high school swimmer thinking about track

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        • Participant
          omar on May 16, 2006 at 6:10 am #11848

          I'm a sophomore and I swim competitively year round. I feel I have some ability in running, especially mid-distance, although I have never trained for track or been timed outside of PE class.

          What do you think the strengths and weaknesses of a swimmer's background would be? I swim 5-6 days per week, plus abdominal exercises and push ups/pull ups.

        • Member
          rice773 on May 16, 2006 at 7:13 am #53416

          You have a great base of fitness and that is a huge advantage for training in track.  We had swimmer come out and train with our 400m group this year, he improved from 56s to 52 mid over 1 season, phenomenal.

        • Participant
          omar on May 16, 2006 at 8:00 am #53417

          so swimming fitness can change to track fitness pretty quickly?

          also, will I have any obvious weaknesses switching sports? i'm pretty thin, and my strength isnt great…

        • Participant
          CoachKW on May 16, 2006 at 8:47 pm #53418

          The problem that swimmers have that I've coached is that their legs-particularly the lower legs are not used to the pounding and they quickly experience shin issues.  My advice would be to do a 2-3 mile run 3-4 days per week during swimming  or at least do some shin strengthening exercises.

        • Participant
          omar on May 17, 2006 at 4:51 am #53419

          thanks- sounds like a good idea

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