@Poet I actually enjoy pull and paddles
Takes the focus off my stupid sinky legs.
Means I can focus on hand entry, catch and rotation whilst also trying to stay at a consistent pace
Win win
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I enjoy paddles, not so much pull.
Paddles and fins are best 
♂:ocean:
I’m slower with pull, but my kick is terrible with a board (like 50s per 25m at least) so I’m not sure what’s going on?
Had a few 100m with paddles today. And pull. And fists. And catch ups. No kick
I found that using the paddles without the pull helped me, subcsciously, workout the timing of my kick. When the timing is poor the pull feels arm/shoulder when I get it right it feels like the body is working together. If that makes any sense?
Woke up late this morning so only 30mins, again just kept it easy some pull and some kicking 
ETA: I mean by subconsciously that I didn’t know it was wrong until I got it right, well better.
What have you guys been doing for 4 months that has maintained your muscular endurance?!? These times don’t seem hugely different from what you’d be doing after a decent chunk of swimming. A few seconds sure, but not 10+ per 100?
Yesterday was better than Monday, and I lasted about 400m before my arms turned to jelly, but the ability to “move water” just disappears fairly quickly at the moment as my arms just fatigue. It’s completely identifiable that my arms have no ability to maintain resistance against the water and collapse into a less “grabby” shape. Effectively stroke length plummets.
The technique is still kind of there (certainly needs work, but when fresh I feel fairly strong and fluid), but even 50’s yesterday I was struggling to break 1:40 pace. That would have previously been my relaxed swimming all day pace. Ultimately, I know it will come back with time in the water (it began to after lockdown 1), I’m just amazed how everyone else seems to jump back in a not just do 1 rep as a decent clip, but repeat that over and over. Probably should have actually used those swim cords I bought! 
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Nothing.
I cannot do one pull up, sit up, or press up.
I’m weakAF.
I last did some core work about a year or two ago, but got bored and sacked it off.
I just got in Monday at 0617 and blasted out a 1:21 100m out of sheer exuberance.
The rest were 1:27-1:31 (excluding the admin laps of getting stuck behind people)
Yesterday’s 200s as free/pull were 1:37/1:44, which was easy-mod free/easy pull.
Today was hard. Arms are wrecked.
Meant to do solid 50s and 100s, but sacked it off and did mainly drills.
Did a few “sprints”;
Still under 1:40/100m average for the set.
What’s your rest?
I’m doing massive rests.
25m I’ll go off 30s
50m off 1:00
100m off 2:00
200m off 4:00
Etc.
I find having longer rests helps to maintain form.
And have a chat 
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On the subject of rests what is normal?
I do a set of 20 x 100m (1.41 to 1.42) with 30s recovery. I have 3mins rest after the 10th.
This seems to be completely different to what I see here which is more of a rest of 1:30 to 1:45
Am I doing it wrong?
So, you’re effectively doing (10*100)*2 there.
I’d keep the middle rest at 1:41+30s, to keep it at your active work.
Are they CSS?
I’d be inclined to do them off 2:00, meaning your rest will be 20s
You can use the wall clock then (better push offs if not looking at your watch)
When I’m fit, I’ll do 15*100s off 1:45.
If they’re all under 1:30, then I am good to swim 3.8km under and hour (or so history tells me!)
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Thanks that’s really helpful.
Your explanation makes more sense to me now. When you were using the expression ‘off’ I have always assuming that that meant the amount of rest you were having between each 100m 
I’ve never done a CSS test but the effort feels about right. If I ever get back in a pool then I will drop my rest from 30s to 20s
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10 or 15 years ago I remember a killer main set at our club:
5 x100m off 1m50
5x100m off 1m45
5x100m off 1m40
5x100m off 1m35
This in the middle of about 4500m of swimming over 90 minutes
Right now I’d take 5*100m off 1m50 
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depends on the goal of the session
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I’d keep it that way 
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That’s not “massive rest” in my book, at least not currently! Sure, it would be big rest in a “swim fit” state, but that is far from “massive” when you’re getting c25s per 100, when in a normal world you might expect to take 10-15s.
Yesterday was 4x(5x50) with reducing rest … first set 10s, second 8s, then 6s then 4s. The 4s rest block was horrid. I couldnt hold 50s per rep, as the final block were all 51. But when fit, I’d expect to be able to do 15x100 with 10s rest, and have the 100s all come in about 1:30-1:32.
Anyway, your response is helpful in that you didn’t do anything. It’s just rather annoying! Big envy here! As I say, I can rep a 3:05 200 after 600m of warm up, yet after those 50’s I was completely shot and couldnt do a 3:20 even after a full 3 minutes rest. Now that’s “massive rest”!!
I used to go “off”, but in my own sessions now, I generally use fixed rest. A bit like on a turbo in erg and the spiral of death, if you go “off” a fixed time, then you can start to spiral into issues if you miss a single rep by a second or two. 10s becoming 8s is actually quite a big difference.
The main time I still use “off” is if I was deliberately doing a set to failure, like hammerers 4x100 repeats “off CSS”. The other is club sessions. It’s much easier for a coach to have everyone going off 1:40/1:50/2:00 within a lane, as it eliminates the variability of different swim speeds. The only issue with that is that it means two people in the group are getting very different sessions. When fit, and at my club’s fastest session, we’ll do 100 repeats off 1:35/1:40 say. For me, that’s 10ish seconds of rest, so a proper CSS set. For the fish, they’re getting 25+ seconds of rest, so it’s a pretty easy session for them. But if you did it off fixed rest, the entire lane would be a mess, and not much different from a public swim session!
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Says you knocking out 2 sub 19 5km times in the middle of a long run!
Whilst the rest time isn’t massive as an absolute, as a percentage, it is!
We will see what I do tomorrow 
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“offs” are largely useful to keep things simple, but if you wanted to get overly scientific about it you’d have a set rest, but again in the real world it matters little. off 20 or 22 or 25, as long as your HR hasnt dropped to resting levels in the case of say a lactate tolerance sets then go with it.
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Yes, but I’ve been run training through lockdown! (and it was only 1, the second was 19:30ish )
I guess I just thought everyone would be fighting some kind of uphill battle like I’m finding. I still know in general terms what I’m trying to do, but my swim muscles just arent conditioned enough to do it. I’m doing an “easy” 100 at the end of a session and coming in nearly 20s down on what I’d expect. Yet, everyone on here who has posted times seems to have seen drop offs of a handful of seconds 
Nothing I can do about that at the end of the day, other than stick with it. It’s just frustrating having gone through exactly the same thing last year, and just when I was getting somewhere, having an even longer 4 month stint out of water, and being shoved back beyond square one
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Spoken like a true Arnie 
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@stenard I’ve still be doing some weights.
Nothing dramatic, just rows etc once a week.
My 100’s were a good 7-10s slower and I could manage 10-12 as opposed to the 20+ I would do before.
@Sparky as mentioned, think about the rest in terms of the session.
If you were doing hard bike or run repeats what ratio of work:rest ratio would you go for there.
Then do the same for the swim repeats. The harder the effort, the longer the rest.
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easy 1k indoor pool! lots of 50’s and 25s multi strokes. Still swimming like a legend…as long as i don’t go too far 
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Just got in a late evening splash.
400 W/u, 400 IM, 400 pull, 4*200, 400 w/d
Good: Had a whole lane to myself, bonanza.
Bad: Deltoids still feel like blancmange.
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