Discover your life aquatic

Bahamas Swim Camp Day 2

As the weather continued to make some beaches unsuitable, we headed back to Deal's beach for the second day of camp, focusing on morning group sessions, afternoon private coaching and a long swim with tempo trainers to help us hit our stride. 

We were fortunate to have three Sea Hiker coaches in attendance for this camp which allowed each to concentrate on certain areas. Coach Stewart began the day with effective arm stroke techniques (recovery, entry, catch, pull and finish) while Coach Jen focused on the use of the kick to improve rotation and speed without creating more drag (with two beat kick and rotation drills).

These two skills are essential and naturally complement each other when learning awareness of body rotation and how to use arms and legs for leverage.

Coach Peter's focus was to help swimmers with breathing, tempo, and open water confidence. 

But there were others taking part in our activities:

As Peter walked out to place the swim buoys, he saw an octopus shift in the sand and then suddenly change colour rapidly. It turned dark brown, trying to mimic a small patch of sea grass.

Linda found a lone crab running for cover in the shallows and while we took a break between sessions, a pod of bonefish swept through the shallows, mere inches from shore.

Later, a large stingray settled on the sand next to a pile of discarded conch shells, a mere inches from shore, posing for photos and giving everyone an afternoon thrill.

Wonder what they thought of us swimming in their backyard?

Stroke Tempo Fun

We finished off the day with a swim to a boat moored down along the west side of the beach each with a Tempo Trainer Pro. With this device, everyone got a chance to discover a better stroke rate for efficient stroke mechanics without over gliding (tempo too slow) or getting choppy and turbulent (tempo too fast).

Most found their most comfortable tempo was in the 48-55 stroke per minute range. The challenge always is, however, to ensure that your "comfortable" tempo is also your most efficient. Comfortable is often a misleading sensation, but the exercises we did helped many swimmers feel how increasing tempo to some degree, usually by 4-6 SPM, made their stroke smoother and faster.

Jen and Stewart found their best tempo was in the mid to low forties and yet they were swimming the fastest in the group. Peter's general stroke rate is in the low fifties. Lots of open water swimmers opt for an even faster stroke rate upwards of 60-70 SPM. 

As expected the coaches had lower stroke rates, illustrating how much further they travel per each stroke. It is no accident that each of them have worked hard on increasing distance per stroke in a variety of different ways without sacrificing speed.

What's the best stroke tempo?

Well, there are several answers to this question. It depends on how fast you are swimming. It also depends on the conditions for any given open water swim. Lots of chop and current will penalize a swimmer with a lower stroke tempo as you will spend more time exposed to oncoming water on each stroke.

If you're trying to find your best tempo, you need to measure and experiment constantly. A Tempo Trainer makes this easy (if you don't mind the constant beeping) or you can do it subjectively as follows, by creating a mantra or beat in your head:

• Slow tempo: say "stroke and..... stroke and......breathe and...." (40-45 SPM)
• Relaxed tempo: say "stroke and stroke and breathe...." (45-50 SPM)
• Moderate tempo: say "stroke..stroke..breathe..stroke...stroke...breathe..." (50-55 SPM)
• Faster tempo: say " stroke! stroke! breathe! stroke! stroke! breathe!" (55-65 SPM depending on your timing)

Tempo Awareness Challenge 1: A really great exercise is to try this out and have someone adjust a tempo trainer to match your stroke rhythm and write them down for each gear. Try 3 x 50m or 2 x 100m for each tempo to see if you can change your tempo with accuracy.

Tempo Awareness Challenge 2: If you regularly use a Tempo Trainer Pro, try the same exercise : Can you achieve your desired SPM or shift gears at will without the beeping as a guide?

At the end of the day, with the sun setting into the ocean - something we never see in Vancouver - the moon rose up in the east with Venus and Jupiter shining brightly. With another day of ocean swimming and learning behind us, we looked forward to a Blue Hole adventure.

Next post: Day 3 - The  Blue Hole Experience