03/25/03 Gloves-Nekked Hands-Paddles

03/25/03 Last night I had a rare 90 minutes of free pool time between coaching assignments, so I did this practice. I repeated the same set three times -- first with fistgloves, then with "nekked" hands, then with paddles. I counted strokes throughout the sets, and tried to keep the same number of strokes per lap, regardless of what I was wearing (or not wearing) on my hands. The point of this is to gradually add surface area to your hands, and to add "stroke rate" as you add more surface area. This goes against your instinct to start pulling harder and "bigger" as you add more surface area. Instead, you need to think about letting go a little bit, letting your hands and arms slip through the water at a little faster rate.WARMUP: 200200 easy swim.MAIN SET: 30001 X 2001 X 1751 X 1501 X 1251 X 1001 X 751 X 501 X 25Even swims: freestyleOdd swims: backstrokeFor recovery between swims, I did as many "bobs" as I had done laps on the prior swim. For example, after the 200 (8 lengths of the pool), I did 8 bobs as recovery.Wear fistgloves the first time through. Wear nothing (nekked hands) the second time through. Wear paddles the third time through.I tried to hold a stroke count of 15 throughout the entire set. I came pretty close, but some of the fistglove laps crept up to 17 and some of the paddle laps were at 14. WARMDOWN: 300With flippersAlternate one lap of short-axis drill with one lap of Body-Dolphin Breaststroke.Total Yardage: 3500