a bit more firmly.. .or holding my upstretched arm just a bit straighter above my nose.. .or rotating back my upper shoulder ever so slightly. And
because my body resists each of those fine adjustments — to "breathe away" tension and allow straining muscles to work with, not against, one another. Gradually, I learn to maintain the pose in a calm — almost detached — way, without fatigue, for as long as I wish.