I wish I knew too.

I swim breaststroke and usually do 50 x 18m lengths in 27mins av. and recently completed a 5km swim (200 x 25m) in 2:44:16.

I've seen another bloke at the gym (who's also a bit bigger build than me) swimming breaststroke and he's lapped me within a few lengths.

I would like to be able to swim 5km in under 2 hrs.

You might want to Consider investing in some coaching (or get someone to video you /watch you swim) - you 'll find out where your technique is dragging you into a slow time, and get to understand what the different drills do.. Or google like crazy ( eg you tube clips) for 'how to' technique clips...

I am taking this approach and gradually my overall speed (and endurance) is going up ...it's still frustrating when the guy with bad technique goes faster than me, but i am closing the gap! One day ....

If you log on to

http://paceclub.speedousa.com

They have workouts for you to do to increase pace. You can set a distance target for yourself too. I have one for Liverpool to the Isle of Man which I hope to do in just over a month. Only found it today but looks fab for tracking your swims. They workouts are done over 8 weeks defo worth a look Xx

I was sent details of the swimfit site (www.swimming.org/myswimming/login) when I did my Swimathon and it's similar insofar as you can set challenges and view techniques.

I think I probably need a swimming coach, because of two things: 1) I'm pants at watching a video and reproducing the actions, and 2) I cannot swim front crawl (freestyle) without swallowing a litre of water.

I will need to try and do some drills though with a float.

I posted this on another thread in this group:

First off, you should be doing fartlek types of workouts in the pool to improve your time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fartlek

For now work on it with 100s. Doing 4 x 100 with a 25 sprint somewhere in there.
Ex:

1 x 100 - 1st 25 hard
1 x 100 - 2nd 25 hard etc...

Then build up to doing 150s, 200s, and then finally start playing fartlek for 400s. Each time you increase the distance, increase the distance that's supposed to be hard (but you can also start with 25 and build up to longer sprint distances depending how you feel).

Hi< thanks for sharing but... can you translate? What does 1 x 100 - 1st 25 hard mean? you swim 4 laps of 25 meters (or yards) freestyle, the first of which is "hard", meaning more effort?

There's on major question that needs to be answered before you try to swim faster, are you trying to swim fast for a short distance or to increase your endurance so that you can go harder for longer. In the off-season (I'm a DIII varsity swimmer) I work mostly on trying to go harder for longer because it means that I can get the most amount of swimming in during the time I'm in the pool, as opposed to spending 10 seconds out of every minute and a half resting.
There are very different training regimens for sprint training, going really really fast for a short amount of time, and endurance training, going faster than is comfortable for a long time, usually for longer than about 6 minutes at a time up to anywhere from 20 minutes or so for the mile race, or much longer for something like open water swimming.

If you want to get faster at sprinting, then you'll want to start with some interval training. You can either do this by using the time clock on the wall, and setting actual times, like you will do a certain number of 50's, or 25's (down and back, or just one way down the pool) on a certain interval, say one minute each. The goal with this set is to swim them fast, and then get about 10 seconds of rest after each one to recover. That's the other way to do interval training, swim a distance, then count an amount of rest, generally about 10 seconds, and then do another one. The benefit of setting an interval is that the set becomes more difficult as you get more tired, but since you have a specific time you need to leave the wall, you have to go on that time. If you're counting 10 seconds every time, you're getting a consistant amount of rest, but you're probably swimming slower. For sprint workouts, you generally don't want to do much more than 100 yards fast at a time, especially if you haven't been training for too long. Sprinting should feel very uncomfortable in your muscles, you should feel like you're swimming at a pace that you can't hold for very long, probably not more than a minute.

If you want to get better at endurance training, you'll want to practice swimming for longer distances at a pace that is slightly uncomfortable. If it's too uncomfortable you won't be able to hold that pace for the whole time, but if it feels actually comfortable, like you could do it forever, then you should be trying harder. Call this pace your "strong pace." Once you do this for a long time, you'll be able to know what your pace is for all different sorts of distances so that you can complete them, and be very tired at the end. This is where I'd recommend interval training based off of a certain amount of rest. Swim a considerable distance, this will depend on your own abilities. For newer swimmers, 50 yards might be a distance where holding a "strong pace" is a good goal, or for more experienced swimmers, or those training for longer events, holding pace for a few rounds of 400 yards, or even a thousand or for 30 minutes straight for as far as you can go, are great goals to work on going faster for longer.

Though, all of that said, technique is really the most important part. If you're fighting your body all the way through the water, you won't be able to go as fast as you would like. Aim for feeling smooth in the water instead of jerking, and maybe consider getting a coach or watching videos online. You can do it!

I personally find that the best way to increase speed with little effort is by improving your stroke technique. Since it doesn't seem like you swim intervals or sets, the easiest way to increase your speed at freestyle is by doing what used to be called a SKPS (Swim, Kick, Pull, Swim). For starting out, I would suggest doing it in a 400 swim x 400 kick x 400 pull x 400 swim set. When you do this, focus on the kicking and pulling. For Kick, hands at the top of a kick board (or over the top of each other if there is no kick board available) and arms fully extened. Reach as far as you can and sprint every 4th leg. When you Pull (pulling is not using your legs, but only your arms) extend your arms as far forward as you can and each stroke should be as deep as possible with your hand exploding from the water at your waist. I know it doesn't sound like much, but if you focus on those simple mechanics you will see improvement in your stroke.