Invest Wisely in Your Training

Looking for an easy answer or a quick fix, we all fall prey to the pill or gadget mentality sometimes. In swimming this often comes in the form of buying an expensive racing suit.

These days tech suits usually start at $200 and $400 for men and women respectively. There’s little doubt that these high-tech suits have allowed swimmers to go faster than in previous generations.

What’s curious though, is that some swimmers will pay a substantial amount of money for a suit, yet not invest more into training their actual body. It’s sort of like buying the outer shell of a Porsche and putting a Volkswagon Bug engine in it. The outside may look nice, but investing more under the hood will make for much better gains.

Here are a few practical tips you can follow to make sure you’re investing more into your engine than your paint detail:

• Commit to a progressive strength-training program that addresses your weaknesses
• Swim at race pace in the water at least occasionally, if not regularly
• Pay more attention to your fuel, including its quality, quantity, and timing
• View the start of your bedtime as you would a workout—don’t be late
• Mentally visualize yourself achieving your goals and improving on your technique or training

Small, consistent investments over the long term are the most beneficial. Make sure you’re following these tips and that nice racing suit you end up getting will actually pay off.