WHY THE RED MIST SWIM SET (PART 1)
Challenge your mind and body. Do you want to try it?
The Red Mist swim set is very challenging, mentally and physically. The set ranges between 4000m to 6000m, and requires you to keep going strong while maintaining a consistent pace throughout. As such, this set is only for triathletes/open water swimmers who have been swimming a minimum of 2-3 times a week.
The set is long enough to crack your emotions - testing your mental and physical state at the same time - but it will give a sudden boost to your endurance ability. The “red mist” means you see nothing but a red blur while you attempt it and you'll probably feel like quitting halfway. Watch out for that feeling, that's the Red Mist coming at you!
Why should you perform the Red Mist set?
- If you want to improve your swim pace after hitting a plateau
- If you want to gain massive fitness for your 1.9KM or 10KM swim
- If you want to come out of the water with a fresh body to perform your best in the next disciplines
- If you want to challenge your mental ability
The idea behind the set is that it pushes you beyond your limit and breaks the threshold of your current performance to bring you to the next level in pace and endurance.
And we tried it on ourselves…
Our squad coach, Coach Alyce Ooi, had no prior competitive swimming background. She started at a Critical Swim Speed (CSS) of 3:00min/100m four years ago and up till a year ago, was swimming at 1:46min/100m. An extraordinary achievement.
For the past 10 months, however, she has been on a plateau, unable to break her CSS time of 1:46min/100m. We tried Sprint sets, CSS sets and even strength & conditioning workouts but none of them worked. Her stroke is almost perfect and there’s nothing much more to correct. So we tried a different training regime, we went beyond conventional swimming practice and put in a Red Mist set twice a week.
Her new training routine: Monday - Red Mist Tuesday - Technical & Recovery Wednesday - CSS Friday - Red Mist With this new routine, her CSS improved from 1:46/100m to 1:43/100m within 6 weeks. This was far beyond our expectations.
Try the Red Mist set as it promises huge gains in fitness and confidence in your swim. As one of our squad swimmers say, this set is “like taking cannabis”. It’s really addictive once you’ve conquered it.
Come join Swim Squad
If you want to share the pain with others, drop by at my squad. We swim 5 times a week. Our Red Mist sessions are on:
Alternate Thursday mornings 6.30am-8.00am (PJ Palms)
Alternate Friday nights 6.45pm-8.15pm (University Malaya Pool) More info: https://www.myswimcoaching.com/swimsquad
Alternatively, follow our stories on www.instagram.com/swimsmoothmalaysia for our Red Mist swim sets every Thursday.
Stay tuned for how to set up a Red Mist set for your own swim in my next post.
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