Location and USRPT Status
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Don’t let them tell you that “you will get slower from her on in.” You do certainly have some surgery issues to get past, but if you put that phrase in your head then you will go slower!
Each person is different, but I can tell you what my experience has been. I have been swimming Masters for 35 years and last year after doing USRPT for 6 months I swam the 500 freestyle faster than I did in college. If you put in the time and EFFORT you will do well.
Just don’t waste your time with the garbage yardage, as in pulling, kicking, drills etc.
Thanks GG, I move up to 60-64 this year and am still convinced I can get faster. From the general performances from our masters at our National Short Course Championships last year I am sure the USRPT training helped . I am hoping for the same effect for me this year.
Hi,
I’m Richard Thomas and i am an assistant coach at Bath Dolphins Swimming Club working mainly with age group swimmers. and also doing a masters degree in sports coaching science.Looking forward to using this for my thesis to see how successful it is with my swimmers.
Im Mike- just ended my collegiate eligibility. I am venturing out of ‘traditional’ training by beginning USRPT. I am excited for this journey!
Hi! From Northern Wisconsin here. Exposed to usrpt in Indiana and actually had a bit of a heart attack when my daughter came home telling me they did 30 X 25s at practice. Honestly, I sneered my nose and actually said something like “I did NOT just pay a fortune for my children to swim 30x25s at practice!” They swam For a full winter season this way and interestingly enough, with crazy winter roads and facility closings, they probably only avg 3-4 practices a week. I was panicking for my then 15 year old daughter bc she had already begun plateauing and I certainly didn’t expect this program and sporadic days at practice to have a good outcome! Yet, at her state meet where she didn’t even “taper” she swam faster than she had over several seasons and years on a traditional training platform. My other two children also swam exceptionally well and furthermore, they were all happy and definitely not bored! Rather they were energized and interested again! We then took leap of faith with training it exclusively with those three (ages 12-17 now).
We are 50 minutes from the nearest club team and so we only go twice a week and they train by themselves at a local YMCA on the other days. My kids were becoming disillusioned with the traditional format of “work yourself to death and maybe or maybe not hit your taper at one or two meets a year”. My 12 year old girl and 14 year old boy have little interest in that. My 17 year old girl was tired of watching all her Wisconsin swim friends from other teams drop so much time year after year while she dropped time in much smaller increments. Whereas she has the tenacity to see anything through to completion, I worried about burnout and frustration.
So Last spring and summer, upon careful consideration, she trained usrpt mostly with a spattering of some longer t-pace work. I work a lot at that time, so we spelled out her micro and macro cycles at the start and she went to it all by herself. By the end of the summer she had gone from a 2:49LCM 200 breast to a 2:40.04 and got her junior national cut and first place at state. She also went a 1:13.97LCM in her 100 breast (previous time of 1:19LCM) and got that cut also. She’s swimming those two events plus bonus cut events in 50 free and 200 IM this week at junior nationals and she couldn’t be more excited. Her success caused 3 other high school coaches to implement usrpt in their programs. Our local club also turned their program upside down to try something new based on her results only. The kids love it at the club level and it has breathed new life into the program. The kids who were never standouts are getting attention they deserve and improving by leaps and bounds. Eager to see how the end of the season will turn out. Eager to share ideas and results. Nothing like experience to keep moving forward.Hi Everybody!
I’m Miklos Petras, from Hungary, Europe (not on your map 🙂 ) Sorry for my grammar mistakes, english isn’t my first language. I heard about USRPT last spring, and got excited about it, because 10+ years ago I myself tried to ‘invent’ something like it but failed (long story short: I grew up with old-shool ‘garbage mileage’ methods, I got sick of it, and tried to focus more on the real demands of the races, like Rushall. I failed because I always overtrained myself with sprint work – too long rest periods caused extreme mental fatigue, and I had to quit.) Last year, when I first read about USRPT I immediately saw the genius in Rushall’s words, and tried it on myself first. (I’m a Senior/Masters/ swimmer as well) I soon realised he’s right, and that he found the solution for the problem I got too. I totally love his critical attitude towards old ‘but we’ve always done that’ methods. I was like that too, but you know: if everybody else is coming towards you at the motorway, then you must be on the wrong side – I didn’t believe myself. But after I saw the wisdom in his words, I tried it, and felt almost immediately that he’s right. I hope we here are on the right side of the motorway… 😉
I’m a coach at Aligator SC for 4 years now. I work with 18 kids who are not really ‘first class’ or ‘talented’ (most of them would be denied by the ‘big and famous’ clubs of my country – the kind of clubs I swam in, the clubs that ‘produced’ Egerszegi, Darnyi, Gyurta, Cseh, Hosszú…), and our training opportunities are far from ideal: 2 lanes SCM, 45 mins 3 days a week at the morning, and 1.5 hours every afternoon/evening Mon-Fri. That’s all, no gym, no track, no dry-land opportunities, nothing, just a pool. I got kids from age 8 to age 16, and I’m the only coach at the club, so 2 times a week we all need to train together, the other 3 times I can train the smaller/beginner group at the afternoon, and the pros come evening.
I started hybrid-USRPT work with my swimmers 4 weeks before the Hungarian Nationals last year (2015). They absolutely loved it, and almost everybody shined at the Nationals, my best swimmer became 5th in 100m BR (14 y.o. male, 1:11,27, previos PB swam cca. 3 months before 1:15,76), and everybody stepped up 10-30 places in the rankings!
I started full USRPT this september (I mean last september 🙂 ) and they continued to swim exceptionally good. The final LCM meet at around december 20 however didn’t happenned to be as good as I wanted it to be. Everybody looked tired (and they were!) and they weren’t able to swim their bests (PBs mostly, yes, but not as good times as I calculated before). Truth be told: 3 weeks before that meet they swam amazingly good SCM, two of my swimmers became 10th or better in the SC national rankings at their best events, and almost everybody swam PBs 5+ seconds in 100m and 7+ seconds in 200s! After this amazing race they let themselves down a bit, and most of them got sick for around a week – just a week before the final meet in 2015.Anyway, some of my thoughts about USRPT:
1. It works. It works wonders, and kids love it.
2. Technique is key to success, they improve it ‘instintively’ if you can guide them well. Most of my swimmers have way better starts and turns than any of their rivals, and it’s mainly because turns are not a rest opportunity for them, but a way to go faster.
3. I feared they won’t have good endurance for 200s but they actually do! Most of them happenned to stuggle a bit with 100s though – too fast first halves, they got tired around 75m, or they started too slow and couldn’t let everything out, that kind of struggle. When they can get the 100 right though, they fly, and they really enjoy their races! 🙂
4. Rest time is important! You actually can and should play with it, but too much is wrong because it results higher fatigue levels. 20 seconds for 25s and 25 for 50s are max as I can tell.
5. I bought an ‘action cam’ (SJCAM SJ4000+) and a cheap tri-pod, and I make amazing footage of their underwater technique. It helps them to see their mistakes and learn from each other. This makes technique teaching way much more effective. (I wish we had those stuff when I was their age… 😉 )And some questions for the experienced USRPT-users:
1. I’m not sure though that prolonged USRPT training doesn’t become boring and/or ineffective. (continued repetition of a stimulus isn’t effective after a while.) I’d like to ask experienced USRPT-users about their findings.
After 8-12 weeks of USRPT training I think they need 1-2 week of something else. Maybe a week of recovery, maybe some ‘old-school’ work, something… else. Then back to work. This Sep-Dec period showed my swimmers just got tired of USRPT sets after prolonged use. They got 2 weeks rest around Xmas, and they swim very good and fast right now, they’re motivated and seem to be fully rested.
2. My swimmers cramp a lot. (Is it the right word for it? They got spasms (gastrochnemius, vastus lateralis and/or medialis, feet, etc.) during exercises sometimes even during warm-ups) Why can that be? I told them to drink more and use calcium/magnesium as well as vitamins, and it helped a lot, but the problem still remains. Got anybody any advice about that?
3. Rest periods between USRPT sets: I think they need to move and don’t let the heart rate drop down too much, but Rushall doesn’t recomend easy swimming. What are you doing in the recovery-time? Stretching is too ‘low-intensity’ for my taste. Have you got a good gymnastic set or something else you can (and would) share?Hi Kevin.
I am traveling in CA this summer and was hoping to try to find a place for my son to practice on vacation. He does USRPT and is 14. If you don’t mind me asking where you are, I might want to join you or someone you know that does some sort of sprint type training. Thanks!
Tim Manley from Arizona, I’ve been using the Parametric System (PS) for about 10 years, it’s been a long learning curve and I still can learn from others and from my own results. USRPT is very similar as well is 3S and Sweetenham’s Australian / British program. All of these programs begin with speed first and build endurance through increasing repetitions of race pace training that creates a “resistance to fatigue.” All of the systems must include a technical skill component and I have followed the posture, line and balance model of Boomer and Nelms. I’ve learned from many on this board and will continue to. I have always wanted to start a private group on facebook as well for anyone interested, but it would not be a beginner group. Please let me know if you would be interested to use as another forum to share information.
? Practice Technical Skill's and Make Fast a Habit!Hey everybody, I’m Kyle Tek from Arizona. I’ve been using USRPT exclusively with my senior athletes for 1 year now, and getting better results than “traditional” systems.
Hello to the URPT World! Before I go forward, after reading through the forums I have to say that no matter how you feel about USRPT this is one of the most informative ones on the net. Thanks for those of you who have shared your experience and knowledge.
While I have used a traditional training program through the years, I have always done a fair amount of race pace swimming. That is why USRPT has sparked my interest. Being in the middle of a season at the moment I am obviously not going to switch modes mid season. However I have two questions to whom ever might have some thoughts or information.
First, every short season we have the challenge of welcoming back fully tapered boys form their HS season and then trying to decided weather to keep tapering or go back to work etc. This year I will have a little over a month between their return and the Speedo meet. In the middle of that will be a district championship meet. I am thinking about putting them on a strict USRPT program. The idea being they can stay sharp and fast while building back up slightly and by cancelling every set after failure I can make sure they are not over fatigued. At the end of the month I would probably do a light decrease in their volume just to make sure they are not fatigued.
Good Idea? Bad Idea? Any and all opinions are appreciated.My other question is for those who have now had athletes using this system for several years. Do you find they flatten out or get board? With all the Capacity vs Utilization talk out there, are you concerned that their early years are not spent increasing “capacity”?
Thanks again for the great forum and any assistance anyone might be able to offer.
Brad,
Your thoughts on the HS boys are logical or “good idea”. If you can keep their current speed up the better. Don’t give them 30 x 25 on :30 or 20 x 50 on 10 sec rest, just freaks the shit out of kids (they have accumulated potential). I would control the number say 10 x 25 on 1:00 or 9-12 50s on 1:00 or 8-10 x 50s on 2:00. Then the next time you run the set go with maybe 12 x 25 and 11-13 x 50s. Hopefully, they went fast at HS meets and use those speeds for the sets. Its quick, down and dirty way, plus it saves you a boat load of time figuring out times for each swimmer.With regards to your second question. Capacity vs. Utilization, it is actually Accumulation & Utilization it was taken from Dr. Sergei Gordon in the development of the Parametric System. I know Bowman and others use “capacity” and that has become the new “buzz word” But he just high jacked it from the Parametric System and rephrased it. I will add with out recognizing where he got it from! It’s not an original thought!
What adaptations comes from “Capacity or Accumulation of Potential” (actual Russian phraseology)?
1. Increases in collateral circulation.
2. Increases in mitochondrial density.
3. Increases in respiratory functions.
4. CNS, namely its neuromuscular co-ordination SPECIFIC to endurance activities.
5. Requires vast amounts of energy not only from a fuel standpoint. But socially, physically and emotionally and the list could go on.Then what adaptations occur in the Parametric System Training? The same adaptations occur. Less the vast amounts of energy expended.
The question then becomes, if both make the same adaptations then where’s the advantage with traditional training or more work at sub race speeds?
My questions are:
1. Why would you want to spend 2+ hours per day doing something that you can get done in 1.5 hours or less?
2. Are 4 x 25 on :30/1:00, the same as 20 x 25 on :30/1:00?
3. Are 6 x 50 on 1:00, the same as 16 x 50 on 1:00?
4. 4 x 100, the same as 16-20 x 100?If you understand how the body handles work this is a no brainer! Constantly rehearse key points of your race.
Race pace practice sets are constant rehearsal of your race (tempo, finish, pace…). Last 15y/m in a race is trained behavior – You must practice those last 15y/m repeatedly. If you are trying to entertaining them.Then have them stay home and watch TV.
Train to race, don’t train to train.
Food for thought,
Doc
? All that is not shared... is lost.Dale, HS Swim Coach in Wichita, KS. 26 years. Started USRPT 3 seasons ago, great results with boys, mixed results with girls.
Hi all,
@SwimCoachStu (Twitter) here from Scotland – yes, USRPT has reached the other side of the pond. I would suggest my programmes are 5%-100% USRPT depending on the club I work with; I belong mainly to two clubs and consult for a few more.My main club utilises USRPT in a sprinting programme (working solely toward 50m Free) and the other is a bit of an up-hill struggle; depending on the week I will get in around 1-4 USRPT sessions. With regards to the latter club, the head coach is very much a belief-based, traditional coach.
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