Trying to Sprint, Kind of Succeeding

Journal by Jeff Commings, Swimming World associate producer

PHOENIX, Arizona, August 24. SWIMMING World associate producer Jeff Commings, who will be the second oldest man to compete at the U.S. Olympic Trials next summer, is journaling his daily training regimen on his personal blog. We are reprinting those articles here:

Date: Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Time: 5:45 a.m.
Short Course Meters
306 days to Trials

300 warm up: 150 free/50 back/50 breast/50 free (In case you haven't noticed, this is my typical pre-workout warmup.)

6×100 on 1:45 freestyle with roving 25s of no breath (i.e. #1: 1st 25 no breath, #2: 2nd 25 no breath, #3: 3rd 25 no breath, etc.)

12×25 on :30 descend 1-3 choice stroke

4×75 on 1:30 best average (freestyle, :47)
100 easy
3×75 on 1:45 best average (backstroke, :50)
125 easy
2×75 on 2:00 best average (breaststroke, :54)
100 easy
1×75 fast from dive (freestyle, :42)
100 easy

6×25 easy, :10 rest

6x(50 fast, 50 easy on 2:30)
Breaststroke: 35.3, 35.1, 35.3, 34.6, 35.1, 34.9

100 warm down (with stretching)

Total distance: 3200 meters

At the gym: 5:45 p.m.
Five minutes of shoulder exercises

Seated bench press — 15 reps @110, 12 reps @ 130, 10 reps @150

Lat pull — 15 reps @ 100, 12 reps @ 125, 10 reps @ 145

Leg extension — 15 reps @ 95, 12 reps @ 120, 10 reps @ 145

Dumbbell curls — 15 reps @ 15 (each arm), 12 reps @ 20 (each arm), 10 reps @ 25 (each arm)

Box steps — three sets of 20 with increasing weights each set (set 1 12 pounds, set 2 15 pounds, set 3 20 pounds)

Core work for 10 minutes

Five minutes stretching

Wednesdays are always sprint day, though I should call it "sprint day." I think of sprinting as doing race-pace swims with lots of rest. Some of our main sets don't give you the type of rest you need to do race-pace swims, as today's main set exemplifies. Today's set was essentially building the speed from 200 pace to 100 pace. My stroke felt great for freestyle and backstroke, but I fell apart when trying to sprint breaststroke. With only two official weeks of swimming under my belt in this new season, it's going to take another week or so for my breaststroke to fall into place. I need to do more drills to "find the water" again.

Phoenix Masters has three workout groups: morning, noon and evening. Coach Mark Rankin usually tells the noon group about the fastest swims from the morning, as a motivational tool. Usually, I am the one who posts the fastest swim of a particular set each day, and most of the noon swimmers hate me for pushing that bar a little higher than they can reach (with the exception of distance-based sets). This week, I have been dethroned.

Alan Carter recently joined Phoenix Masters after moving to Phoenix from the East Coast. He went to Notre Dame and came here for work as an engineer… and that is pretty much all I know. I have not had the time to do a Google search on him, and of course, it would be much easier just to ask him what he specifically does. I am not usually very conversational during workout, and even more so in the early hours. He has been kicking our butt in the pool every day, which is just fine with me. Alan is 26 years old.

I'm no diva. I don't need to be the best in workout. At a meet, however …

Alan put up some pretty big times today. On the dive 75, he went 39-plus for freestyle. I was ecstatic that I went 42, because it's on pace for about 56 for 100 meters, which is close to my best time in the 100 free. Admittedly, the 100 free is far from my top event, but after almost getting a Masters national championship in the 100 free at the spring nationals, I have started thinking more about adding it to my championship meet program. I swam it last spring because it fit into the schedule, and I had nothing to lose. I got second by .01 and thought the time (47.29) was pretty good. I think my best short course meters 100 free is 54-low, but that was about seven years ago.

I'm trying to be more focused in the gym this season. I usually go in there, do the sets and leave. I don't stay in there for more than 50 minutes, but I want to try some new exercises, just to shake things up. I didn't do anything new today, because the thought of trying new things came to me in the middle of today's workout.

We'll see how it goes on Friday.

Reprinted from Jeff's personal blog at commings.blogspot.com

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