Swimming Set of the Week - February 12, 2010

In honor of Valentine's Day on Sunday, this week's set is a cardio challenge.   It's not a lot of yardage, but it will test your heart in more ways than one.  

The set is 10 X 100 on a 3-minute sendoff, trying for the best possible average time.  

There are several ways to swim this set.  Some of them were discussed in a previous forum string on goswim.tv.    Typically, you would do the same stroke (or IM) all the way through the set.  You could start from the blocks or from the water; just be consistent.

Some cautions:
1.  Prior to starting the set, do an adequate warmup of at least 1000.  Start with some slow, easy swimming/drilling, progress to some repeats at threshold pace, and finish with some shorter repeats that push your heart rate just a bit.  Finish the workout with an adequate warmdown of 200 to 400.  
2.  These are not all-out, race-effort swims.   Race-effort swims done over and over again can be hard on your nervous system.   If you follow the REC, EN1, EN2, EN3, SP1, SP2, SP3 parameters, this set would be swum in the SP1 zone.   A reasonable goal would be to swim all 10 X 100 at your best racing time plus 10 to 15%.  E.g., if your best 100 freestyle is 1 minute, you might try to hold  1:06 to 1:09 on these swims (60 seconds X 110% = 66 seconds; 60 seconds X 115% = 69 seconds).  

Valentine's Day Weekend is also "Swim Quick" weekend.  This is an event created by Swim Across America (SAA), whose mission is to raise money and awareness for cancer research, prevention and treatment through swimming-related events.  Swim Quick weekend was created by SAA to honor 6-time Olympic coach Richard Quick, who died last year of brain cancer.  If you'd like to dedicate your weekend swim to coach Quick or to a loved one affected by cancer, you can find out more at Swim Across America.