SwimSwam wants to give you an inside look at what a normal day-in-the-life looks like for any given swimmer, and how that differs from team to team or city to city. We send our head of production, Coleman Hodges, to be a fly on the wall at practice, then relay what he discovered back to you over pancakes. Or at least breakfast.
Time to complete the double. If you didn’t see it already, on a typical Thursday morning, Katie Ledecky, True Sweetser, Simone Manuel, and Lia Neal have a specified workout with Greg Meehan. On those days, Ledecky and Sweetser come back in the afternoon and swim an afternoon workout as well. And every Thursday afternoon, Greg Meehan‘s 400 IM group is in action.
Lets give this group a little bit of context before we delve into the main set. The 4 girls leading lanes (for most of the set) placed 1,2,4, and 14 at this year’s NCAAs. The 3 that were in the A final all dipped under 4:00. The 2 that went 1-2 have both held the American record (yards) at one point in this event. And that’s just the leading 4. So let’s see what battle Greg had these girls fight today.
Main Set:
(Pace +, Pace, Pace – by chunk for each stroke progression)
8×50 @ 1:00
2 fly, 1 kick strong, 2 fly, 1 kick fast, 2 fly
300 Free FAST
11×50 @ :50/1:00 (kick)
3 back, 1 kick strong, 3 back, 1 kick fast, 3 back
200 Free FAST
14×50 @ :50/1:00 (kick)
4 breast, 1 EZ, 4 breast, 1 EZ, 4 breast
100 Free FAST
This practice was THE SAME DAY as Katie’s practice with Sweetser??!! Words fail. I don’t want to analyze it too much. I’ll just enjoy Ms. Ledecky while she’s here, competing and doing things no one else has ever done.
Wait a sec….was this the same day as the previous practice?
Apparently, yes, which makes it even more ridiculous.
Imagine being a girl going 3:20 in a 300 lc free in practice and getting destroyed
I was also impressed with Easin’s 1:02 100 free at the end, but again, next to Ledecky it looked pedestrian.
*Eastin
All that water — I wish! Tomorrow morning I’ll share one of the four 25-yard lanes allotted to our masters group with 5 of my closest friends, and love it just as much.
Don’t know where else to post this. Seems like Belichick runs his program like almost all swim teams do. I guess hardwork isn’t for everyone.
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000935157/article/donta-hightower-playing-for-pats-not-for-everybody
Ledecky is stupid fast. 303, 200, 58… you’re kidding
From a push. In the middle of a brutal practice.
How many swimmers, of any ability, can go within 7 seconds of their 200 free PB in heavy practice?
And 7 seconds is a lot bigger proportion of her swim than it is most of us!
Katie has a rockstar freestyle, but ugh, her breaststroke is painful to watch.
It’s still faster than yours.
lol loved that one
Good one
Maybe her stroke isn’t pretty, but I was amazed how well she was keeping up with Eastin and Forde on breastroke! Apparently conditioning helps. Who would have thought that was true? 😉
Oof