Congratulations, you’ve made it through the festive season!

There’s every chance you ate well and drank plenty… and did minimal training.

Don’t worry, so did we.

Once the fireworks have gone off for New year’s it can be a shock how fast the ocean swim events come at you. In fact, there are swims most weekends in the major centres for January and February.

If you’ve found yourself out of shape or you’re looking to get involved in an ocean swimming event for the first time, we have a super simple four-week plan to get you in shape and ready to conquer that first ocean swim event of the year.

We have purposely kept it minimalist so you can just get straight into it.

Good luck!

Related article: How to train for a 1km ocean swim

Where to start

Get to the pool now!

Well not really, just get back to training at the pool as soon as possible.

During the next four weeks, you’ll need to aim for three sessions per week ranging from 1-3 kilometres.

What training looks like

Over the next four weeks, your training sessions will include a mixture of aerobic base work to increase your current fitness level and speed work to give you that boost at the start and finish of your ocean swim.

If you feel like the sessions are too long coming off your holiday break, don’t stress, just skip a couple of hundred metres from each session, to make the distance suit you.

How you’ll train (by week)

Tip: Print out your training plan and put it in a zip lock bag to take to the pool.

Week 1

Focus: Building back your swim fitness while getting your feel of the water back.

Week 2

Focus: Continue to build swim fitness and aerobic base while adding some speed work.

Week 3

Focus: Gain speed endurance while maintaining the swim fitness you have built so far.

Week 4

Focus: Working on your technique and speed as you head into event week