Mastering the Swim

I am a slow learner and I often don’t connect the dots in life.  So it isn’t surprising that after years of doing interval and speed work on my runs, it would take getting knocked over the head with a flier to make realize that adding speed work and intervals to my workouts might help improve my swimming as well.

Before learning about U.S. Masters Swimming Programs in the county, I would head to the pool and swim at the same speed and intensity for an hour and call it a day.  The fact that I was not improving should have had me searching out answers but no, that isn’t how my brain works.

Luckily Masters Swimming programs have made their way not just into our county but right in our backyard at the Big Vanilla Athletic Club.

Aquatics director Shelly Beigel created the program at Big Vanilla in January.  Hiring Gladney McKay who has been coaching swimming for twenty five years, Nancy Brown who has not only served on the Masters Swimming Associations Board since its inception but also founded the Maryland Masters Swim Team and finally Total Immersion Coach Traci McNeil, who swam across the English Channel at 19 years old, Shelly has insured that her program will become one of the most popular in the county.

When I was first introduced to Masters Swimming I assumed it was a program for recently graduated collegiate swimmers who wanted to continue racing.  I assumed it was for the crème de la crème of swimmers.  That assumption was quickly proven wrong when I began to meet swimmers throughout the county. 

All swimmers are welcome in Masters Programs.  Coaches work with the swimmers to help them improve their form, perfect their stroke and increase their speed.   And while most of the Masters Programs in Anne Arundel County participate in meets throughout the state these meets are not required. 

Swimmers use the programs for a variety of reasons.  Some are just trying to improve their stroke enough to swim thirty minutes at a stretch a couple of days a week.  Some are training for sprint distance triathlons.  And still more are trying to develop a stronger stroke so they can complete longer open water swims such as the Great Chesapeake Bay Swim.

But Beigel believes that most of the swimmers who attend Masters programs are just looking for alternatives to stay fit and injury free.  With this goal in mind she hopes that members will participate in some of the fun challenges the club will be offering.  Currently there is a Virtual Lighthouse to Lighthouse Swim Challenge that will have swimmers completing swimming the equivalent to the length of the Chesapeake Bay.  Through challenges such as these the participants are encouraged to push themselves  harder than they might if they were not involved in a Masters Program.

Even without the challenges set up by Beigel and her staff, U.S. Masters Programs are designed to challenge swimmers to push a little harder and swim a little farther than they might on their own.  But it is also designed to encourage people to return each week.  Knowing that there are other swimmers who will notice your absence is an incentive to get to the pool on a day when you might rather stay at home calling it a rest day.  The programs over time begin to feel like a team and as part of a team, swimmers are committed to their fitness.

After years of swimming back and forth at the same speed and seeing no improvements, I have begun a program that calls for adding speed work.  I have only been completing these sessions for a couple of months but the once stagnant laps times have begun to show improvement.  Each lap has become a little faster and better yet, a littler easier.