How They Train: A Look At the Work Of Florida Recruit Bobby DiNunzio
Bobby DiNunzio, ranked by Swimcloud (collegeswimming.com), as the No. 1 high school male in Virginia (and 29th nationally), is the latest TIDE swimmer to be named a member of USA Swimming’s national junior team. A University of Florida commit, DiNunzio had an impressive Junior Pan Pac meet in which he placed fifth in the 800 meter freestyle (8:06.90), ninth in the 1500 (15:31.72), 11th in the 400 free (3:55.72) and 13th in the 400 IM (4:33.32). In February as a junior at Ocean Lakes High School in Virginia Beach, he again won the VHSL 6A state championship in the 500 yard free (4:24.65) and finished second in the 200 free (1:39.60). As a sophomore in 2021, he added a 200 IM title (1:52.39) to his 500 victory (4:31.34).
“Bobby has been successful at each stage of his development,” says his coach, Richard Hunter. “He was a very good age group swimmer and made a pretty seamless transition to senior-level swimming. He embraces hard work and is extremely internally driven. He is a quiet, performance-based, lead-by-example type even when at the younger end of an age group.
“The training standard for a practice is noticeably different when he is there. There are times when I can tell what kind of practice some of the other boys are going to have based on how close—or far—they are to Bobby’s lane. They know if they are training next to him, the accountability factor is high. So there have been instances when someone moves three to four lanes over to try and avoid it.
“Bobby’s greatest attribute is what he is willing to do in practice to prepare himself for competition. This presented some challenges early in his transition to senior swimming, as he expected high levels of performance on a fairly regular basis. At times, there was some disconnect on how to measure success if he was not winning against a more experienced competition pool. However, he would always come back to practice focused and ready to work, regardless of whether he was coming off the best meet of his life or the worst,” says Hunter.
“I believe the best approach when collaborating with any new athlete is to talk with them to identify their potential and high-level goals as well as their challenges. This is a little more difficult for younger athletes. They usually know that they want to get better, but their point of reference for achievement is based on what they have already done instead of what the next level looks like.
“In Bobby’s case, he was winning most of his events at state age group champs and participating in All-Star/Zone-level selection meets. COVID submarined a possible National Select Camp opportunity. That was unfortunate because it was apparent he could make the national junior team and compete on an international stage.
“During our conversations, it was clear that Bobby’s approach to getting there was always to work harder. I credit Jack Roach for recognizing how to balance Bobby’s eagerness with a longer-term approach to training and development. The first thing we did was take a step back and identify when he was good—in a training cycle and in competition—and when he struggled. We noticed three trends.
“First, Bobby was great at the front end of each week. Monday-Thursday practices were really good, but Friday into Saturday, they would taper off pretty dramatically. I often use Saturday as a way to gauge the week as a whole, so the athletes will do something that is challenging, often race-oriented, and I measure it. Initially, I thought he was just more of a practice swimmer versus a ‘racer.’ We did a lot of HR work to identify his baseline, and realized that while the plan for each week was energy system-focused with two three-day micro-cycles, Bobby’s default approach was to work harder. In doing so, he had been working in the threshold zone daily.
“As a distance swimmer, this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but again, at the behest of Jack, we emphasized slowing things down and pivoting to swimming faster, easier. This meant incorporating stroke count work and capping his heart rate at certain levels and asking him to go as fast as possible, but not exceed that heart rate.
“Secondly, we addressed his approach to racing, which was to push the pace early and see how long he could hold on. That method worked about 25 percent of the time. We incorporated a lot of descending into his training and focused on matching his kick rhythm with his stroke and stroke rate. He had a tendency to overkick, so his stroke ended up being a little bit disconnected, resulting in earlier onset race fatigue.
“The best-swum race he has done so far was a 1500 free in April of 2022, where his 300 splits were 3:04.8/3:07.5/3:07.1/3:06.5/3:05.0. That day, he was able to bottle up the early eagerness, get into a rhythm and then methodically descend. It ended up being a negative split, telling us there is room for improvement. It was a big developmental milestone in his swimming,” says Hunter.
“Thirdly, we noticed that Bobby tended to have his best meet about three quarters through the season rather than at the end of a training cycle. Bobby said that taper periods threw him off enough that he couldn’t really get a proper gauge of how he felt going into a championship meet. Consequently, he didn’t know how to pace his races properly.
“Additionally, he likes to compete in settings with less perceived expectation. While he still likes to compete at high-level meets, he gets a confidence boost from going fast ‘ahead of schedule.’ Our job was to get him to produce when needed in order to qualify for a meet or a team. Exposure to higher-level competition and keeping him involved in the planned progression of a season were key.
“This past summer, he and Kayla Wilson swam at our state senior champs, then two-and-a-half weeks later, they went to summer juniors, then two-and-a-half weeks after that, they went to Junior Pan Pacs. The goal was always to get better at each step without giving up too much training at the first two. Each of them really did a nice job in managing their training over the course of a longer-than-normal long course season, and the results reflected that.
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“Over the course of three years, Bobby has continued to buy into the process and currently approaches his training with more nuance. He is much better at focusing on ways to channel his work ethic effectively. In 2021, he achieved an Olympic Trials cut in the 1500 about a month after the meet. That was a jumping-off point for his 2021-22 season,” says his coach. “We then put a focus on competing at higher-level meets with the stated goal of making the national junior team. In addition, we knew that at International Trials, Bobby had a shot at qualifying for Junior Pan Pacs. Mission accomplished…and at Junior Pan Pacs, he dropped significant chunks of time.”
SAMPLE SETS
“The following set was done at altitude at the Olympic Training Center (long course), where the focus was consistently incorporating descending into his training program.
“BBM is Beats Below Max Heart Rate…50 BBM is aerobic, 30 BBM is threshold,” says Hunter.
4 rounds:
• 1 x 100 @ 1:30 (speed play)
• 1 x 50 free @ :45 @ 50 BBM + 1 x 100 free @ 1:20 @ 40 BBM + 1 x 50 free @ :45 @ 30 BBM
• 3 x 50 fly @ 1:00 @ 200 pace + :01/200 Pace/200 Pace -:01
• 150 easy @ 3:00
(On the 50s fly, Bobby averaged 31.8/30.5/29.7)
“Last year, we also began incorporating some timed straight swims to help him stay connected and maintain his rhythm. It was usually either 30 minutes or broken up into 3 x 10-15-minute blocks. The goal was to maintain a pace and rhythm for a large window, then come down to threshold for a short period and then go right back into his previous rhythm. It was like doing hurdles or the steeplechase in track. It disrupts your rhythm enough to force you to account for it and be able to change gears in both directions.”
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“Here’s another favorite DiNunzio set,” shares Hunter. “This was done on a Saturday, a quality-oriented day with relatively high rest, with the focus on descending and holding an average.”
SCY:
• 5 x 400 @ 5:00 (descend 1-2 and hold for 3-4; #5 fastest of the set)
(Bobby was 3:47/3:44/3:45/3:44/3:41)
“He also likes sets like 30 x 100. On short rest like 1:05, he will hold 56-57. On medium rest at 1:20, he will hold 53-54. Any time we do a set like this with a sustained heart-rate focus, I ask the athletes to produce two all-out efforts at the end to see if we hit the sweet spot for taxing them, but not to the point of losing the ability to dip into the anaerobic system to pop a couple fast swims.”
Photo Courtesy:
Michael J. Stott is an ASCA Level 5 coach, golf and swimming writer. His critically acclaimed coming-of-age golf novel, “Too Much Loft,” is in its second printing, and is available from store.Bookbaby.com, Amazon, B&N and distributors worldwide.