CAPE SWIMS
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TRAINING AND PREPARATION FOR A LONG SWIM
Training for Long Distance Swimming in cold water - By Otto Thaning
There are many similarities in preparing for both swimming and running marathon-type challenges. This brief article will highlight my own preparations for swims in excess of 15kms, as races or as pure challenges.
Basics
It is essential to have a basic background of competitive swimming. The real issue is understanding of stroke technique. In swimming distances of significance, the crucial point is the ability to be comfortable in the stroke. Technique is paramount importance and regular stroke correction sessions are essential. The scope of this article does not attempt to cover stroke technique, as this is a subject worthy of a full paper in its own right.
Distance Program
As with marathon running, it is important to build up a ‘bank” of distance made up from the training sessions. Although I do not personally keep a “personal log”, it may serve to assist those starting on the long road preparing for long swim challenges. There are very few of us who are fortunate enough to be able to make a sport the prime function of our day’s activities. My training has to come at the end of the day, and serves also to be my way of relaxing or unwinding from a sometimes stressful daily working program. I believe in a pre-workout stretching session, and then a gentle warm-up of about 500m. This should be a stretch swim, by this I mean the swim should be slow and with a lot of extension and “length: to the stroke. A standard pace session should follow with the aim of totaling 2.5 to 4 kms. The pace work is usually short-break, repeat runs of 50m, 100m, 200m 400m and 800m distances in combinations determined by a coach who is not advising you beforehand as to his evil intentions! The session should, at least once a week, concentrate on all the strokes making up a medley.
I aim for three such sessions per week during the period Monday to Friday. I am a strong proponent for the concept that a hard day’s session in the pool should be followed by a day’s rest from the pool. This is particularly important for those of us starting serious training later in life! The youngsters in their late teens and early twenties can do amazing things to their bodies without feeling the effects of this abuse at the time, but as age progresses, it becomes necessary to show more circumspect to this amazing machine. If handled carefully it will respond and surprise you.
Weekend-TBC
The weekend is saved for one long swim! I believe that the combination of the week’s pace-work is complimented by a long swim over the weekend. This takes the form of a long sea, pool or dam swim in a group accompanied by the coach in a boat or on a long board.
TBC stands for Total Body Confusion! The aim of this is to organize the long weekend swims on a haphazard and unpredictable manner. It is important for the body to be presented with varying and differing forms of challenge on these long sessions. This is the situation that prevails in the competitions and in the long sea swims, and preparations for these events should follow suit. I tend to set the type of swim at the point when everybody is ready at the venue. The point is to present the participants with something unexpected but not impossible, and preferably enjoyable. The Channel Swimming fraternity do this by a blind draw. They have a number of possible swims written on pieces of paper that are drawn out of a hat and this is done on the beach at Dover just before they enter the water. The possibilities are, for example:
- One hour straight swim
- Three hour swim
- Five hour swim
- 500m fast, followed by 3 x 30 min.
- Slow swims
- 2km swim
- 15 min. Swim only
The whole object is unpredictability – or TBC!
Feeding
This is a vast subject and will only be briefly touched on.
Fluid loss in LDS is as significant as it is in marathon running. It needs to be supplemented from the beginning as once a body deficit is encountered it is virtually impossible to rectify. The current program adhered to by the Channel Swimmers is HOURLY feeds for the first 5/6 hours. Thereafter, half-hourly feeds. The basic quantities depend on body mass and swimming conditions. A simple guide is 10mls. Per KG weight per hour. This means that a normal male adult will need approximately 600ml. per hour in volume.
The type of feed is also important. It should not be hypertonic fluid replacement. This means that the concentration of the replacement fluid should not be more concentrated that that of the person’s own plasma. I believe that it should be hypertonic, that is, dilute when compared to blood plasma. It should contain a balanced amount of slow release carbohydrate. I use Maxim 2 scoops in 600ml. With a touch of juice concentrate for taste.
The best monitor of successful fluid replacement is the rate of urine production during the long swim. In the open sea or in a large dam it is possible to pass urine on the swim without upsetting the other fish! You should be passing urine every 2 to 3 hours whilst swimming. If this rate decreases then the feeds are insufficient and disaster looms!
Energy requirements in LDS are high. They are even higher when water temperatures are low. Energy is used up by muscle action and in heat production. Energy stores are found mainly in muscle glycogen. When this store is used up a complex change in metabolic function occurs with the conversion to a lipid based energy cycle. This is associated with more acid metabolic by-product formation, and it associated with the famous “WALL” that is well known to Comrades Marathon Runners. I believe that it is possible to delay this point by careful use of programmed carbohydrate feeding. I have found the use of Maxim particularly helpful in this and I do not underestimate the importance of constant self-monitoring throughout the session, whether
It be a training swim or a long race.
Cold water swimming is another ball game! It is an additional challenge in physiological training and somewhat daunting to those not regularly able to get into the Atlantic in the Cape. Rest assured that training makes the ability to withstand the cold improve. The pain persists, however, and no amount of persistence diminishes that!
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