It’s Taper Time

It’s music to a swimmer’s ears. If you are not intimately familiar with any endurance sports, you might not know taper is when you reduce your training in order to rest for a particular competition. It’s part of training that has the obvious benefits of reduced workouts, but also comes with challenges.

First, if you haven't been here before, I'm a father of a child with Autism and I'm competing in the 2012 US Masters Swimming Summer Nationals, and raising money for the Ozark Center For Autism. Go here for my intro blog.

 

Every athlete is different, and needs to approach their taper strategy differently. Many of my friends that are distance swimmers, triathletes and runners go through their entire taper process in a week. That doesn’t work for me. The benefit of taper is really just beginning for me after a week. I’ve done a two week taper in the past. That has done okay for me, but I think it has been cutting it too close. I’ve noticed that I’m still tapered even after a week or two break after my big meet. I would come back to workouts, and still be swimming crazy fast times. This time around, I’m going for a full 3 week taper.

Now I’ve decided how long my taper is, next I decide how to do it. First, what do I do with my gym workouts? Some continue their weights and running, or whatever they do in the gym, they just reduce weight, sets, reps, or all of the above. I’ve tried that before. I’ve found its best for me to drop my gym workouts all together. Second, what do I do with my pool workouts? My normal ‘in season’ workouts range from about 3,200 to 4,200 meters, and are filled with a wide variety of endurance work, drills, speed work, kicking, pulling, anything under the sun. One theory is to slowly reduce your workouts over a 3 week period, another is to drop down to a certain amount and hold it there until your competition comes. Since I’m going to have the Kansas City Corporate Challenge meet in the middle of my taper, I’m going to drop to around 1,700 meters per day up until KCCC, and drop down to 1,000 meters or less after it. My swimming workouts will consist of warm up, some drills, some sprints, and warm down.

So, how is it that can be challenging? There are a few reasons. Time to relax can be hard to find. It wasn’t a big deal before I had a family. Before family life, I could come home, sit on the couch and enjoy some TV. The only responsibility I had was feeding myself. That is not the case now. There is always work to do when I get home. Chores, picking up, cleaning, cooking, getting kids to bed, etc. Having a child with special needs makes it even tougher. Autism has a way of making things way more difficult than they need to be. And at taper time, all I want to do sit down. That’s not happening for this dad. The second thing that is challenging is it really tests your faith. No, I’m not saying it’s a strain on my religion. Taper gives the mind too much time and energy to wander, and to question. You begin to question your training, or if your taper will even work. And if you feel there is something you left out of your training, its too late to make it up. You have to trust you have trained as well as you could. You have to trust your taper will work. You have to have faith.

So, does taper really work? You might think that taking it easy for 3 weeks would have to reduce my fitness significantly. Believe me, where I talked about trusting my taper, I have those doubts too. History has proven time and time again, my fitness will still be there 3 weeks, and even 4 or 5 weeks later. And as fatigue leaves my body, my strength improves dramatically. How much can it really help? Many people will drop 2 seconds per 100 yards/meters when they taper. Some will drop more. I am in the more category. Way, way more! I usually drop between 4 and 6 seconds per 100 when I taper. And for some reason, for 50 meter course, it is usually in the 6 range. If that sounds like a dramatic difference, it is! In season can be really tough. It makes the big meets a lot of fun.

Training has been fun lately. I had my last full workout last Thursday. Since then, I just get in the water, and do what ever my body tells me I need. The minimum requirement is a good warm up, and getting something with some really good speed. I make sure I stop before fatigue sets in, get a nice warm down, and get out. Getting some speed every time is critical. It keeps everything sharp, and helps keep up confidence going into the big meet.

Thats it for now. My next challenge will be trying to keep some business travel from being too disruptive, in the pool and at home.