We are joined on this episode of Torpedo Swimtalk Podcast by Open Water Swim Coach Vlad Mravec. Among the many, many swimmers he has coached to open water success, are the 73 "and counting" swimmers who have completed the English Channel crossing. Throw in numerous Triple Crown holders and other well known swims all around the globe and you get a sense of just how experienced Vlad is in preparing these crusaders for their ultra marathon swims.
We trace Vlad's inspiring story from his humble beginnings in Slovakia to becoming a respected figure in Sydney's swimming community. Discover how he employs unique training techniques, tailoring programs to suit individual swimmers, and the fine art of coordinating successful channel crossings.
Do you ever wonder about the science behind feeding schedules for swimmers? Vlad's got you covered. He sheds light on how different body types and swimming styles impact feeding times. Hear from Vlad on the critical role of technique and how training with successful English Channel crossers can be a game-changer for all his squad members at Vladswim
Whether you're toying with the idea of swimming the English Channel or a swimming aficionado, this chat with Vlad Mravec promises to be an engaging, enlightening, and inspiring listen. So, don't miss out!
Connect with Vlad
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Torpedo Swimtalk is sponsored by AMANZI SWIMWEAR
#swim #swimmer #swimming #mastersswimmer #mastersswimmers #mastersswimming #openwaterswimmer #openwaterswimmers #openwaterswimming #swimminglover #swimmingpodcast #mastersswimmingpodcast #torpedoswimtalkpodcast #torpedoswimtalk #tstquicksplashpodcast #podcast #podcaster #podcastersofinstagram #swimmersofinstagram #swimlife #swimfit #ageisjustanumber #health #notdoneyet
We are joined on this episode of Torpedo Swimtalk Podcast by Open Water Swim Coach Vlad Mravec. Among the many, many swimmers he has coached to open water success, are the 73 "and counting" swimmers who have completed the English Channel crossing. Throw in numerous Triple Crown holders and other well known swims all around the globe and you get a sense of just how experienced Vlad is in preparing these crusaders for their ultra marathon swims.
We trace Vlad's inspiring story from his humble beginnings in Slovakia to becoming a respected figure in Sydney's swimming community. Discover how he employs unique training techniques, tailoring programs to suit individual swimmers, and the fine art of coordinating successful channel crossings.
Do you ever wonder about the science behind feeding schedules for swimmers? Vlad's got you covered. He sheds light on how different body types and swimming styles impact feeding times. Hear from Vlad on the critical role of technique and how training with successful English Channel crossers can be a game-changer for all his squad members at Vladswim
Whether you're toying with the idea of swimming the English Channel or a swimming aficionado, this chat with Vlad Mravec promises to be an engaging, enlightening, and inspiring listen. So, don't miss out!
Connect with Vlad
Facebook
Website
You can connect with Torpedo Swimtalk:
Website
Facebook
Instagram
YouTube
Sign up for our Newsletter
Leave us a review
Torpedo Swimtalk is sponsored by AMANZI SWIMWEAR
#swim #swimmer #swimming #mastersswimmer #mastersswimmers #mastersswimming #openwaterswimmer #openwaterswimmers #openwaterswimming #swimminglover #swimmingpodcast #mastersswimmingpodcast #torpedoswimtalkpodcast #torpedoswimtalk #tstquicksplashpodcast #podcast #podcaster #podcastersofinstagram #swimmersofinstagram #swimlife #swimfit #ageisjustanumber #health #notdoneyet
Hello Swimmers and welcome to the 126th episode of Torpedo Swim Talk podcast. I'm your host, Danielle Spurling, and each week I chat to a masters swimmer from around the world about their swimming journey. Today I'm joined by open water swim coach Vlad Mravec, who's coached 73 swimmers, and counting, to successful English Channel crossings. He shares all about his knowledge in preparing swimmers for these challenges from his base in Sydney at Vlad Swim. Hi Vlad, welcome to the podcast.
Vlad Mravec:Oh, thank you very much. Thank you, Danielle. Thank you.
Danielle Spurliing:It's great to have you here. I know you're based in Sydney. Which pools do you work out of there?
Vlad Mravec:I'm at Andrew Boy Charlton Pool, close to the Domain in the Botanic Gardens. Really nice location. It means everyone who's happy to come to the Sydney and wants to do something extra. I welcome over all the swimmers who can swim actually.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, I've only seen photos of it. I've never swum there myself. Is it a saltwater pool?
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, saltwater pool is a really nice location. You can have a nice walk around. You don't need a parking straight away in front of the pool, you can park a little bit further and 10 minutes nice walk around all that boat and yacht and all yacht and everything. That's a really nice location. Yeah, people love it.
Danielle Spurliing:Very nice. Yeah, it looks beautiful from the photos. And when you take groups out into the open water in Sydney, which beach do you normally swim out of?
Vlad Mravec:I used to run open water, swim different locations because, as you know, I've got a lot of crazy long distance swimmers and swimming always on the one location is sometimes boring. It means all I used to do before the COVID, before we started. I started to do something different. I've been doing mainly Koji, balmoral, bondi, blaperoo, brighton, lasanne all their locations every Saturday, different locations. But after the COVID, after everything, I just stuck on the Koji. I love it Koji. Koji is a great location but sometimes, if we can't swim in the Koji because it's a danger condition and it's really rough condition, we can do LaParis, we do sometimes Brighton, which is called water similar in Melbourne, and sometimes we go to Manly or Shelly or something like that, but not really often we're changing but yeah, we try to do combinations.
Danielle Spurliing:Nice. Now I know you're from Slovakia and you do have a background in open water swimming. Can you give us a bit of a background of how you got involved in it and what that was like swimming in Europe at that time?
Vlad Mravec:Oh look, I used to be swimmer in Slovakia. I used to be Czechoslovakia. In Czechoslovakia my best result was win 50 meters Czechoslovakian championship. That was when I was 16 or 17. And then I still keep swimming. And then suddenly I was around the 17 years old and I just clicked to me. I want to be swimming coach.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, but in Slovakia I don't have an open water swim. So that's the time when I grow up as a swimmer. Yeah, that time it wasn't only one one five K swim, that's it. And we didn't have any ocean swim or swimming in a sea or whatever. Yeah, we were swimming, always in a dam or we're swimming in the river, always one in some of the lakes, but not really. I was always scared. Everyone who was swimming in the pool was scared to get an open water because you can't see down on the bottom. But anyway, I did few five K swim over there, but not really like we are doing here in Australia.
Vlad Mravec:And then I moved to Russia for one year study university physical education, specialized for swimming. That was a great university. I love it because we used to have a subject like you've got the anatomy for swimmers, biomechanic for swimmers, yeah. Psychologists for swimmers yeah, I mean, everything was actually specialized for the swimming. It was a fantastic school, but after one year I moved back to Slovakia and I finished university in my country, because if you want to be swimming coach in Slovakia at that time you have to have a higher education, you have to have a university. You can't be coach after I don't know one week course. Yeah, it means we have to have a understand everything what happened with the body, with the psychology, what was that and that for me? Everything, everything, I mean this is what I studied five years and then I start coaching, coaching, coaching. And yeah, and I start coaching since I don't know, maybe 30, 35 years ago.
Danielle Spurliing:That's amazing. And so what year did you come to Australia and set up coaching here?
Vlad Mravec:Look, I was coaching Slovakia but I found out that I'm not getting any more information about swimming and I want to grow up, I want to get better, better, better, and I was really hungry about information and that time I said I have to go away from Slovakia because there's nothing there and all this book was since, from 1983. And I was. I was thinking about move. That was around the 2000. Yeah, I moved to 2001 with my wife and we spent three years in Sydney. We stopped, I was stuck. I start coaching.
Vlad Mravec:I learned to swim, program lifeguarding and I used to work with the John Conrad. They used to be really good swimmer, yeah, 1968, olympia, nix and all the stuff I worked for him. And there was another coach, really good coach, ghana, and I used to coach with him, Steve Ghana. Yeah, he had really good swimmers. He had the one swimmer who qualified for Commonwealth Games, samantha Marshall. She was doing 100 breaststroke to 100 breaststroke. But that program, what he was running, he was running kids program and adults program. It means I was covering adults and he was covering the kids program.
Vlad Mravec:But sometimes on that time it was 2001, 2002, 2003,. A couple of people asked me can you make the program for me for Rottenest Channel or for 10K Swim Southhead I said are you serious? I don't have any experience about open water. I don't have any clue how to coach you for 10K Swim. I just asked Australian swimming coaches. They lived here. They got more experience about open water. They got the experience about the coach swimmers for Olympic Games. Don't ask me.
Vlad Mravec:I came here to learn and then that time I was just coaching the adults and kids as well. But no, open water, nothing. And then I moved back to Slovakia because I didn't have a visa. Then I moved to New Zealand. I was at Rockhampton where I used to be a head coach Rockhampton for two years for CQ Accordjet and then I moved back to Sydney. That was 2009. And then, if someone came and asked, can you do program for me for 10K swim, of course it's easy, so simple. I can do everything now. I had the knowledge, I had experience. It took me actually 10 years to learn how to set up the program and everything that swimmer needs to be ready for any goals.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, that's amazing. I love that story that you've come across your passion and the thing that you're really, really great at, because you have had over 70 swimmers get past, get over, the English channel, which is an amazing, amazing statistic. What makes the English channel such a sort of a goal for the swimmers that you coach?
Vlad Mravec:Oh look, it's. Everything started with the. With the, there was first swimmer coming on Spittle. Yeah, he's really good friends with Talbot, the best one of the friends. He came and said, vlad, can you do the program for English channel? But before I coach, I coach Louis Stevenson. She used to be really good swimmer on the Rodnes channel. She won three Rodnes channels at the time and I used I used to coach her and I said, oh look, if I can coach the swimmer for the Rodnes, I can coach for English channel. But what happened? This time I start coaching as well.
Vlad Mravec:My group. It means if I had a I don't know one English channel swimmer, another swimmer start thinking I can do it. Well, because he can do the channel. He did the channel. It means I'm doing exactly similar what he's doing and I've got the same coach. I can do another. Yeah, there is another swimmer came, another swimmer, another. I call in an English in my group. It's a virus. Yeah, don't talk to the English channel swimmer, because you cut the virus and then you have to work harder to complete the English channel. Other people that understand yeah, there are a few people when I said don't ever think about English channel. Some of the people are not strong enough to do the channel. Some of the people are really strong and they can do without the problem. Yeah, it means it can just. Just I just managing who can do can't do, otherwise I've got the 200 supers. Yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:So so, a swimmer that's about to do the English channel. What does their training week look like? How many times do they come? How many times do they swim what? What kind of sets do they do?
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, Look, I all my long distance swimmers. They needed the five sessions a week. Five, yeah, I'm setting up the structure. Three, one, two, one. What means three day swims one day off? Two day swim one day off? It means Thursday and Sunday. Sunday is off. They're not swimming. They can do whatever they want. They can do walk, bike run, ski, surfing, whatever they, but they're not going, not able to go in the water and do swim session.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, it means this is first set up weekly program. Yeah, second one definitely they need to do. They need to understand intensity, what kind of intensity they're doing. That can't do all the time. Hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard. Yeah, it means I just explained to them okay, now we're doing easy technique work. Wednesday we've got another big threshold set, which is you have to and kill yourself because it's really important. On Thursday we've got the off. Friday we try to get to the speed up because we need to activate the other muscle fibers, not only slow muscle fibers. And then Saturday it's a long, long, long distance swimming. Yeah, it means five sessions and average distance for English channel swimmers from 25 to 35, 40. Yeah, depends. Swimmer depends swimmer. Everything depends swimmer. We've got 73 channels swimmer's, 73 different programs, 73 different books, 73 different personalities, 73 crazy swimmers.
Danielle Spurliing:That sounds great. When you say a long swim on a Saturday, how far would they swim in that particular?
Vlad Mravec:one Depends when they are on the preparation whether starting and first goal is, I don't know, rock, next channel, it means they're doing between five to 15 k's. After that, when they're working on the eight hours qualifies swim, they start changing everything. They're not working on the distance but they're working on the hours, which is they have to do two to eight hours swims and sometimes they're doing two hours, sometimes four hours, sometimes 10 hours, sometimes five hours. It means it's just about the hours, yeah, and yeah, of course they're covering the distance, but they have to learn how to manage the hours in the water and all the distance. It's totally different, because channel is about the hour spending the time in the water and completed, not about the distance, because distance can be totally different, depends the tide and different weather and speed, everything. Yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, because the conditions are very obviously to do with the weather, but the tides over there are quite significant as well.
Vlad Mravec:Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and just feed yourself if you are attached to friends.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah.
Vlad Mravec:And swim between.
Danielle Spurliing:Yes, I mean, do you I know you train out of the pool do you get them to actually do a weekly swim in the ocean, or is most of it done in the pool?
Vlad Mravec:Most I do in the pool. Yeah, pool is more important than open water. Actually it's preparation for open water Pool. If you do, if they're doing a lot of a lot of open water swim, they're not doing pool. They will be struggling at the end of the channel. They'll be struggling at the end of the channel. It means pool is great, great session for set up and learning the swimming pace and improving the swimming pace With the swim technique.
Vlad Mravec:Swim technique must be covered every session. It's not session form on my sessions. There are no sessions without the technique Whom up. Focus on the technique In set. Focus what you have to be done, what has to be done. That means I know we're fresh out of speed or technique work or pool bottles and all the stuff that, yeah, pool is actually pushing, always with the pool is really important. Yeah, because in the pool we can actually adaptate on the speed and we can hold the same speed because we can measure that speed. But in the open water we're just doing results, what we were doing in the pool and then result is I can do three case per hour, I can do 3.5 case per hour.
Vlad Mravec:How you can do that because you are holding 130 pace in a pool or 125. This is really really important connection.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, absolutely All those swimmers that you coach to get across the English channel, the feedback that they've given you afterwards. What kind of challenge, or what are some of the main challenges that people come across when they're swimming it?
Vlad Mravec:Wow, that's a good question. What kind of challenges are actually everyone who cross it? They are so happy they actually they know that preparation covered everything what they've been using during the channel.
Danielle Spurliing:This is really important.
Vlad Mravec:Preparation is hard to spot. English channel stream is not really hard. It's just a result, it's a celebration. I cover everything. I cover cold water, I cover nutrition, I cover my mental style, I cover my intensity, I cover my physio recovery in my body. I just, I just enjoy my swim. Some of the swim is coming that way, that reaction, and I said, oh, I could swim back, but I was, I'm not tired. This is my question. First, is it's not about how was English channel? How did you feel after the swim? If they say I was exhausting or I was struggling, well then we can have a look. What was wrong, and usually wrong, was bad feeding. Bad feeding, for example, or different head space, mentally just gone. Too much negativity or worry or whatever. This is too really important stuff on the swim channel. But if everything is fine, everyone say, oh, that's it done. I thought it would be harder. No, because they only depression. It is harder.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, yeah. And what is a good feeding schedule that you would advise them to undertake?
Vlad Mravec:Look, it's really really individual. Yeah, it means you know they will go to the two types of the swimmers, okay, two types of swimming. So first type of swimming is who's swimming? A slow, tall, it's really got a lot of a lot of dominator with the slow muscle fibers. Yeah, these guys are saving the energy. They're not getting you and she's just saving.
Vlad Mravec:It means that feeding is 45 minutes one hour, yeah, but if you've got another swimmer's one who are short, a little bit more muscular, yeah, they've got a high stroke rate, that you can see them. They're strong as run of 65 to 70. Sometimes, yeah, means they need more energy because they're hungry for energy, means they need to be feeding every 30 minutes. Yeah, this is type of. And then if you calculate, if you're feeding one hour twice or feeding one hour once, you and you need to replace everything when you burn for example, I know the liquid, yeah, carbs and all that stuff you have to set up your feeding plan. Yeah, and then the feeding plan is always individual. Yeah, I can advise okay, try to carbohydrate first, three feeds and then try to get to the protein, or go to get to the protein and then go to the caffeine, caffeine and then all the stuff, but it's only general information. But if they want to do specific information, nutritionist, best way way to go. But they need to find nutritionists who's not specialized for losing the weight, like everyone wants to lose the weight because they are literally stuck on a lot of sugar. But yeah, we need that. We need that. We need actually nutritionists who is specialized and understand for long period of the time, performance and what's the energy going through and stuff like that.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, means, I've got a few guys and I'm just advise them them if they want to have a specific, if they don't want to, they've got one year to practicing what actually the body can absorb or they can use. Yeah, and I've got a lot of swimmers, english and swimmers. That it's his best, best environment for the new English and swimmers because they can ask whatever they can ask them. They don't need the Googling, they don't need to do any research. They're coming and say, hey Dean, please can you tell me what your feeding is? Oh, okay, I can try this one. This doesn't work, okay, hey, steve, can you tell me what is your feeding is? It means they can do combination and see the people how they prepare and they already done channel. It's really good advantage.
Danielle Spurliing:It's great to be able to train in a squad with swimmers that have already done it and learn from their experience. Fantastic Is the feeding something that you practice during training, as well. Yes, must do that.
Vlad Mravec:You must, you can. You know you used to swim. It means you understand that body must adapt it or anything, everything, yeah, and we can adapt it on a cold water, we can adapt it on a high intensity, we can adapt it on the endurance, you can adapt it on a nutrition where you can get. We actually we giving the body something where the body start using for energy as energy, and if they're on a year preparation in the pool, only on the water, and then going for open water swims where they needed to get the carbs and a little bit more energy, the body say, hey, what are you giving me? I never had the carbs. What you silly, I don't want to let carbs, I will be vomiting. Yeah, how the body react.
Danielle Spurliing:Do you? How do you get them adapted to cold water, like what's your, what's your program for that? They're obviously training in saltwater pool, which is obviously gets colder during the year but when it's heading up to the channel like cold water.
Vlad Mravec:Adaptation is always, always through the, for example, I prefer if the swimmer coming in the winter, we actually Sydney. It's a base, best place to prepare swimmers for English channel. It's the best. Yeah, melbourne, for example, you guys, melbourne, you you can get a nice 16 or 15 degrees water when you need for English channel for maybe one or two months and then your temperature drop down to 10, 11 or nine. Yeah, brisbane, tour Brisbane, they don't have anything like that. They are lucky they've got a one lake and they are on a 16, maybe 17 degrees, yeah, but not 15. Yeah, it means Sydney. We've got the location, brighton or Balmoral. We can get the water temperature to 13 degrees, 15 degrees, but for the three months, yeah, we can get a rough condition and now I swim in a Koogee or the Koogee or Bombay, but temperature will be 17, 16, 18. It means they all the English and swimmers can practice whatever they want and that temperature was at the channel. Okay, this is a great location.
Vlad Mravec:It means if swimmers coming and can go through the two winter season, that'll be fantastic. First winter season if they start swimming with the with the wetsuit first half hour and then the next half hour go without the wetsuit. They step by step adapt it. Yeah, it means if they start from the, I know from, let's say, june, july will be a little bit cooler but they can go without the wetsuit. 30 minutes, excellent. One hour, oh, fantastic. Two hours, it means the first winter season is just getting to the swim cold water and adapt the cold water as far as we can do at two hours or three hours or four hours, yeah.
Vlad Mravec:And then what happened? After eight months, because we have to go through the winter or through the summer, then there's coming another winter. But body, what we got? We got body adaptation, good body, muscle memory. But the other body, body remember everything. They won't starve in the 30 minutes. They already starved the three hours where they finished eight months ago and they they just getting built up to four hours, five hours, six hours, eight hours, okay, body is fantastic. It's just, if someone understand the body, how body works, you can achieve whatever you want. But you have to be for the, the coach, everyone who coaching. They need to understand what body go through during the session. If you understand as a coach, you understand what's going on, then you are can prepare anyone for any swims, whatever world record. Yeah, we can. We can, I love it.
Danielle Spurliing:And you've had quite a few swimmers also complete the triple crown which is Catalina, english Channel and Manhattan, and do you prepare them any differently or do you advise them any differently with those swims, cause they're quite different swims One's obviously, you know, around Manhattan is a lot less, with waves to start with. How do you speak to them about those differences?
Vlad Mravec:If someone, starting with the English Channel, this is a gate to open waters for me. Yeah, if you can do English Channel, then get to all the other channels, it's no problem. Yeah, because one thing's you actually accumulate all the distance for that during the preparation. For example, if you, if you calculate all the distance per year, or half year or two years, yeah, you've got to run the 2000 case in your arms, 2000 case in your body, 2000,. I don't know how many hours you pushing your body to the other day go better, go better, go better, go better. It means he's got a really everyone who finished channel, they've got a really nice package. Okay, that package that can use, use for the next swim, if it's a Catalina.
Vlad Mravec:I'm not changing anything, I'm not changing the distance, I'm not changing intensity, I'm changing something, what they need, what I found out. For example, one guy he never been doing dry land session. Put over the dry land session, you will be faster, you'll be stronger, you can do, you can do Catalina. What I changing? I, as close to we going to Catalina, I'm managing to change open water swim with specific for Catalina. And specific for Catalina is swim through the night, because this is only one swim where we can swim. First we need to know everything, what result we want to. Oh, what swim we're going to swim, what it's actually characteristic for that swim, night swim, swim in the dark, swim with the padlock, swim in the padlock in the dark. All that skills and when we're getting close out we see which is we practicing how to how to actually swim will be at the catalina.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, which about Manhattan channel? Oh sorry, manhattan, manhattan swim. Look now it's not really hard swim. I know it's a long distance. I know it's a spending around the 12 or 18 hour or 16 hours, some of them 10 hours. Yeah, but actually it's not usually your swim. You still got that push from that river. Okay, it means if you are on an English channel, swim by doing three k's per hour, but in Manhattan you can do 3.8 k's per hour. You've got little bit push, which is what I prefer to my swimners if they can see them how much mileage they're doing. I sometimes suggest them if you do catalina, give yourself a month and do Manhattan.
Danielle Spurliing:Do you ever go on the boats, or is it your job really from Sydney and then they go out and do their swims.
Vlad Mravec:Or, look, I am coached when I believe that everything that guy's been doing, they're ready, they don't need me. Okay, all done, this is your journey. Now just show yourself what you've been doing through and enjoy it. Yeah, if there are a couple of swimmers who we are connect, like as a coach, and say I definitely need you because I can't find anyone and I'm just struggling, of course I don't want to be guilty that he didn't finish because I didn't go. Sometimes I go, yeah, but not really often, yeah.
Vlad Mravec:But I more prefer they swim as already and doing the swim by them, for themselves, not for me, not for everyone. I think that's yeah, this should be.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, yeah, and I know you just mentioned dry land. How much do you get them to do each week dry land?
Vlad Mravec:I prefer two sessions, two sessions minimum. Three sessions will be great, but two sessions depends the time you need to understand preparation for English channel for some of them, our third job. This is what I want to explain as well. Yeah, you've got the family, you've got the normal job and you've got a job to be ready for the English channel, which is spending a lot of hours Everywhere. You need the energy. You need the energy for family, for work, for swimming. It means if they're doing two sessions, I'm happy they are doing two sessions, if they can't, I won't push them, because swimming is more important. Yeah, but still has to be balanced. Yeah, I know, and I pushing everyone swimmers. Hey, guys, be good at the beginning of the preparation, be good husband and be good at the work. Why? Because the last one month you have to stop cheating because you won't have energy to those two covered because you'll be swimming more. So, yeah, that makes sense.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, that makes sense, and you've had two or three swimmers across the Suzuga Strait in Japan and obviously I don't know whether you're on top of all the controversy with that this year, but Andy Donaldson, who I had on the podcast last week, he's been the only swimmer that's crossed it this year, but you've had some swimmers in the past that have done it. How have they been able to do it? Because it sounds like it's a pretty risky crossing with those sort of tides coming together and also the support system that's over there. So how have you found your swimmers?
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, look, the swimmers who used to cross the channel. They were using the captain who Donaldson was using. It means it was all the guy, he was experienced skipper, he knew what's going on, he knew everything and for this I think they was as well helpful for Donaldson to finish completely, because it's a really big advantage this year it's the new skippers. This year no one crossed. With the new skippers it means change everything. The other thing is they changed the rules as well. It means they said you've got only two days window and when you come into Japan they said okay, but two days window, and you can't swim only through the day, you can't swim through the night. It means you don't have actually 48 hours, you've got only 24 hours, and whether it can be 25 hours every day is great, especially and there is a lot of politics. It's just. I think it's everything just confusing. But really shame because I think that was one of the really good channels and I've heard and I know that some of the channel swimmers came twice over there to complete.
Vlad Mravec:I had one Dean Summers Actually with him would be actually I suggest you to having the conversation and broadcast, because he went through all the channels and the two guys channel. He went over there three times, four times, yeah, and we came a couple of times back because the weather was horrible. Last time we did this July and he was swimming eight hours and we pulled him out because the current was six, six Ks per hour. It's not possible to go through. They actually pulled him out because if he passed one point the current changed to the 10 Ks per hour Means we could lose him. It's just, I don't know, it's really politics around there and I think this should be set up in much more professional and the people that should ask other channels, other channels, how to run.
Vlad Mravec:And I spoke with the VAUSA, world Open Water Saving Association, and I suggest to just set up the rules for all the channels, or for all the channels, and take the as English channel swim as the main guideline because got the history, got the most experienced pilots, because these guys running summer I don't know how many 200 swimmers or maybe 200 swimmers every season for last 50 years. It means that those guys how to run English channel swim, but it's not. I don't know if Vauser wants to do something or not. Yeah, like two guys are tricky. I think he's pulling out from the seven channels. Now it will be interesting if there's another seven channel comes up or not. We'll see.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, where could that be?
Vlad Mravec:I don't have a clue. There's a lot of Maybe we can set up something in Australia. You've got the two in America, you've got the Europe, you've got Cookstraight, which is New Zealand, but something in Australia may be missing. You have to find some crazy channel or whatever.
Danielle Spurliing:Maybe out to one of the Whitsun, or the Whitsun days are probably around there. It's a bit hot in that water, I suppose.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, we have to be something challenging. Maybe Tasmania to Australia, this is will be great.
Danielle Spurliing:Oh yes, how far is that?
Vlad Mravec:Oh, it's just, I don't know, maybe 60, 70, 80, I don't know yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:Wow, that's a long one.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:So all these swimmers that you've had very successful swimmers with all these different crossings what kind of qualities do they all share to make them so successful at doing such a crossing?
Vlad Mravec:First is really important environment, how they live. Everyone belongs to, for example, bloodstream and they're helping each other. If it's new swimmers coming and say I'm an English channel swimmer, I always straightaway introduce them English channel and the English swimmers they know what they're getting before English channel. It means they're actually sharing and giving back what they got before the English channel. It means they're friendly, helpful, smiling. We don't have any conflict, no politics. If someone starts doing politics and say, hey, there is another coach, go over there, it's much better. Yeah, it's really important community.
Vlad Mravec:What everyone said friendly and smile and be happy and don't care about it and really really strange stuff. And this is what I don't like it. I mean I personally say okay, smile and be happy, don't worry about it, and just keep going and just help each other. Especially when you do it in long. Assume you needed some support because otherwise you can't actually go for that long swim. It's really important community. We've got a lot of people who are really helpful and they have got the experience, like, for example, dean Summers. He coming in, he just will come everyone to the community because he went through the older channels and he knows that okay, what's going on and what's how important is be connected with the swimmers and be friendly, and this is really. This is this is fantastic. This is what, what makes actually lots of swimmers succeed, because they're stuck together.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, I know, one of my very first guests on the podcast was Rod Watkins, and he, he raves about you and your, your Vlad swim squad up in Sydney and I know he lives down here but he flies up to Sydney to swim with you.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:And so someone that was hoping to do the English channel as their very first swim. What sort of what's the first step they could take? What advice would you give them? What do they need to do?
Vlad Mravec:Okay, First no one realized they're waiting list for the spot book the pilot, sometimes one or two years, sometimes three years. Yeah, Of course he can, or someone can book the pilot for next year.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah.
Vlad Mravec:But he can get the spot four or spot five, which is first three swimmers, has to go through that week or that that time and then he will be fourth. But whether sometimes it's not great for that five swimmers. Yeah, it means if you are England, if you are in England, who cares? You can defeat and you can just travel, okay, and now I'm can go. But if you are in Australia, you want to definitely having good sport. It means first, second or third action for this, really tricky It'll be, yeah, not really not really safe. Yeah. It means yeah, book the pilot, yeah. And the second thing is depends where you are. You need to start swimming with a group swimmers or swimming by yourself. You need to start basic. Yeah, it means if you used to do, I know, three swims and only a 30 minute swim, of course, you need to step up and start being three sessions one hour swim and then go one and a half hour swim, then add another swim, session fourth and then go another session fifth, yeah, and then you're progressing and just climbing up with the distance per week. And I've got the distance per week and the slow intensity. What next? Okay, now I've got the base. I have a big base capacity. I need to get a little bit faster and fitter. That means let's go start being on a real special set right A little bit, push yourself on the sessions and then, step by step, getting a long distance and everything coming suddenly coming works together.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, this is for a thing about really important before starting swim, share a goal with your friends. It's really important. It's really important. I had a few guys and they say, oh, I didn't tell anyone that I'm going to swim and I didn't share that. I'm going to swim English channel at school or at the work. Yeah, and when he fell he said oh, one bigger, bigger mistake was that I didn't share my goals. Because what happened? The school said hey, man, if you tell us that you are an English channel, we can give you excuses. If you are an English channel the work, oh, we can just manage and help you to know. It's really important to share information, especially family, friends, and then tell the employee or school what you want to do.
Vlad Mravec:If he wants to be quiet and they want to tell anyone, it's right, but certain people around him or run. You need to know what's going on with you, because sometimes you're coming to really tired and they're worried what's happening. But if you say I'm, you know, today was really hard said, and I still have to get in the water again tomorrow and I don't know how I'm going to do that, they can say, oh, that's fantastic, your English channel, so I don't worry, you can do it Mentally. Support them, yeah. But if they don't know, oh my God, you know, have see and go and see the doctor. Don't worry about it, don't do it. Don't do it. It means negativity or not understanding. It's just really kill everything, yeah, yeah.
Vlad Mravec:This is really important what I said as well. Everyone who set up the English channel because it's not something, it's something unusual, yeah, it's not for everyone. And someone said I want to assume English and I asked him why. Oh, because I read the book and I just start dreaming of it. Perfect, because if you start dreaming of it, you've got inside like momentum. Yeah, I want to do, I want to. My role as a coach is grow that momentum and keep life that momentum till the finishing the channel. What happened after that? I'm going and he feel free, why my rock? Always, always tell me I lost my rock. I just dropped the rock from my heart because I English shell. Yeah, because you were holding that momentum inside and that moment. It's a part of the way we, everyone has to help.
Vlad Mravec:Not only me why, husband whatever, whether community friends or whatever, and this is why they really important to share the information they want to be with show.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, great advice. I love that. I love the fact to book it first, because that sort of cements you into your goal. Your goal, doesn't it?
Vlad Mravec:And you hook, and then you have to do that.
Danielle Spurliing:Yes, yeah.
Vlad Mravec:A lot of people that change during the preparation, a lot of people that learn about themselves. A lot of people they say, oh, I was feeling healthier because I was just pushing them. If you want to be fast of course you can't have a party every night, man, you need to be swimmer I mean, let's stop drinking some of them, let's start change the life, because there's preparation and then that works, everything works.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, fantastic. I always ask people that come on the podcast a little bit of a snapshot about their swimming, but I want to ask yours from a coaching perspective. So just five very quick questions. Tell me the first thing that pops into mind what's your favorite open water swim location, Could you?
Vlad Mravec:Could you? Yeah, could you? Could you? Very nice, I love Vanuatu but I have to travel over there. But if I'm on the Vanuatu, I'll be telling you straight away where. Now I'm here in this location when I pop up. It's good yeah.
Danielle Spurliing:What about your favorite freestyle training drill? You give your swimmers.
Vlad Mravec:Oh, one-armed drill, one-armed drill. What I'm set up, my one-armed drill, which is you are not allowed to turn your body on your chest and start doing stroke, but you must keep your body on your side, which is, you've got one arm in front, you're only kicking sideways, you're looking down and your arm getting in the water earlier and you're finishing stroke, which is one-armed, does action, although I'll lead you through the water, it's a reaction, action, reaction and gliding, or teaching everyone gliding to relax the shoulders and turn the body on the side.
Danielle Spurliing:And would you get them to do 50 meters on one arm or 25?
Vlad Mravec:Yeah, we do 25, 50. We always. My program is every week cover one drill and focus on one part of the technique.
Danielle Spurliing:Oh, I like that.
Vlad Mravec:Yeah. For example, this week we are working on a catch. Yeah, it means every session we're doing a lot of doggy paddles and sculling, yeah, and every time we're doing catch, catch, catch, connect with the stroke. And next week we will do body rotation, which is with the catch, and body rotation which has gone through the water. Before we did a straight arm drill, for example. Focus on body rotation, recovery, arm or finger drags as well. It means every week I'm just covering one piece of the technique, but of course that piece of technique links for next week technique yeah. So body rotation works with the longest stroke, catch work with the longest stroke and hips and stuff like that.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, I like that. What about the toughest open water swim in the world?
Vlad Mravec:Toughest open water swim, I think North Channel.
Danielle Spurliing:Yes, okay.
Vlad Mravec:Why is that?
Danielle Spurliing:Why.
Vlad Mravec:It's just, I was over there and I saw that North Channel swim with the Dean of Dean Summers. I came back and I said, guys, if someone wants to do North Channel, think twice. Maybe you just try stop thinking and then try again, because water is cold. Yeah, 10, 11, 12 air and water. Air it's a cold. It means if the sun's come up you're actually not feeling the sun's actually there and the jellyfish inside and like who did it in North Channel? It's just, yeah, it's just really, really good swim. The second one, I think Molokai. Molokai Channel it's the second one. Yeah, molokai will be second and I don't know something happened there because this gun was so strong. I had one swim over there and he was spending I know 10 hours and he did only eight Ks or something like that. He couldn't move. Yeah, and about sharks yeah, there are sharks, but I think I said Dean Summers will explain to you how he swam five hours with a shark around him and nothing happened. Yeah, it means yeah, I think North Channel will be killer there. Yeah.
Vlad Mravec:Well, for all those people listening, maybe don't do the North Channel, then If you do, do hard work, make sure you're not missing anything in the cold water and don't say oh, I'll be ready because I did English Channel. That's not North Channel, it's killer. Be careful. You need to do a lot of work.
Danielle Spurliing:And what's your favorite training main set that you give your swimmers?
Vlad Mravec:I like that Easy Sessions, which is I call Easy Sessions, but it's a killer. It's another treasure set. Yeah, it's another treasure set. And combination hundreds, 250s and stuff like that. That's. That's just actually giving them actually working hard. Yeah, for example, we had a five to 100s, five 100s, four by 150s, eight, 50s, and then go back to the three to 100s, two 100s and then again four, 50s.
Vlad Mravec:But everything in the high intensity rest, minimum five, 10 seconds. Yeah, depends the pace, what they're doing. Minimum rest sometimes help them, but sometimes I've got 45 swimmers in a session and I've got a 10 swimmers in the lane or 15 swimmers in the lane and sometimes really hard to get them short rest because otherwise the kids are catching up. If they are not fit enough, it means I just giving them a little bit more. But they're, yeah, they're doing really good job. Yeah, and I always calling them it's just easy session because they don't know how hard they can go. Because last time I did the one session with them and say, oh, that was hard. And then I did another session next week and said there was harder session. Well, you said there was a last week. What it means they don't know. It means it was hard last week, that was easy for you. Now it's hard. It seems easy.
Danielle Spurliing:And last question I wanted to ask you who's an open water swimmer you admire and why?
Vlad Mravec:I'll open with my swimmer. It's really hard because everyone is fantastic.
Danielle Spurliing:Give me three, if that helps.
Vlad Mravec:Everyone is really good, motivated and really good, actually Focus. I love one guy. It's a Linton Linton from the Queensland. He was one first swimmer who crossed all the seven channels from Australia. He's fantastic. He's just a really good spirit, really good. He's slow swimmer but he's a great swimmer. He's a really tough swimmer. He's coming from the Queensland, which is everything where they're going, where there's a call. It's just unbelievable.
Vlad Mravec:He's a fantastic, great swimmer. Of course we've got Dean Summers who I'm always talking about. He's just amazing. He did a really good job and he's always focusing. He's going to try swim from Newcastle to Sydney next year. If he do that one he will be ready, definitely be ready if everything like health and everything go through. He's the toughest guy when I was on the boat and I see him how he's fighting with a swim. He's great. Third, it's really hard to say Andy is fantastic because he's done all the seven channels in one year, which is amazing. He's got a really good support, a really good character and a really good swimmer. He's number three on my list because what he's done is just unbelievable. You can see everyone.
Vlad Mravec:I picked three guys who tried to do all the seven channels because I know that every channel is different. I know the preparation for all of them. I know it's not easy to get through all the sevens. I know that it's. Everything is different cold, warm, rough. Everything is pay for everything, travel, weighting and all that stuff. It's not about being tough swimmer, but it's about being mentally ready anytime. This is just unbelievable. How people can manage Physically it's much easier Go, go, go go but how to manage mentally everything that's bigger package for preparation and finally get through the swim, it's just amazing.
Danielle Spurliing:Yeah, that's great. That's really good takeaways that you've given us today. Vlad, Really appreciate your time and just so happy that you were able to come on the podcast and share all of that with us.
Vlad Mravec:Look, I want to help swimmers to understand that more knowledge than others or more other experienced coaches or swimmers can share, I think the level of open water swimming in Australia or the world can be better, and then we can actually protect swimmers as well, not doing mistakes as well, and some of them learn. Some of them say, yeah, it's true. Some of them say, oh, look, maybe I do some different.
Danielle Spurliing:Okay, so of course no problem, we have to help them, nothing else, that's right. That's right, I can tell. Yeah, well, thank you so much for your time, vlad, and hopefully one day, when I get to Sydney, I'll come and have a session with you.
Vlad Mravec:Yes, yes, yes, thank you very much.
Danielle Spurliing:Okay, thanks, take care, bye.
Vlad Mravec:Thank you Bye.
Danielle Spurliing:Bye. Thanks for listening into my chat with Vlad today. I hope this gets you enthused for some open water swimming in your own future. To help you on your way, Vlad has kindly shared one week's worth of sessions that he gives his swimmers. To get your hands on these, all you need to do is send us an email at torpedo swim talk at gmailcom and we'll send them through to you and you can be on your way in an open water swimming journey. Till next time, happy swimming and bye for now.