Winter Level I/II Practice Schedule- Revised Schedule x 2

This session is designed for anyone getting ready for the 2010 triathlon season (or wants to learn how to swim) who feels they need help defining or refining their swim technique. The emphasis is on technique, body position so thatis reduces drag and stroke count, propulsion, power and increasing speed. You can't go faster

until your technique is correct. We promise to teach you more about swimming than you ever care to know....

What will you get out of this class?

1. How to swim with a group

2. Coach Feedback

3. More info about swim technique than you ever care to know

4. An email after every practice discussing what you worked on at practice

5. Videos of all the drills you

work on

6. Swimming articles and online videos

7. Email with coach to discuss swimming

We would love to help you with your swimming!

Practice Schedule:

Start Date: Tuesday, February 9

End Date: Wednesday, April 28

20 Practices TOTAL we would like for you to attend.

1st practice is MANDATORY!!!!!

All Practices are held at the Williamson County Rec Center (ISC)-

920 Heritage Way, Brentwood, TN, 37027

Practice Schedule:

Tue, February 9- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, February 14- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, February 16- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, February 21- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, February 23- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, February 28- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, March 2- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, March 7- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, March 9- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, March 14- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, March 16- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, March 21- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, March 23- 7:15-8:30pm

Sun, March 28- 1:15-2:30pm

Tue, March 30- 7:15-8:30pm

Wed, April 7- 6:15-8:00pm

Wed, April 14- 6:15-8:00pm

Wed, April 21- 6:15-8:00pm

Wed, April 28- 6:15-8:00pm

Semester COST: $375

*1st Practice is MANDATORY!* You will not be getting in the pool for the first session.

It is a class room setting.
*Do bring your fins and pull buoy to the first practice,
so we can make sure you got the correct ones.

How do you reserve a spot for Fall?
1. Email Ashley triash@gmail.com to reserve your spot.
2. Bring your check made out to Excel Aquatics to the first class.Class cost is $375

What equipment do you need for swimming with Excel?
1. Swimsuit* Men are NOT allowed to wear board shorts or trunks with pockets.Jammers are your best options.
A picture of what a jammer looks like is attached to the email.
*Men and Women- any suit made of polyester is the way to go!
Poly suits will last years!

*Women- the cutest suits in the world can be found atSplish.comSplish offers many suits in a poly blend!

2. Goggles
Finding the right pair of goggles-

A. Take them out of the package and try them on at the store
B. Without putting the strap around your head, stick goggles to your faceC. If goggles stick to your face for a few seconds then you found a pair of keepers.

3. Cap- if your hair gets in your eyes or mouth while you swim* we have caps for sale at the pool for $3. They say Excel on them.

4. Fins
Attached is a picture of what shape they should be. Just about any brand will do.

Scuba fins do NOT work for this class!

Please do not go to Dicks Sporting goods, any sporting goods store or scuba shop to buy fins.

They do NOT have the correct ones.

5. Pull Buoy

Below is a picture of what a pull buoy looks like.* The TYR, Nike, or Speedo buoys are great to get.

Where can you buy your swim equipment?
Stores is located in Cool Springs Shopping area:
1. Endurance Sports and Rec

2. All American Swim and Surf In Nashville:Stores Located in Nashville:

3.. Team Nashville off of West End
If you prefer to buy your stuff online, swimoutlet.com is about the

best place to buy it.

We look forward to working with you,
Dee Davis and Ashley Whitney

Use All Your Senses When Swimming to Reduce Drag | Active.com

Use All Your Senses When Swimming to Reduce Drag | Active.com

Become More Efficient By Finishing Your Stroke | Active.com

Become More Efficient By Finishing Your Stroke | Active.com

Stuck in the Slow Lane? Try These 10 Ways to Swim Faster | Page 3 | Active.com

Stuck in the Slow Lane? Try These 10 Ways to Swim Faster | Page 3 | Active.com

Freestylers Should Be Free With Their Strokes | Active.com

Freestylers Should Be Free With Their Strokes | Active.com

Decoding a Swim Workout

Found on Active.com

Walking into a swim club, Masters or triathlon club swim session for the first time can be an intimidating and confusing experience. Fear rises in you as you stroll across the deck, working your way through the gear and fit bodies to a crowd standing around a dry erase board.

As you peer through the crowd, you realize you have no idea what the fellow dressed in the Speedo polo shirt with a whistle and stopwatch is saying. You are even more confused when you glance at the board and see nothing but brackets with numbers and letters. What is going on here?

Ideally, when a newbie inquires about joining a swim club, the coach provides a quick personal orientation session, and thus spares him or her much of the potential stress of that first workout. But it doesn't always work out that way, so here is a different sort of orientation to help you decode the swim workout.

The Language of Swimming

The language of the swim workout is fairly simple and basically made up of abbreviations, numbers and a few terms. While most of what is written on the board will be fairly consistent among all coaches, there will always be variations, and it will still take a week or two to get to know your coach's swim set language.

Here is a list of the most common terms and abbreviations:

FR = Freestyle stroke	EZ = Easy
Fly = Fly	RI = Rest interval
BR= Breaststroke	w/ = With
BK = Backstroke	Dr = Drill
w-up = Warm-up	CH = Choice
c-d = Cool-down	PP = Pull + paddles

Here are some less common terms and abbreviations:

IM = Individual medley (all four strokes swum in the order of Fly/ BK/ BR /FR)

Lung busters entail purposely restricting the number of breaths you take while swimming. For example, "breathe 5 or 7" would mean "breathe once every 5 strokes or 7 strokes."

SG = Swim golf, a fun drill in which you add your stroke count for a given interval (say, 50 yards/meters) to your time for the same interval to generate a composite score

Band = Band only, a strength drill where one wears a band around his or her ankles to limit the kick

DPS = Distance per stroke, a drill where the swimmer tries to get as much distance as possible out of each stroke, usually measured by counting strokes for 50m

(NS) = Negative split, where the second half of the distance is swum faster than the first (e.g. (-) 100m)

"Descending" and "ascending" refer to swimming increasingly fast through a set (descending) or starting fast and then getting slower through a set (ascending).

There are quite a few swim drills, as well, including sculling (Sc), fist, head up (h-up), drag finger tips (dft) and one arm. These drills work mainly on "feel" for the catch and pull phases of the stroke.

Deciphering the Workout

After you've learned the basics, the next step is learning to read a swim set. Swim set descriptions are usually fairly clear. Sometimes, however, as in the world of academics, where it often seems the professor is either trying to confuse his or her students more or just impress them with his grasp of the English language, the swim coach can get carried away as well.

The bottom line is that we are just describing a workout. Sure, it can be creative, but it should make sense and be simple enough for people to remember.

For example:

2x (4x50m FR 1-4 on :45 / :55 / 50 choice ez :15 RI )

OR

2x 4x50FR 1-4 on :45 / :55
50 ez :15 RI

These two sets are identical and show that there are a few ways to write the same thing. This set reads as two sets of 4x50m with 50m swim choice in between. There will always be a few monster sets with brackets within brackets, and then you will have to rely on your old college math and physics classes to help you make sense of them.

I also threw in a send-off time. That's the part that reads "on :45 and :55", which means that if the 50m took you 38 seconds, you then have seven seconds of rest left before you have to go again in the case of the 45-second send-off and 17 seconds of rest if you go on the 55-second send-off. For 100m sets you will have send-offs of 1:15, 1:20, 1:30, and so on.

The entire swim workout is comprised of sets. Usually the coach will start everyone off with a warm-up, and then maybe a little drill set followed by perhaps another little pre-set with some descending 50's to get the swimmers ready for the main set. After the main set, it is pretty common to go right into the cool-down, but you never know what kind of mood your coach will be in. You may find yourself having a kick set thrown your way before it is all over.

I hope this little lesson helped you make some sense of what is on the dry erase board and ultimately avoid any possible personal embarrassment.

Workout, Wednesday, December 16, 2009

20 Minute Warm Up

8 x 75 2 of each stroke 1:30-2:30

25 kick, 25 drill, 25 swim

2 fly, 2 back, 2 free all with fins

2 breastroke no fins

3 x 400 pull on 6:30, 7:00, 7:30, 8:00

10 x 100 1:40, 1:50, 2:00

Odd 100's = IM

Even 100's = Free Kick to the 3 blue line off every wall under water fly kick

Warm down No Free 50

Total- 2800 yards

Workout, Tuesday, December 15, 2009

4 x 100 25 = 1-2-3 drill fins 1:30-1:40 or 1:50

30 Rest

8 x 25 One eye drill fins :30

30 Rest

8 x 25 catch up quick drill NO fins :40

12 x 25 :30

fist, fork, spoon - 4 of each

6 x 50 until drill 1:00 - 1:10

Units = number of strokes + your time it took to swim the 50.

4 x 50 = UNDER/ OVERS!!! (we skipped these to get to the pull set)

3 x 500 pull 7:30 or 8:00

Total- 2900 yards

Workout, Sunday, December 13, 2009

20 Minute Warm Up

14-20 x 50 with fins on 1:00-1:20

odds- fly kick

even- swim your choice of stroke

400-300-200-100 swim free working on stroke count.

Count strokes 1st 50 and last 50. count should be the same.

20 RI

6-10 x 100 pull 1:45-2:20

breathing pattern 3-5 100's

Warm Down

Total-3000 +WU/WD

Workout, Wednesday, December 9, 2009

20 Minute Warm Up

14 x 100 or 12 x 100
1. Fr 1:40, 2:00
2. kick fly/br 2:00, 2:30
3. Fr
4. back drill
5. fr
6. BR kick
7. fr

18 x 50 pull on :50- 1:10

3-5-7 breathing pattern by 50's

25 kick

50 swim dps

75 kick/drill/swim

100 swim dps

125 drill/swim by 25's

150 dps

175 fast/easy by 25's

200 dps

20 RI

Workout, Tuesday, December 8, 2009

20 Minute Warm Up

12 x 75 fins- 1:30- 1:45
free- fly- free
free- bk- free
free- br-free
free- ch- free

30 Rest

fly free fly

back free back

breast free breast

choice free choice

30 rest

free- fly- free
free- bk- free
free- br-free
free- ch- free

30 Rest after each set of 4

1 x 300 FR 4:30-6:00
4 x 150 pull 2:00-2:30
1 x 300 FR
4 x 100 kick 2:00, 2:30
1 x 300 FR
4 x 50 Fast/East 1:00

Warm Down

Total- 3000 Yards + WU + WD

Workout, Wednesday, December 2

600- 2 x (200 swim free /50 breast kick/50 back drill)
8x50 @ :50-1:15 (descend stroke count 1-4)
4x50 @ :50- 1:10 descend times 1-4
4x100 swim @ 1:30- 2:15
400 pull smooth
4x100 swim @ 2:30
400 pull smooth
4x50 @ 1:30 - 2:00 (kick/drill by 25)
200 cool down
*3200 Total*

A must read article on EVF

This article was found on the USAT website- http://www.usatriathlon.org/pages/7899

By Lee Zohlman

Lap after lap, day after day, season after season you swim at the pool with hope that in your next race it will just click. You wish for a smooth, powerful Phelpsesque stroke that will leave you feeling fresh and ready to bike and run your way to glory or in the very least the finish line. Perhaps you've been fortunate to work with a coach or two and those swim books are still on your desk waiting to be cracked open at your lunch break and the words and pictures absorbed into your tri head. You understand in theory what you want your body to do in the water and you can visualize the perfect stroke in your head but for some reason an element is missing, a piece of the aqua puzzle. You begin checking off the components of the swim stroke you comprehend, your body position is much better and you have fixed where the hand should enter the water, the reach after entry is there as well. Now what?

While you address the fundamentals of the swim-stroke-like balance and rotation you can begin to integrate where the power of the swim stroke comes from. This part of the stroke can be called the catch and pull phase and this is one of the most crucial areas to work on. Having a good catch and pull phase will help you move more distance with fewer strokes and this is good stuff. You will be able to have better economy of movement in the water and after training this component you will be setting PRs.

Let's get down to the nitty gritty. U.S. Masters Swim Coach of the Year Emmet Hines says, "If you are using the fullest extent of your wing span in each stroke (i.e., stretching your stroke out in front and finishing your stroke completely in the rear) you should be able to move approximately the length of your wing span with each freestyle stroke. (In real life we find that some of the best swimmers move even farther than their wing span with each stroke." This can be accomplished by catching and pulling the water correctly. After your hand enters the water and you extend your arm to reach you will want to grab a handful of water by flexing your hand downward but keeping the arm relatively straight. This step takes place in less than a second so it is a very quick movement.

The beginning of this step is seen here:

To work on this in the pool you can use the various drills:

• One arm drill - this will allow you to focus on one arm at a time.
• Sculling in the front - simply extend your arms out straight in front of you, head is looking down and you are flutter kicking. At the same time you are pushing and pulling water with your hands. Your arms remain straight and you are just working on grabbing a handful of water.

Now that you have this big handful of water, what are you going to do with it? Now you begin to pull the water straight down. You do not want to pull out to the side. The KEY aspect to pulling the water is keeping your elbow up and NOT going into a straight arm pull. By keeping your elbow up you will be able to engage larger and more powerful muscles in your back. You do not want to cross over your mid line either or reach your hand towards your neck in this phase. An example of a bent arm pull is in Step 3 in the photo below.

Some drills you can use to develop this are:

• On dry land with elastic exercise tubing to practice the steps of the stroke and to develop the neuromuscular patterning you will need in the water.
• One-arm drill or catch up drill to isolate one arm at a time in a slow and focused stroke. You will be able to see where your arm/hand is going and fix it without having to worry about the other arm. With catch up drill you have one arm in front of you all the time so one hand doesn't start stroking until the other hand catches up to it.
• Paddles and pull buoy work will help you develop more swim specific strength and power and assist you in a better feel of the water.
• Once you are starting to be proficient at swimming and with a good foundation you can tie your legs together with a rubber tube or elastic band. This will force you to focus on body position and pulling hard through the water. Warning: this is a toughie.

Make sure you finish each stroke by pushing your hand all the way down so your thumb brushes your thigh before you begin to pull your elbow up on the recovery phase.

You can make very large gains in your swim by incorporating this information to your current routine. But in the end you will still have to be there lap after lap, day after day and season after season.

Lee Zohlman is a USA Triathlon Level 3 Coach. To reach your goals please contact him at leezee@bodyzen.com or visit www.bodyzen.com.