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Is There a Best Way to Race the 200 Freestyle?
By Daniel Zeng, Swimming World Intern
The 200 freestyle is commonly debated among swimmers as an unnecessarily confusing race to pace. Should you sprint all out from start, try to hold on, and race other competitors for a strong finish? Should you be more reserved to have the energy to finish the not-sprint, but also not quite distance event?
In an episode of former Auburn University head swim coach Brett Hawke’s podcast, “Thorpedo” Ian Thorpe expressed to the swimming world that most were swimming the 200-meter freestyle too reserved. Thorpe stated that in order for the current long-course world record to be beaten, swimmers must not hold back on the first 100, and then push even further past their limits on the end.
Thorpe’s Way
Considering his ideal approach scientifically, since your body will already be numb from the first half, and prepared by all the tough sets in practice, you could attempt to exert your muscles and all-out sprint to the end. His method emphasizes combining the utmost endurance and speed required in this event. Pacing this way forces you to keep a constant hard effort, then push to find a higher gear.
Some practical reasoning for this is it would force you to start strong, thus acquiring a lead. Once you get somewhat ahead enough of the field, the job then becomes exerting the entire capacity of whatever strength you have left and maintain a lead until the end. In other words, employing every last grain of grit to slam into the final wall.
An obvious downside to this pacing strategy is many swimmers tend to have expended the majority of their energy by the closing stages. The result is a rather painful fight to finish the race as your whole body and soul are begging for the pain to cease. All of the lead you possibly could’ve gained over your competitors could be lessened to a disheartening zero. It could also completely collapse where you fall way back and despise yourself for going out that hard.
There is certainly a group of swimmers yearning to learn new strategies to break Paul Biedermann’s world record of 1:42.00, set 11 years ago, and at the height of the supersuit era. That time is still the fastest anyone has ever swum officially, and continues to be one of the oldest world records still standing.
Now that the recent “controversy” has been discussed, it begs the question of whether the next generations of swimmers should take the advice of the “Thorpedo.” To explore the question deeper, here is a general breakdown of several pacing methods to see if his is truly the most effective.
Non-Thorpe Ways to Pace the 200 Freestyle
Reserve Energy For When You Need It/Negative Split
Attempting this pacing method will ultimately prevent the “dying” sensation toward the end of Thorpe’s way. Start at a solid relaxed pace, ensuring that you secure a firm feel for the water. At the 100-meter mark, rapidly build your speed to essentially an all-out sprint. It will seem as though the rest are well on their way to fighting for that top spot, while poor you does not quite have a rhythm yet. What you do have on the other competitors is knowing they will all be desperately struggling to the wall with all their energy practically gone. Some magical speed out of nowhere will shine at the end of the race.
Be careful and very centered on your race. Conserve energy for later when you’ll be praying for an out-of-nowhere boost of strength to not “die.” However, do not wait until a bulk of the race has already happened. There will be too much room to make-up otherwise. Your coach and everyone on deck, plus the minimal spectators in the stands, will think you were doing a warmup swim.
Fast Ends, Conserve in The Middle
Sprint the first and last 50. Keep the stroke long and smooth but maintain forward pressure. The goal is to utilize a bit of easy speed off those blocks, settle into a fluid rhythm during the middle 100, and rechannel the stored energy to finish solid. If you get out ahead by sprinting the first 50, you can intimidate the others in your heat, and make them “lose hope” of winning. People might be trying the “Reserve Energy” method mentioned prior, so don’t get too confident in yourself. Just focus on your race plan. Sprinting the last 50 ensures all the energy you had coming into the race is used up, and you could not have gone any faster. Just a moment ago you were relaxed, so hopefully this last push is relatively painless.
One fault with this is that all your energy could be used up by going too fast at the start. The remaining distance would for certain be a struggle to complete. Try to mainly utilize the initial assist in speed from the powerful underwater off the dive, as opposed to bringing in raw force from your muscles.
Stay Close to Everyone, then Try to Power Past
Do what is needed to be even with most of the other lanes from the start. Begin upping the tempo, along with the overall intensity of your stroke, at 125-150 meters. A benefit to this method is that you will never really lose focus on the rest of the pack, as you’ll be constantly trying to stay even with the others. One other positive is you won’t have to think about anything besides not letting people get too far ahead, or letting yourself drift too far ahead. Another plus is that further in the race if you’re still close to everyone, the winning ambitions of you, alongside the built-up adrenaline, will kick in. The urge to win, and prove that you are capable of more than you thought, is what makes sports like swimming unique. While every part of your body will be hurting, your soul will desire to prove that all the hours of training, in and out of the pool, has not gone to waste.
A potential flaw in this plan is that the rest of your heat might be faster than you. Therefore, you would have a difficult time keeping up with them. Additionally, someone might be more tapered than you, be looser and fresher, and swim the whole 200 easier. People next to you could also be taking it slow, causing the race to not be much of a race.
So, Is there a Superior Way to Pace the 200 Freestyle?
No clear answer comes to mind at this point. What is for sure is that you should adjust how you pace the event in practice and at meets to figure out what works best for you. It all depends on what kind of swimmer you are. Each of us has developed our own personalized style.
All commentaries are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Swimming World Magazine nor its staff.
Samantha Thompson
200 is a Sprint
Harry Came
yes it is. the 3rd quarter all inn 🙂 the same as 200 fly
It’s hard to swim on its own strategy unless you are comfortably leading the race. In competition, I feel like most swimmers use the last one: follow then sprint at the end. Other parameters may impact: the pool, the warmup, the mental that day.,,
It’s only a 200; the whole thing is a sprint, just not a breath-hold sprint.
Sprint the 1st 50, pace the middle 100, sprint the last 50.
The best way??? Same as ANY other race to achieve your ‘fastest’ time is to even pace the race based on your ability level. Thus your intensity level increases as you progress through the race to maintain that same pace throughout.Calling a 200m a ‘sprint’ misses the point and doesn’t enlighten how to swim the race. Do they mean flat out from the gun, 100% effort? If so then see what happens after the first 100m……..However, ‘racing’ the 200m freestyle does not necessarily mean the same thing……..
Peter Scott Agreed, very common misconception in the delivery when training 200m freestylers.
However, to those who do not specialize in it- the race indeed seems to be at the intensity of what many would consider “sprinting freestyle”
Sharif Alaoui the reason that we rarely see a 50m freestyler at world level in the 50 competing at the same level in the 200 is because it is not possible to sprint it. Very few athletes at the top level able to perform at a good level on both…Amaury Leveaux is one. In breaststroke similar….Adam Peaty, great at 50 and 100 but never managed to get it together in the 200……
Peter Scott I’d say in adolescence, 95% of prospect elite swimmers can; but after 18- specializing in training will develop the athlete to maximizing either fast twitch muscles or balance
Peter Scott
I absolutely agree Peter. Armand Maritz
Frans Maritz thanks?
Great rule of thumb for elite swimmers is start with PB plus 5% for your 100. Then back end this plus 20%.
Yes, in a pool that allows swimmers during covid times … sadly not happening in our Province ??
False start and DQ?