7K Training Advice

[KatieK]

Hi All,
I'm (sort of) doing a 7K lake swim in a little less than two months from now. I say "sort of" because it's actually three events in a row--1K, 2K and 4K. I should have 10-15 minutes to rest between events.

I usually swim 2500-3000 yards at a time. That's a convenient distance for me because it takes about an hour. I swim at least once a day. If I feel like going in for a second swim, I swim as much or as little as I want. I swim at the lake at least once a week, twice if I can manage it. (BTW, I'm swimming so much because it's fun, not because I'm trying to train hard.)

Today I swam 4400 yards. That's the longest I've swam in one session. I did a 400-yard warm-up (drills and very slow whole stroke). Then I moved on to 4x1000. I did the first 3 1000s at 1.2s/stroke. For the last one, I turned off the Tempo Trainer and swam at a relaxed pace for the first 700 or so and then sped up when I realized I was at risk for getting kicked out of the pool before finishing.

Ideally, I'd like to alternate between tempos of 1.1 an 1.2 on the 1000s. I couldn't have done that today, though.

How often should I be doing long (4-5K plus) swims? How fast should I be incrementing the distance?

[naj]

Katie if water temp is not a factor then I would say doing 80% of the total distance once or so a week is sufficient. For myself - when I train for a swim - I try and follow this discipline. Concerning the incremental adjustments on the TT go with a gradual 10% increase imo. Hope this helps you and best of luck in the race!

Naji