Improving your swimming economy is a fool-proof way to up grade both the quality of your training and your over all swim performances.

Your swimming economy, of course, is simply the rate at which you utilize oxygen in order to swim at a specific speed; decreasing this rate of oxygen utilization at a particular speed constitutes an improvement in economy. As economy is enhanced, your performances are upgraded, because you can either swim for a longer time at a very desirable speed (because the oxygen cost associated with that speed is lower) or else you can swim significantly faster with the same oxygen accountability which was previously associated with a slower speed.

There are three basic mechanisms which can account for economy improvement: (A) The amount of energy (ATP) created for each unit of oxygen that you consume might increase, an effect which would reduce the oxygen "bill" when you swim at a specific speed. (B) The amount of energy (ATP) actually needed to swim at a specific speed might decrease, which would place a lower demand on your oxygen-utilization system. This might happen, for example, as a result of improved coordination while swimming. (C) Of course, A & B might occur simultaneously.

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