Do-it-yourself Aquathons

Treat these like mini-races and do a 20-30 minute dry land warm-up. You can use easy jogging that builds to Steady or riding your bike to your open water location (or pool).

To simulate Open Water in a swimming pool, see if they will let you slide 3-5 lane lines over and create a box that you can swim around – set your turns under the flags so you don’t touch the wall. Quite often a “hot dog” shaped course is a great way to learn to make turns without losing speed.

For turn buoys, we used to use floats with rubber-coated weights to hold them down.

With your “races” that start with a swim, put the slower swimmers up front (or give them a lead) – this gets everyone used to swimming in traffic at the start.

Swim Warm-Up
400 nice and relaxed end each 100 with 25 non-free
4x100 descend 1-4 on 15s rest
4x50 Build each 50 on 20s rest
200 Easy

Race Format #1 (Choose One, or Mix & Match)
Traditional Swim/Run – swim distance should be ~1,000 with Run of 2-3 Miles

Race Format #2 (Drafting Decisions)
Strategic Run/Swim/Run – 1 Mile Run then Swim ~800 then 1 Mile Run

Race Format #3 (Swimming While Loaded)
Swim ~500 then Run 2 Miles and Swim ~500

End each “race day” with an endurance set such as the following:
5x400 as
• Swim
• Band/Buoy
• Band/Buoy/Paddles
• Paddles Only
• Swim

If you are too shot to swim 2K at the end then loosen with 200 Easy.

You can complement the Aquathon workouts with a small group ride where you insert 2x20 min pace-line (sustained Threshold effort, not max effort). Total ride duration should be 60-90 minutes. Great training for short course athletes.

Watch how the fact that you had your HR up earlier changes your reactions/emotions during the ride. Learn your tendencies, as these will be magnified in a race. Make sure that your decisions are serving your goals.