Masters Swimming | Triathlon Training

Our Masters swimming program is geared toward former competitive swimmers who are looking to stay in shape, meet new people, and do some Masters and open water competitions, if the interest is there.  We will do all of the strokes in these practices.  Our focus changes throughout the year:

• Fall Season (Sept through Dec) — Work on building aerobic fitness, hone stroke mechanics, and get ready for the Masters competitive season in January.
• Winter Season (Jan through May) — Incorporate more speed and race skill practices into the mix to be ready to perform at Masters competitions.  This season culminates with the Masters State Meet in April and Masters Nationals in May.
• Summer Season (June through Aug) — While there are some long-course Masters meets, we shift more toward an open water swimming and triathlon focus during the summer.  We have such few warm days during the year in Chicago, it would be a shame not to be outside more.  Many of our swimmers target the Big Shoulders 2.5/5K open water swim in early September as a training target

Our Fast Forward Triathlon Swim Training Program is a technology-enhanced, accelerated swimming program for adult triathlete and fitness swimmers. Fast Forward is the program for you if you are looking for more intensive coaching, individualized practices, and specific training sets designed for fitness and racing needs. We designed Fast Forward to rapidly develop and refine the skills and fitness that you need to achieve race day successes. We apply the Total Immersion stroke drills and training methods to help you practice mindfully and improve in a shorter period of time.

• Fall Season (Sept through Dec) — During the triathlon off-season, we will work on improving technique and efficiency while working on building each swimmer’s aerobic base.  This time of year is also great for taking lessons and classes at our Swim Studio.
• Winter Season (Jan through May) — During the early part of the year we will start to work on greater variety in our aerobic training sets while incorporating some speed and tempo sets to build each swimmer’s speed range.  We encourage our triathletes to do some of the Masters sets and competitions as a fun break from all of the distance freestyle.
• Summer Season (June through Aug) — We move into summer racing season and add in weekly open water swims at Ohio St. Beach when the weather and lake temperatures get nice.  Our goal is to help our swimmers simulate racing conditions so they are ready on race day to have breakthrough swims.

Masters Swimming

People joining the Masters Swimming program should be competent in all four competitive strokes.  You should also be interested in doing some sprint or higher intensity work.  Since most of the training sets will be interval-based, you should feel comfortable working off a pace clock and leaving appropriate distance between yourself and the person in front of you.

If you want to compete in US Masters swim meets and open water competitions, you’ll need to register for US Masters Swimming.  Click the USMS logo to go to the US Masters Swimming registration page.

Fast Forward

To take part in the Fast Forward program, we require our swimmers to be able to swim at least 200 yards of freestyle with just minimal stopping at the walls to turn around (note:  flip turns aren’t required).  You should also be comfortable swimming in and out of a 12 foot deep end.  This fitness, technique, and water comfort threshold is intended to make sure you can do most of the sets that we have in store for you.

If you don’t feel like you can meet these standards, we’ll need you to complete either a CBD Freestyle 1 class, a Total Immersion Level 1 Freestyle workshop or an equivalent series of private lessons with a CBD coach.  Even if you can meet these requirement, Fast Forward is a program based on the Total Immersion set of drills, exercises, and philosophy.  Taking a class or lessons where we teach you these drills will make the training more effective — even if you do the class or lessons while simultaneously doing Fast Forward.

If you are on the fence, you can always schedule a 25-minute $30.00 evaluation lesson and our coaches will let you know for sure where you fall.  To schedule that lesson, simply contact our office and someone will get you on the schedule.

We offer swim practices on Mondays through Thursdays from 6:15-7:15pm.

We conduct our swim practices at the Keating Sports Center at the Illinois Institute of Technology (click the name for a link to Google Maps).

The monthly tuition for our Masters and Fast Forward swim programs is:

Subscription	One Group Session per Week	Two Group Sessions per Week	Three or More Group Sessions per Week
Masters Swimming	$60	$80	$100
Fast Forward	$60	$80	$100

In addition to the monthly fees, you will be assessed an annual $20.00 safety fee to cover the cost of insurance and other water safety related issues.

As an added perk to your membership in our Masters Swimming and Triathlon Training programs, you will receive a 20% discount on all lessons and classes at our Swim Studio while your membership is active.

When you register for our Masters Swimming and Triathlon Training program, we charge your credit card that day for the first month.  If you register before the 15th, we will charge you for the full month; registrations after the 15th will be at 50% of the regular monthly costs.  We will then set you up for automatic payment to run on the 1st of the month for the subsequent months.

We will keep you on auto pay until you notify us in writing that you are planning on leaving the program.  You must let us know before the last month of the month that plan to discontinue your membership.  We will not offer refunds after the monthly automatic payment cycle has run.

Whether you’re a returning member or new member joining our team, the registration process is simple and takes only a few minutes. You will be requested to provide payment information during the last step of the registration process.

At the conclusion of the registration process and upon team admin approval, you will be granted access to your own private account for the team.  Your private account is your one-stop-shop for maintaining your contact information and for gaining access to information about our team.

We look forward to having you be part of our incredible swim program. Just click this link or the image above and you be brought directly to the registration page on our team’s website.

If you would like to schedule a trial workout to see if the location, times, and practice content are a good fit for you, please fill out the form below and we will contact you.  You can always contact our office at (773) 342-7250 if you would like to speak with a friendly voice.