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Hi All,

Does anyone have any good experience in relation to improving swim conditioning and the ability to swim under water for extended periods on a single breath?

I need to build up to the following:

1km swim in under 24 min
25m underwater swim, but need to come up comfortable and no coughing or spluttering
Search for items on bottom of pool in a single breath

I can probably gut out the swim if needed, but I want to build up to doing it easily.

I can swim 10-15m underwater with no issues, but any further I would come up gasping for breath. It's not a comfortable swim I could do any day of the week.

Single breath hold would be very difficult as the items are hard to find. The idea is you have to find them by feel and maximise your time on the bottom.

I have done small amounts of weighted underwater work and I am an extremely confident diver.

For now I will be slowly building up my swim fitness and technique, but I would love to get a conversation going about how people have approached this in their own training.

Maxrip13 wrote:Hi All,

Does anyone have any good experience in relation to improving swim conditioning and the ability to swim under water for extended periods on a single breath?

I need to build up to the following:

1km swim in under 24 min
25m underwater swim, but need to come up comfortable and no coughing or spluttering
Search for items on bottom of pool in a single breath

I can probably gut out the swim if needed, but I want to build up to doing it easily.

I can swim 10-15m underwater with no issues, but any further I would come up gasping for breath. It's not a comfortable swim I could do any day of the week.

Single breath hold would be very difficult as the items are hard to find. The idea is you have to find them by feel and maximise your time on the bottom.

I have done small amounts of weighted underwater work and I am an extremely confident diver.

For now I will be slowly building up my swim fitness and technique, but I would love to get a conversation going about how people have approached this in their own training.

Yes, I can help you here. The key to swimming farther underwater, is the keyhole/ underwater breast stroke. Start by getting a good streamline position from your kick off the wall, and glide as much as possible. You can get ~10m of the pool done just by doing this. From there you'll begin your UW breast stroke. ANY motion underwater is going to burn oxygen, so you want to use as little motion to propel you as far as possible.

This video, or pretty much any other USAF Pararescue training video will show you plenty of examples.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTWggEciSDA

In regards to swimming 1,000m in 24 min, you certainly have the fitness for it, what you lack is skill/ economy of motion. Swimming is all about REDUCING DRAG, not INCREASING POWER.
-I imagine you're built stocky and muscley and thus not a natural swimmer. SWIM SLOW......but just practice going a little bit farther each time. If you can swim 1 min without stopping great. rest and do it again.

Think of your swims as BB/LSS work, don't worry about speed for now. You'll gain more by doing less. LESS IS MORE in the pool


Feel free to PM me with more specific questions and I can explain more there or send different links. There's 9 ways to skin the cat that is swimming. Just have to find which way you prefer then focus on that. You aren't an olympic swimmer, so whatever keeps you comfortable is likely the best way.

alottadav wrote:

Maxrip13 wrote:Hi All,

Does anyone have any good experience in relation to improving swim conditioning and the ability to swim under water for extended periods on a single breath?

I need to build up to the following:

1km swim in under 24 min
25m underwater swim, but need to come up comfortable and no coughing or spluttering
Search for items on bottom of pool in a single breath

I can probably gut out the swim if needed, but I want to build up to doing it easily.

I can swim 10-15m underwater with no issues, but any further I would come up gasping for breath. It's not a comfortable swim I could do any day of the week.

Single breath hold would be very difficult as the items are hard to find. The idea is you have to find them by feel and maximise your time on the bottom.

I have done small amounts of weighted underwater work and I am an extremely confident diver.

For now I will be slowly building up my swim fitness and technique, but I would love to get a conversation going about how people have approached this in their own training.

Yes, I can help you here. The key to swimming farther underwater, is the keyhole/ underwater breast stroke. Start by getting a good streamline position from your kick off the wall, and glide as much as possible. You can get ~10m of the pool done just by doing this. From there you'll begin your UW breast stroke. ANY motion underwater is going to burn oxygen, so you want to use as little motion to propel you as far as possible.

This video, or pretty much any other USAF Pararescue training video will show you plenty of examples.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTWggEciSDA

In regards to swimming 1,000m in 24 min, you certainly have the fitness for it, what you lack is skill/ economy of motion. Swimming is all about REDUCING DRAG, not INCREASING POWER.
-I imagine you're built stocky and muscley and thus not a natural swimmer. SWIM SLOW......but just practice going a little bit farther each time. If you can swim 1 min without stopping great. rest and do it again.

Think of your swims as BB/LSS work, don't worry about speed for now. You'll gain more by doing less. LESS IS MORE in the pool


Feel free to PM me with more specific questions and I can explain more there or send different links. There's 9 ways to skin the cat that is swimming. Just have to find which way you prefer then focus on that. You aren't an olympic swimmer, so whatever keeps you comfortable is likely the best way.

Cheers mate.

That video is helpful.I definitely need to be reminded of the long extended glide.

I started yesterday with 500m broken up into different strokes and followed it with some underwater breath holds.
I rested between each lap, as I really wanted to focus on technique.
I focused on freestyle for 6 of the 10 laps which might have been the wrong approach. I have a strong sidestroke and breast stroke so maybe I will use them a bit more for the longer distance.

I am lucky to live close to the academy and have access to a 50m olympic sized swimming pool and gym in the same complex.
I might have to start using the laps in the pool as a finisher to my strength work when able.

I have until the end of the year to prepare and decide whether to apply for the specialist police group I am considering.

I can share my cup of tea, if it can help.
What I did was not in pool, but in different water bodies, I was more focused on diving and water combat, not much on swimming.

This was couple of days per week routine:
I would meditate 2x, morning, evening, but not some fancy thing, it was basic zen meditation, you focus on exhale and natural body posture.
The longer the exhale, the calmer and easier you are underwater. You would be surprised what is the difference, measured in minutes!
This is especially good since you can feel the amount of oxygen in lungs, so you can get good distance while slowly exhaling and not losing composure.
After achieving notable improvement, first I did diving seasons, once a day. Lose as much breath in water and fall to the bottom. This takes time, but enables you to be calm. After getting good in calmer water, this was progression sea-lake-stream-river. After managing to stay in river, you would build great stamina. Also, if you train there, your touching sense would improve over pool drastically. I could catch a fish in a hole without seeing it in whole or notice a difference between shell species.
The biggest problem with this is you lose your condition pretty fast if you stop training. After a couple of month, I was back to beginning.

That's all from me.