Drastic improvement tonight in the pool. I feel like I can chalk it up entirely to more of the technique coming back and clicking because as soon as I hit the water I felt different.
600m warm-up - 200 full freestyle, 200m kick only, 200m pull only
10 x 50 @ 1min
Basically this means I start a hard 50m freestyle every minute, on the minute. The faster I go, the more rest I get. It was the standard training format my coaches used. I try not to think too much about the fact that I used to do 50's on 40s intervals and go a lot faster. This is a process.
The first 50 was 32 seconds, the fastest I managed last time but most of the 50's averaged about 34, 35 seconds with the slowest being the last couple at 38 seconds. I noticed the biggest difference in my breathing. Proper breath control in swimming isn't just about managing oxygen and C02 for endurance purposes, it's also about ballast. Manage your air improperly, and your hips sink and wreak havoc on your hydrodynamics.
I'm feeling pretty good about this. I tried doing backstroke and breastroke in my cool down and the technique for those actually came back more readily than freestyle had. I'm afraid to try butterfly. It was my best stroke back in the day, and 200m butterfly was my highest national ranking event so it'll probably be where I see the true extent of my decline. I'll leave that until I've put some more time in. One psychological barrier at a time.
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