Finis Tempo Trainer: A Tool With Many Uses

Ryan Woodruff
Head Coach
Lynchburg YMCA




One of my favorite training tools is the Tempo Trainer from Finis.  It is essentially a swimming metronome, giving an audible beep that can been heard underwater.  Just tuck the tempo trainer under your cap near your ear, and you are good to go.  You can get one at aquagear.com, who provided us a Tempo Trainer to use.


There are many creative ways you can use the Tempo Trainer:

1. In the conventional way, to help a swimmer hit a certain tempo at practice.  Here is an example.


2. For breaststroke, you can use it to help your swimmers hold their glide.  Check out this workout from Coach Parker Ramsdell. Here is another good workout for breaststroke.


3. You can use it as a sort of audible pace clock to help swimmers know when to start and stop an exercise like in this workout.


4. Try this: "The Beat the Beep Set". Set the tempo trainer to beep on the swimmers time for a race pace 25.  Then, the goal is to get to the wall before the beep!

5. You can use a Tempo Trainer in dryland -- try doing some stretch cord work at race tempos.

6. For swimmers who have difficulty hitting fast tempos (most often distance types, in my experience) it may be helpful to have a Tempo Trainer set to race tempo and listen to it behind the blocks or in the ready room.


Here are a few more of our best Tempo Trainer workouts:


Breaststroke Magic for Age Groupers


Beat It - The Michael Jackson Set


E.T.'s Backstroke Set


500 Tempo Trainer Pace Set with Chris Plumb




Check out aquagear.com to get a Tempo Trainer and get this awesome tool!




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