Swimming News / Swimming Video Interview courtesy of Team Andrew Indie Swimming, a SwimSwam partner.
This interview was captured at the 2014 ASCA World Clinic. Coach Peter Andrew, Indie Swimming, conducts the interview.
5-time Olympic Medalist, Josh Davis, breaks down your swimming career, and why USRPT works for the majority of swimmers.
Michael Andrew (courtesy of Mike Lewis, Ola Vista Photography)
USRPT provides training materials associated with the Ultra Short Race Pace Training and is offering a Christmas Special – over $50 off when purchasing both titles – “Understanding and Implementing USRPT” featuring Dr. Brent Rushall and “How We Train with USRPT” featuring Michael Andrew and Peter Andrew. This special offer is good until December 25th.
Just found this thread and have read all of the comments. First, thank you Wave Rider for the very kind words.
I would like to point out a few things I have learned after using USRPT on my own exclusively for a year and a half. USRPT is not new. Dr. Rushall wrote about race pace training in an article published in Swimming World in May of (I believe) 1960. Over the years Olympic gold medalists have used many different training methods to achieve their goals. There have been the mega yardage eras and and other methods that have produced fast swims. Not every body type is the same. Not every swimmer has the drive and motivation of a Spitz… Read more »
A lot of interesting feed back to this post. I do find it very interesting that people will criticize Dave Salo. His, and Nova, method is similar to USRPT. I personally think Dave’s method is much more interesting and much more practical.
Coach Salo has been coaching with his particular method for at least 30 years. In those 30 years, he and Nova have helped a lot of swimmers accomplish their goals. Some became Olympians and some continue to swim even after their college years. All the results are there. You just have to look for them. Also, If top swimmers around the world are asking for your help, you must be doing something right. I want to be… Read more »
I’ve been swimming for a very long time, which does not make me a swimming expert, but I can tell my own experience with training USRPT. I train on my own, so I get very little feedback other than what I observe myself, ie stroke counts, etc. I read all about USRPT, and decided to try it out for 6 months. They were hard workouts, but with that came significant shoulder pain. I was eating ibuprofen like candy. I changed back to traditional training methods, and my shoulders are no longer bothering me. If I were 20 years younger, my body may have held up better. Did my technique suffer with USRPT, I don’t know, like I said, I get… Read more »
USRPT is a great program. For about 6 months I swam 10-12k a day hoping when taper came that I would see great results. I swam slower in every event and was disappointed when I realized it did not help. I tried USRPT for my highschool season and I swam personal bests going about 2k-3k a day. Sprint track athletes do not train to run the marathon, so why should a 50 freestyler?
Nice summary Josh. If youre still reading these comments, I thought it was important for you to hear from a masters swimmer (and former USA National Team Member) 10+ years older than yourself. Like you, Ive been conducting the USRPT experiment on myself for the last year or so. Results: Swam faster than I did last year AND the year before. After age 40, we supposed to be getting slower each year, not faster. i swim 3-4 times per week for 60-90 min and exclusively USRPT. I am self coached and often swim alone, although I would definitely prefer a coach with a stopwatch and a group training environment. Best times in many events ranging from the 50 free all… Read more »
Dave is too humble to say it but he was also an Olympian – and in the 1500! If he feels this type of training can work, take a look. I know what he did to make the Team and it was not a Sunday stroll to say the least (70’s over-over-over distance). No one’s forcing you to do this exclusively – try some of it and see, then commit or go back to the grind.
Michael Phelps like Michael Andrews is a special variation. The other 99.999% of athletes don’t have the time, money, etc…to execute their training in this way. It took several gold medals to afford Michael Phelps this luxury.
Whenever someone comes to the market with products and systems that are “faster, easier, and take less time” and they are making money off of these products and systems the buyer needs to be wary.
To me, the over promotion of USRPT smacks of the old snake oil salesmen of yesteryear.
I’m old, so the expression, “nothing worthwhile is ever easy” resonates with me. USRPT has a place in the toolkit but in my opinion, it’s not the only tool… Read more »
I wish you wouldn’t equate less volume to ‘easy’…
It’s funny, because I use the “nothing worthwhile is ever easy” quote with my athletes… it’s HARD for a 2:02 200y Freestyler to hold 30.2’s for 16x50s on :50… just as it would be HARD for them to hold 2:12’s for 8x200s on 2:30…
It just comes down to which is preferred by who’s coaching him/her and what they feel is more relevant.
The whole USRPT movement reminds me of the Amway pyramid marketing scheme of the 1970’s. Who is making money off of USRPT?
Is USRPT to the swim world what any one of a thousand “diet pills” or products/systems are to the weight loss market? You can look at any bodybuilding magazine with more advertisements and promises of short cuts if you take their products or use their system, than actual scientific articles, that certainly gives me hesitation to jump on the bandwagon.
Aren’t the folks leading the USRPT movement also selling supplements in a multi-tier marketing fashion?
The gold standard of USRPT is a young man who has not had traditional schooling since he was a pre-teen, trains… Read more »
Clark – as for your question of how many other swimmers in the world have this sort of system to train in, I can think of one: the gold standard for ALL swimming, Michael Phelps.
Who is making money off of USRPT? Dr. Rushall has a website devoted to USRPT and most of the information is available for free. He has e-books on swim techniques and pedagogy for $25 each, but that’s not too expensive. There’s a 7 dvd set on USRPT recorded when he presented the information at a seminar last year. Most of the information is already on his website. I don’t think Dr. Rushall is making a lot of money promoting USRPT because so much of the information is available for free. MA is promoting P2Life, but that’s not USRPT. There are USRPT clinics offered by Team Andrew, but there are thousands of swim clinics out there. That’s not exceptional.
USRPT………..BS
I’m going to study what Mike Bottom, Dave Salo, Bill Rose, Catherine Vogt, Dave Marsh, and others are doing too.
From what I understand Salo’s approach is very similar…just saying.