Rowing to complement age group swimmer...

[HonestJohn]

Looking for any help/ideas on a rowing routine/schedule to compliment a 13 year old swimmer's program. What I notice is she "freezes up" in the last 25 meters of her races. Seems to be lactic acid build up or just muscle exhaustion.

She swims 7-8 times a week ~30,000 yards or more for about 1.5 to 2.5 hours per session.
Dryland workouts 3 times a week @ 30 minutes
Short distance running 1-3 miles 2-3 times a week

A very rough estimate of her VO2 Max is 51 ( per her Apple watch - don't plan on having her tested professionally - she's 13)

They work on endurance at swim practice, lots of freestyle yardage which seems to be the norm in American age group swimming. I feel this is not the correct way as it creates repetitive stress injury in their shoulders - the stats are there to prove that. I would rather her take some days off swimming and incorporate other activities that will build her endurance without all of the laps. While I would like her to be in another sport for balance we simply can't manage it.

I have read some stuff on HIIT workouts to increase VO2 Max and would love to hear what type of rowing routine would benefit her and help her reach her goals. In addition to that, possibly something to replace a few of her 7000 yard workouts that will give her similar if not better benefits.

I have read some other posts on diet and getting enough protein and carbs. It's difficult these days to wade through dietary info which seem geared to the obesity epidemic sweeping the country. She has a hard time keeping weight on with all that she does.

TIA

[kini62]

The skierg translates better to swimming as it uses pretty much the same upper body muscle group without the stress on the shoulders.

I have bad shoulders that even a little bit of swimming aggravates but I can do 10k on the skierg without issue.

As for the fading in the last 25 it could be nothing more than a pacing issue.

[Tsnor]

Looking for any help/ideas on a rowing routine/schedule to compliment a 13 year old swimmer's program. What I notice is she "freezes up" in the last 25 meters of her races. Seems to be lactic acid build up or just muscle exhaustion.

A very rough estimate of her VO2 Max is 51 ( per her Apple watch - don't plan on having her tested professionally - she's 13)

Race duration ? Sprinting is really different than endurance work.

Huge VO2

edit: also suggest you talk offline with her coach. Find the best way to go forward working together. Sometimes having 2 people give somewhat conflicting advice to an athlete is stressful for the athlete. Coach will have an opinion on what is happening and best way to fix it. Coach may also have overreach / overtraining concerns if the athlete starts doing independent workouts. At 13 keeping kids loving the sport is step 1 and there are many way (including winning) to do that.

[PaulG]

She swims 7-8 times a week ~30,000 yards or more for about 1.5 to 2.5 hours per session.
Dryland workouts 3 times a week @ 30 minutes
Short distance running 1-3 miles 2-3 times a week

TIA

Is that all in one week? 14 hours/week in the pool plus dry land training? I may be overstepping my bounds, but as a father of two female athletes that seems way too much unless she is posting world class age group times. Even then overuse injury and burnout is often a problem.

Multi sport youth athletes are the healthiest and happiest but you know your daughter better than I do.

[davebray]

Youngsters have no control or experience of pre race nerves. This may not be anything to do with training/fitness, but pre-race nerves/tension. Adrenalin rushes prior to race can burn an awful lot of energy and leave her exhausted before even starting a race. I suggest you try to get her to mentally visualise the whole race process from getting change through the start and through the race. Practice this and she will be metally prepared
to manage pre race tensions.

[alien878]

I was a competitive swimmer though out the 80s and started rowing 2.5 years ago to get back in shape. In hindsight, I wish I had rowed when I was swimming. I had the opportunity to occasionally use the rowing team’s model A, but I rarely took advantage of it. There are two main reasons I wish I had:

Core Strength: Swimmers have a lot of core strength, but it isn’t always balanced. I didn’t realize how much of a swimmer’s slouch I had until it disappeared after I started rowing. My occasional lower back muscle pain also seems to have disappeared.

Endurance: Steady state training in a pool is boring. That’s why most training is set work to help break up the monotony. This results in a workout where the HR is constantly going up and down. A steady state moderate HR is a more efficient way of building endurance, but not many swimmers are willing to do a lot of 4x1500m or 2x3000m workouts. On the erg, the boredom can be reduced with podcasts, Netflix, etc. I expect replacing the occasional 1.5 hour set workout with a 1 hour steady state on the erg would be beneficial (and save time).

As an added bonus, erging has a low injury risk (if done with proper technique).

A few disclaimers:

* Don’t start anything without first discussing with her coach.
* Find someone who knows what they are doing to teach her a good technique. Her swimming instincts are probably going to lead to bad form at the start and possibly injuries.
* Leave the sprint and interval training in the pool where it belongs. Use the erg for steady state (UT) workouts with low drag (~100), low SPM (~20) and moderate SPI (power per stroke). This should best compliment the weaknesses of pool and weight training.

As for hitting the wall in the last 25m of a race, is she training in yards and racing in meters? That would definitely mess up pacing. One way to to counter it is to replace sets of 100, 200, 400, etc. with sets of 125, 225, 450, etc. Pacing can take years to learn. It is a complex mix of control, endurance and pain tolerance. She’ll get it if she works on it.

Cheers,

Allen H

[HonestJohn]

Looking for any help/ideas on a rowing routine/schedule to compliment a 13 year old swimmer's program. What I notice is she "freezes up" in the last 25 meters of her races. Seems to be lactic acid build up or just muscle exhaustion.

A very rough estimate of her VO2 Max is 51 ( per her Apple watch - don't plan on having her tested professionally - she's 13)

Race duration ? Sprinting is really different than endurance work.

Huge VO2

edit: also suggest you talk offline with her coach. Find the best way to go forward working together. Sometimes having 2 people give somewhat conflicting advice to an athlete is stressful for the athlete. Coach will have an opinion on what is happening and best way to fix it. Coach may also have overreach / overtraining concerns if the athlete starts doing independent workouts. At 13 keeping kids loving the sport is step 1 and there are many way (including winning) to do that.

Very late reply because my notification settings weren't set up properly.

Coach calls me when she takes a day off and complains she won't be competitive if we continue doing that - she is a star on the team. I think she overtrains in the pool and would like more balance in her regimen, but can't get the coach on board - he just wants her at practice to swim. Says, "kids this age are like energizer bunnies and can do whatever you throw at them".

I had to speak with the board about introducing a stretching awareness program - so many kids getting out of the pool with shoulder pain including mine. I have talked about recovery days and the coach says, "Recovery is built into the sets". So, we really can't connect with the coach who is not treating her as an individual. She has an athletic trainer now who does treat her as an individual and keeps tabs on her trouble spots, shoulder tightness and knees.

As far as loving the sport, she is in the car before me when practice time approaches. Yells at me that it's time to get going. When that stops I will start probing.

[HonestJohn]

She swims 7-8 times a week ~30,000 yards or more for about 1.5 to 2.5 hours per session.
Dryland workouts 3 times a week @ 30 minutes
Short distance running 1-3 miles 2-3 times a week

TIA

Is that all in one week? 14 hours/week in the pool plus dry land training? I may be overstepping my bounds, but as a father of two female athletes that seems way too much unless she is posting world class age group times. Even then overuse injury and burnout is often a problem.

Multi sport youth athletes are the healthiest and happiest but you know your daughter better than I do.

Yes, that is all in one week - mostly at the middle of the season. She is a highly competitive swimmer and ranked well nationally. However, she "plateaued" as they say in swimming parlance the past three seasons while her direct competitors kept improving. My feeling on that term is that she is not getting the correct individual training, but can't get the coach to discuss it. He has a one size fits all approach and I think that mentality is what creates the so called "plateaus" - athletes not getting the training they need as individuals. That could mean more time off or any combination of things. Maybe less endurance work and more power or strength training.

Would love to do multi-sport, but can't manage it with one car and two children. Next best idea was to have her take a day or two off from swimming and do something else, run, row, sleep - but the coach won't discuss trading one day of swimming for another form of exercise.

[Tsnor]

very scary -->

"Coach calls me when she takes a day off and complains she won't be competitive if we continue doing that " "kids this age are like energizer bunnies and can do whatever you throw at them". "Recovery is built into the sets".

Overreach/overtraining is bad. this podcast might help you know when to intervene and stop things cold. https://www.fasttalklabs.com/fast-talk/ ... d-burnout/

[HonestJohn]

very scary -->

Overreach/overtraining is bad. this podcast might help you know when to intervene and stop things cold. https://www.fasttalklabs.com/fast-talk/ ... d-burnout/

It’s tough. We’re supposed to put our faith in the coach and not question the program because we’re parents not coaches. That doubt will seep into the coach/athlete relationship and destroy performance. Don’t want to be a reactionary when it comes to coach comments but have to take him at his word when my athlete is underperforming.

[Tsnor]

It’s tough. We’re supposed to put our faith in the coach and not question the program because we’re parents not coaches. That doubt will seep into the coach/athlete relationship and destroy performance. Don’t want to be a reactionary when it comes to coach comments but have to take him at his word when my athlete is underperforming.

Huge problem. No good answer from me on how to succeed. Absolutely do not have blind faith in the competence of high school coaches. Do make sure your daughter understands the research and understands the issues. If she is nationally ranked then she needs to make choices based on good information. Consider finding a local college with a strong swimming program and talk to their coach on how their program runs. College coaches are in it for love of the sport and will gladly make time for you (or at least that is true in the rowing world). Elite swimmers, rowers, runners, skiers do not do the intensity of workouts you describe.

The information you posted earlier is an absolutely classic description of non-functional overreach from a focus on 4 or more hard sessions a week.

Yes, that is all in one week - mostly at the middle of the season. She is a highly competitive swimmer and ranked well nationally. However, she "plateaued" as they say in swimming parlance the past three seasons while her direct competitors kept improving.

If you can ignore the snark, this youtube video from an elite endurance cyclist explains the science behind why the training routine you described leads to plateau at best. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0n-nnRbFBs

This video targeted at rowing coaches says the same things differently. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-l1qUftZurw and could point you in a training direction you might follow.

[alien878]

Just another perspective…

Swimmers do train that amount of volume. It isn’t without controversy, but no one has found a better way. I know of no world class swimmers who got there any other way (I’m excluding pure sprinters, but they are extremely rare).

It would be interesting to see what would happen if cyclists/rowers started training at age 10 like swimmers and at a similar intensity. What would they be like at 18? Note: I’m not recommending this for many reasons. It’s just an interesting “what-if”.

As an aside: I know I supported rowing to supplement swimming above, but I just discovered something last week. I went for a swim for the first time in over two years. I was amazed at how much work it was to breath compared to rowing. It is surprising how much difference the pressure of a few inches of water makes. I still think swimmers can benefit from cross training, but it doesn’t fully replace the pool.

Allen H

[HonestJohn]

I still think swimmers can benefit from cross training, but it doesn’t fully replace the pool.
Allen H

That's the conundrum. I want her to do work that will keep her injury free but I don't want to overload her, or have her show up tired to formal practice.

One day, as a trial, I had her do a HIIT workout on the rower:

Drag force was 120
30 seconds hard HR ~180
60 seconds rest
x 20 reps

The next day she was "pretty sore"

That makes me think those muscles aren't used to that kind of work.

Her athletic trainer was working groups of muscles around her shoulders and knees (breaststroker) to help strengthen those joints - she has a bit of hyper mobility and had a subluxed kneecap. I think working different muscle groups is better at this age but don't want it to interfere with practice. She has one day off swim practice per week, Sunday and it's probably best if she just rests.

[Hoovman21]

How’s your daughter doing? I’m in a very similar situation with my daughter. Looking for different rowing/skier routines to compliment competitive swim training.