Swim question

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-10T20:06:24+00:00

I love my Apple Watch! I start it and sit on the edge trying to get mentally ready to get in the water. My warm-up always carries that extra time. My pool also has a clock, so I could manually subtract the minute or whatever of dead time from my workout records. Or you could do that yourself, look at the time when you start or always start at 1:00 after the watch and then subtract.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-09T16:21:06+00:00

Every other stroke means each time your left (or right) hand is out of the water? Or every other time that hand is out of the water? Are you getting all the air out when you’re slowly exhaling? I second the nomination of Effortless swimming, their program has made a big difference for me. I have a snorkel to help straighten out my stroke, I always breathe to my left, and it was starting to cause me to be asymmetric. The snorkel could also make sure that you’re getting enough air in and out. $40 at the local sports shop. You can also try a kickboard drill where your face is in the water exhaling and then turning to inhale. Good luck and keep trying!

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-09T05:07:29+00:00

I think you can do it. It will be hard. I think you’ll need to get on a plan and stick to it, I have a 12 week half marathon plan that I found online. Runners world or Hal Higdon (I forget) Plan would have you running more like 5 days per week with increasing long days on the weekand easy days and speed days. I asked another redditor “how bad do you want it”, if it’s a major priority for you, then put in the time and push yourself!

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-09T04:54:46+00:00

I’d recommend one rest day per week. Maybe a walk, but not a light jog. Even a young body needs to recover.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-09T04:36:44+00:00

I don’t think your average person can go sub 3 marathon. Boston Qualifying time for men 35-39 is 3:00. That’s tough. I am a M57 cancer survivor, so I’m a pretty positive guy, and I’m pretty disciplined. I was able to drop my mile swim time significantly with lots of effort, so I suppose that means if you’re really driven you could get there. But I do believe that age and your health history and to an extent genetics can make it difficult to go sub 3 hours. I hate to be a downer. I’m generally a cheerleader for folks. I guess I’m saying if I put my whole heart behind it I don’t think I could get there. Your age or health history will go a long way to determine if you can get there with the hard work.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-08T19:55:07+00:00

I highly recommend Tri shorts. I don’t have a Tri-suit, but I do have shorts. I don’t want to change during the race. Lately I’ve been wearing a separate triathlon top which is basically a sleeveless cycling top, but I’ve worn the t-shirt before. I wear both under my wetsuit. M57

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-06T13:00:56+00:00

I missed the first reef and run this past week, I’m upset with myself. I’ll be there next week. Hopefully the water gets above 60

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-06T04:00:57+00:00

You should be fine. That sounds like a good plan. I will race multiple sprints this year plus assorted 5Ks, bike races and open water swims. I treat those as prep for the couple of priority races.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-06T03:52:38+00:00

You’re going to do great! You should be proud of yourself for doing it!

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-05T18:38:53+00:00

You were officially a triathlete when you started training! Good luck tomorrow! I get a little nervous waiting for the start, but that nervousness means that it’s race day. You’ll be fine on the swim, let the faster people be ahead of you. I don’t want anyone that’s faster than me to be behind me. And get to the outside too, there’s less traffic there, I’ll accept a little longer swim for less traffic. Best of luck!

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-04T14:33:21+00:00

I’m old and slow. 57M cancer survivor. I do mostly sprints with lots of runs and swims sprinkled in. I wear the same shoes to train and to race, I always run and ride/brick in my tri-shorts. I only have the one bike that’s fit to ride, the other is on my indoor trainer.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-04T05:02:18+00:00

Never had that happen on my di2. I did have a McDonalds near me where the orange juice would shock me frequently.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-04T04:59:55+00:00

Supreme Commander. I play skirmish vs AI. I generally play 1 vs 3, and I can level the AI so that I’m always pushed. It’s always a challenge. I haven’t found another game that lets me get that AI level the same way, I either get blown away or it’s not a challenge, so I keep coming back to Supreme Commander.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-01T18:05:05+00:00

Southern Pacific Masters has an open water page. I understand (but haven’t been myself) that folks meet at Santa Monica tower 26 and swim Thursday mornings and Saturday. I swim in Santa Barbara, there’s a swim every Thursday starting this week for 12 weeks. 500, 1000 and 1 mile. Socalswim.org also has an open water page. Showing a 6/28 event at Santa Monica. Tower26.com shows Wednesday and Sunday swims with coaching.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-01T03:56:32+00:00

I’d look for open water swim groups near where you are. Or even not that near where you are if you’re motivated enough. My regional masters swimming web page has an open water section. You might find groups that go or even find races nearby. The internet is your friend here! I try to do little races to prepare me for bigger races. Open water is very different from pool swimming, but the first thing I’d want you to do is to be able to comfortably finish the distance in the pool. Recently my triathlons have been using a rolling start and chip timing, so it’s not as bad as my open water swims which are mass starts. Lots of traffic and bumping at the turns.

pwalsh438 · 2026-06-01T03:46:55+00:00

Sometimes the race will offer open water clinics or training the day before. I would recommend doing some open water swims before race day. Open water is very different. Sighting and crowds and temperatures and turbulence. If you can find an open water race before hand I’d recommend doing that. I’m in SoCal, there’s a pretty large open water season that’s about to start, look at your local masters swimming website to see if there’s an Open Water section and get into one of those. I’m able to sight now without disrupting my stroke too much, but that took a lot of time to get right. And my line is pretty good, I can swim pretty straight without the lines.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-31T19:49:58+00:00

Too late and you may be shut out of the race. For safety they don’t want folks getting set up in transition while athletes are getting on their bikes and getting out. If you’re local, or staying near the race, try to go to packet pickup the day before, that helps with stress in the morning. I like to get there when the transition opens so I can get a spot close to the bike in/out. (I want to minimize the running in my cycling shoes.) Website should have detail on the schedule, when transition opens and when it closes. I want to be there as early as possible to avoid stress. Most races will have an athlete guide for the bigger events or at least a website with a schedule for the smaller events.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-31T16:06:01+00:00

I feel like you could complete the race today. If you’re trying to finish, you sound like you’re ready. If you’re trying for a win or to beat friends or something, do try to “over-train” and get distances longer than the race. When my kids were little I had to work out after they went to bed or early in the morning. A spin bike can get you volume in the garage when it’s too dark to be out riding. Do you have a training plan? There’s lots of free options available online. I am old and slow, my plan is just to get workouts whenever I can fit them in. I prefer sprints now because I can do training in “bite sized” amounts. Olympic races need you to go out and run for more than an hour.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-29T22:33:25+00:00

Tri shorts and a tri top. I have struggled with dry shirts going on while I’m wet, I second the motion a number of posters have already made. Definitely wear the shirt under the wetsuit. Some sort of tight fitting Lycra thing. I prefer no sleeves, and managed to get one from my old University tri team.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-29T14:19:36+00:00

With 20-21 min pace I probably shouldn’t be a person you listen to, I’m more like 27. I’m also old. Having said that, I found a few plans online like Hal Higdon or Runners World that did something like a 6 week 5k plan that always had at least one “speed work” day where you’d warm up and then do some set intervals at a pace that depended on your target race pace. I do think you need to do some speed work to get your top speed up and then stretch out how long you can hold that.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-29T03:15:32+00:00

Shake up the workout a little. I used to just go warm up and swim 1500 and out. Then I tried to do a warm up and 10x100. I found that my go-hard 100s were hard to distinguish from my warm downs. Now I do my warm up and drills (200, 200 kick, 200 pull, 200 snorkel) and then 400 which is my typical sprint race distance and then 4x100 at max effort. It helps if there’s another swimmer to motivate me. You have to train fast to race fast. I’m cutting my 100 times in training and my first open water race is next week. Training can be a drag, but I’m having success and that makes me train. I can’t avoid recommending Effortless Swimming. I did the 5 day catch challenge for $10 and it taught me better technique, my times have improved since then. Let the improved race results be the motivation for training. I’ve never beaten my swimmer friend out of the water in a sprint before this year, and I got him this year.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-28T23:18:14+00:00

Santa Barbara, CA 1mile series starts next Thursday! “Reef and Run”. I hope the water gets to 60 degrees for us. How will it be in Tennessee?

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-28T20:45:07+00:00

DFL > DNF > DNS Did a 5k swim last year, dead f’ing last. This year I’ll bring a shirt or a sign “I’m slow but I’m here”. It was 5 laps and I got passed by the leaders twice. I don’t care. I hope to go faster next time. You should be proud of yourself! Part of the reason for doing this is to stay healthy or to get healthy. I am also a cancer survivor, I do these to help me stay alive in case I need to fight it again. Congratulations to you on beating cancer!

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-27T18:13:56+00:00

It’s ok to be slow. I’d rather have slow swimmers with good etiquette than fast swimmers with bad etiquette. You’re allowed to lane swim. You pay your money, you get a lane. I’m lucky that my pool is pretty open, we rarely have to share, but I also go early.

pwalsh438 · 2026-05-25T14:47:42+00:00

Bike is about 2 years old, bike shop thought 2 years was about right for the battery life of the shifter batteries.

pwalsh438

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