Breakwater Fitness Swimming

Objective: Have fun building swimming fitness and endurance in a coached group workout. Newer swimmers will be learning new swimming skills, and more experienced swimmers will be adjusting technique as they improve fitness and speed.

Audience: This program is intended for all levels of fitness swimmers. Before enrolling in the program, you should be comfortable swimming freestyle (also called front crawl) for one length of the pool using swimming breathing. If you need to do a bit of work to get to that point, contact Coach Bill.

Grouping: You will be grouped in lanes by ability. At the Mount Auburn Club, two double lanes will be used, with the edge lane used for less experienced swimmers.

Video Analysis: During the first and last sessions of the program, video will be captured. Your techique for a single stroke (freestyle or backstroke, for example) will be analyzed, and you will be provided with an action plan for improving that stroke. You will be given a password protected Athlete page on the Breakwater website, from which you will have access to all of your video clips, coach comments and action plans.

Training Method: Every workout begins with a warm-up and ends with a cool-down. The bulk of the workout is a mix of drill sets and swimming sets: drill sets emphasize technique points, and are generally shorter distances performed at lower intensity levels; swimming sets are higher-intensity and are designed to build fitness, endurance and speed. The mix will vary depending on the abilities and fitness levels of the swimmers in each lane. Each swimmer will have a specific drills to be working on based on their initial video evaluation and their goals.

Strokes: The emphasis is on freestyle, but more experienced swimmers may be doing all four strokes. Less experienced swimmers will have the opportunity to learn the other strokes (backstroke, breaststroke and butterfly) during technique drill sets. In all cases, breaststroke or freestyle can be substituted for butterfly.

Equipment: Goggles, snug-fitting swimsuit. Optional: Fins, hand paddles.

Coach: Bill Steele, USA Triathlon Certified Coach (USAT), American Swim Coach Association (ASCA), Triathlete and Open Water Racer (Alcatraz AG champion, 2007)

Cost: $160 for Mount Auburn Club members, $175 for others
Class Size: Maxmum 12