Need some Endurance Advice

My endurance has greatly increased by doing cross-training. I am strength training 2x and Cardio 3x. My strength includes things like kettle bell, push-ups, burpees, sumo deadlifts, turkish get-ups, etc. Tabata is also a great way to help with endurance. I wish her much luck and success. Keep me posted.

http://ruthkazez.com/50swimworkouts.html
Has some decent ideas, albeit a bit more tailored towards competitive swimming.

Building up swimming endurance is just like building up endurance in other sports (with the possible exception that you should probably be a bit more careful if swimming at the point of complete exhaustion)

If she can do 6 laps now, have her do intervals. An example would be:
1) 4 laps, followed by 2 minutes of rest
2) 2 laps, followed by 2 minutes of rest
3) 2 laps, followed by 2 minutes of rest
4) 2 laps, followed by 2 minutes of rest
5) MAX laps (minimum 6)

And then the next time you do it go for 5,3,3,2,MAX or something.

Play with the rest time, you don't want it to be too long, but you also need to make sure she has enough time to catch her breath before going again.

Another idea is doing sets of 12 laps. After each lap (or each 2 laps, or every 3 laps, or whatever) she rests for a set amount of time, and you gradually reduce/remove the rest periods.

If you're able you may want to have a swim instructor or something check her form. It's possible it's a form thing and not necessarily an endurance thing and you want to make sure your training to improve the right problems.

Final thing is from a training perspective, if you can only do two days a week fine (not ideal but reality has a way with messing up the perfect plans), but maybe you could do Tuesday, Saturday instead of Friday, Saturday? It may help with progress.

Yup, like I said reality makes the perfect plans...unrealistic.

Work with what you have. The more she can swim the better off she'll be. Assuming this is something she wants to continue to improve at, getting into the habit of tracking her stats and working to improve them certainly can't hurt.

At a point though, she'll really need more professional guidance to improve. Form really is huge when it comes to swimming "well". If something like that is a possibility, the sooner she gets that kind of tutelage the better.

My $0.02

Ditto she needs more pool time. Running ain't swimming. Case in point: in 2005 I had a good year bicycle racing. Won a medal in the state time trial, good finishes in road races, and was finishing top 5 in cyclocross races. My cycling and running endurance were very good. Then I ruptured a disc, and for a couple of months the pool was my only exercise option. The first time I went to swim laps, I figured I could swim for at least half an hour. Ten minutes later, I crawled out of the pool, exhausted. Swimming involves very different muscles than running, and endurance has to be built in the water. Your daughter has a good fitness base, so she should improve quickly if she works at it.

we are fish we moved from Guam last Sept. but if you don't use it you lose it i guess. We are really going to have to look at her form and technique. or maybe she is just used to having her snorkel and fins hehe she was wanted on the swim team there but her studies came first her studies and she struggles with juggling sports and academics. She is getting better now that we are stateside and she is older though. Again more great suggestions keep them coming!!!

You could spend your entire life going to the pool daily and be a very 'good' swimmer, but there would still be a number of things about your form that you'd likely need professional help to fix. And it's certainly not to say that your daughter is a bad swimmer or doing something wrong, it's just that there are so many extremely minute details when executing a perfect stroke that it's practically impossible to achieve without help. It's really a highly technical movement when done well.

Does she need to have elite level swimming proficiency to become a lifeguard? No, but it's not a bad thing to strive towards.

ok well my hubby got home and read this thread and we now have a plan of action thanks to all of you and your suggestions. We looked at the pool hours and our schedules are going to get her some more pool time on top of running in the morning and strength training dvd's. I have been volunteered to do each lap and run each mile with her so it should be fun i will keep you posted!!!!!:flowerforyou:

Best of luck.