Tethered swimming is a great option if you’re crunched for time or don’t have access to your usual pool facility.
It can take some time to adapt to the tethered swimming environment, and we’re here to help you make the most of your training sessions! Check out our top tips for tethered swimming.
1. Have a Plan
Just like a regular pool workout, it’s important to plan your workout ahead of time to ensure you maximize your time. Build your workout in the MySwimPro app before you hop in and you’re ready to go!
Related: Try This 30-Minute Tethered Swimming Workout
2. Mix it Up
Who said you had to swim continuously with the tether? Mix up your swims with different strokes, drills, kicking, sculling and more. Change up your intervals and vary your speed throughout the workout so you don’t get bored.
3. Use Equipment
Work on stroke technique and body position with equipment! Pull buoys, fins, paddles and a snorkel are all fair game for tethered workouts.
4. Measure Your Workout
Tethered swimming can’t be measured the same way we measure traditional lap swimming. With the tether, you have 2 options:
- Time: Swim for a set interval. Build an interval-based workout in MySwimPro, load it to your smartwatch and your watch will walk you through each interval, set by set.
- Stroke Count: If you don’t have a smartwatch, stroke count is a great option. Swim for 20, 30, 40 or even 100 strokes, and take a break. Vary your speed, swimming 20 strokes hard and 20 strokes easy.
5. Make Workouts Shorter
It can feel like time moves extra slow during tethered workouts. There’s nothing wrong with shortening your workouts — and the distances you swim. 200 repeats may be replaced with repeats of 50 strokes.
Tethered swimming puts extra stress on your shoulders, so it’s important to give your body time to adapt. If you want to swim for 1 hour per day, try breaking that up into 2 30-minute sessions — 1 in the morning and 1 at night.
Related: DIY Tethered Swimming with MySwimPro
6. Focus on Body Position
Tethered swimming provides an opportunity to work on the fundamentals. Work on keeping your head looking straight down at the bottom of the pool and keeping your hips up — focusing on these basics will make a huge difference in your efficiency when you’re back to your usual swimming routine.
7. Anchor the Tether Higher Up
Do your best to attach the end of your tether to a stable object that’s higher off the ground. A higher tether anchor point will help you keep your hips up.
8. Mix in Dryland
Short, tethered workouts call for some fun! Try mixing in a few sets of dryland exercises between your swim intervals. You’ll keep your heart pumping, build strength and work your muscles differently than you would in a typical swim workout.
Related: Try This HIIT Dryland & Swim Workout
9. Have Fun
While being away from your usual pool isn’t an ideal situation, take this opportunity to try something new and have fun!
Have you tried tethered swimming? Let us know what you think! Download the MySwimPro app and start a free trial of ELITE COACH to unlock personalized swim workouts, dryland training programs and 1-on-1 coaching! Use code myswimpro for 10% off all backyard kits from Swimmers Best.
2 Comments
Great one!!! Thanks you guys!!!!!!
Next summer is going to be bonkers!!!!!
I swim this way often.
Back pool is far from 25 meters but I get a great workout this way.
I’m an OCD 68 year old who counts 20 strokes a length.
80 equals 100 meters etc.
Add an extra 100 to train for a team sprint triathlon in September.
3 old Black Belt’s who all had open heart surgery…
Great way to train!!!
Keep Kickin,
Bob Z