Ok Nick – I’m finally writing this. Thank you for your gentle reminders to get it done 🙂

DRAFT
Now that you’re looking at swimming as an exercise, and have medical approval for the workouts, how much swimming do you need — and how to you track your progress?

Goals:  in my case, I’m seeking about 3.5 hours of aerobic exercise per day. That’s higher than some, but as I mentioned, it appears that my cancer cells don’t like all my exercise, so I will continue to disappoint “my little friends”. Therefore, I swim about two hours/ 2:15 every day and also an hour to 1:15 on the treadmill/elliptical. That allows me to keep my heart in the aerobics range for the time that I need.

So .. start with a shorter interval, like 15 min and use the information from your MD/ cardiologist, or [if cardiac healthy] the charts with target heart rates for aerobic exercise.. As you meet your goal to be able to sustain the desired heart rate for your initial time, you next PUSH YOURSELF to gradually increase your workout time to longer intervals. Your watch/clock will help you track how many lengths you swim in a given time interval. 

You’ll find that there is a comfortable speed [that you will note as time per lap [down and back] or lengths [one end of pool to the other] that puts you at the lower range of your aerobic workout range. As you build endurance and strength, you’ll move to the middle range of your aerobic zone and find your speed increasing and your lap/length timings shortening.

Ultimately, you’ll be able to swim your 15, 30, 45, 60 min goal at a consistent speed — and take a consistent time period to accomplish the workout. Interestingly, I found that my swimming became more efficient using TI swimming, so that my speed increased, my distance/hour also increased, but my heart rate dropped as my heart / cardiovascular system became stronger. When I started [back in 2017], my resting pulse was 75; now it’s 42. So — my target pulse for exercise has also dropped [guidance from my cardiologist]. Initially my cardio target was 163. Now, it’s in the upper 130’s.

Your real goal is: HOW HARD [exercise output] for HOW LONG [duration] ….
rather than how far/ how fast ….

Equipment

  • Basic equipment [0 to $]: you need a water resistant watch [that sits at the edge of the pool] or use the free pool clocks that are displayed in many pools or the portable timer clocks. Create a workout chart so that you plan out your goals and adjust as your endurance increases. Take your pulse manually to determine your heart rate – and check it against your goal heart rate.
  • Advanced equipment [$ – $]: 
    • waterproof watch from Apple, Garmin, Fitbit, Samsung: these devices have exercise logging/measurement programs built into them — and many of them can track your heart rate, to help you stay in the zone. There are also a number of watch/smartphone apps that I’ll describe here, that can give you charts/graphs of your workouts.[more info/ graphics/ reviews forthcoming]

** much more coming, but I’ve got to get sleep for tomorrow. Will be swimming at 6 a.m.   Thanks for reading!