Swim Session

Saturday Swim Session: Janet Evans’ Actual Step-Up Session

Swimming at an aerobic pace and then at a higher intensity train prepares the body to swim faster towards the end of a race. These sessions seek inspiration from a workout that was reportedly conducted by Janet Evans, who won multiple Olympic swimming medals. This is a great session for triathletes and open water swimmers to do to build their sustained speed.

This week I’ll take you through what Evans did, last week I modified the workout for us mere mortals to be able to complete with the normal three options I publish.

Each Saturday I will post a Swim Session, most weeks I will load three options up for you to do. Option A is for swimmers who are after a workout between 1,000 & 2,000 metres. Option B is for swimmers who are after a workout between 2,000 & 3,000m and Option C will be greater than 3,000m.

The inspiration for today’s workout comes from an article by Olivier Poirier-Leroy about a variation of the workout that Janet Evans used to conduct, by Dudley Duncan, head coach of Richmond, Virginia’s Quest Swimming. Janet Evans set world records for 400m, 800m, and 1,500m freestyle in 1987 and in 1988 won three Olympic Gold medals. She was known as Miss Perpetual Motion. Read the original article here.

  • 4x
    • 150y on 2:00;
    • 200y on 2:00;
  • 3x
    • 150y on 2:00;
    • 200y on 2:00;
  • 2x
    • 150y on 2:00;
    • 200y on 2:00;
  • 1x
    • 150y on 2:00;
    • 200y on 2:00;
  • 4x
    • 75y on 1:00;
    • 100y on 1:00;
  • 3x
    • 75y on 1:00;
    • 100y on 1:00;
  • 2x
    • 75y on 1:00;
    • 100y on 1:00;
  • 1x
    • 75y on 1:00;
    • 100y on 1:00;
  • 4x
    • 50y on 0:30;
    • 25y on 0:30;
  • 3x
    • 50y on 0:30;
    • 25y on 0:30;
  • 2x
    • 50y on 0:30;
    • 25y on 0:30;
  • 1x
    • 50y on 0:30;
    • 25y on 0:30;

This workout is effectively split into three rounds. Each round has four sets. Janet has swum hers in a 25-yard pool. The first round has four reps, each rep has two portions – the first being 150 yards and the second being 200 yards. Both swum on 2:00 minutes. That means if it takes 1:25 to swim the 150 yards, Janet got 35 seconds of recovery before swimming the 200-yard rep. If it then takes her 1:50 to swim the 200 yards, she gets ten seconds of recovery before swimming the next 150-yard rep!!! After completing the four reps, she took a rest before the next set.

The next set is completed with three reps, taking a rest, then the third set of only two reps before another rest, and then finally the last set with only one rep!!

The next round is conducted in the same sequence except with the reps involving the two portions now being 75 yards and 100 yards and completed on the minute.

The third and final round is then conducted with 25-yard and 50-yard portions and on only a 30-second turnaround!!!

Off course, Janet conducted these sets with both a warm-up and a cool-down that wasn’t covered in the article.

If you would like further advice feel free to contact me.

I am the Head Coach & Director of Qwik Kiwi Coaching.

I specialise in assisting first-timers and recreational athletes to achieve their sporting goals. I can be contacted at coachray@coachray.nz and 021 348 729.

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If you would like further advice feel free to contact me.

I am the Head Coach & Director of Qwik Kiwi Coaching.

I specialise in assisting first-timers and recreational athletes to achieve their sporting goals. I can be contacted at coachray@coachray.nz and 021 348 729.

Share this post so your friends can benefit as well.

Swim Sessions

The 20 Most Popular Swim Sessions from www.CoachRay.nz

With over 200 articles covering swim workouts published when this ebook came out, I condensed it down to the Top 20 most popular swim workouts. As viewed by people like you, the readers of my website.

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