I am very happy today for several reasons, particularly one that includes a visit from a new-to-Richmond weekend guest, whom I am very excited to see and happy to show my beautiful city. The other big reason is that I had one of the best swims this morning that I’ve had in the past, well, year. It wasn’t all uber fast, but let me describe it.
I didn’t swim yesterday because I woke up early to study for a Copy Editing quiz that I didn’t have. This was still a good move. I know that Friday’s workouts are quality (hello, Broken-Mile Fridays), and 4 days of swimming pre-Friday + sickness doesn’t do much to help make that Friday swim high-quality. So I took yesterday off.
But not today. I woke up twice during the middle of the night, and got about 6 hours of sleep. Yikes! Regardless, I feel good today. Before the broken mile, I did 1250 yards, which is quite a bit of a warm-up. First came the broken mile. I wasn’t leading. I may have brought up the topic of leading somewhere in this blog; I’m not always pushed my hardest when I’m leading (though sometimes I have a burning desire to do it). I didn’t care either way today, but the swimmer in front of me wore Zoomers. Let me take the opportunity here to tell you how much I disdain wearing fins for an entire practice. I DISDAIN IT!! Yes, you still get a good workout. But how are you going to truly know you’re getting faster? (And aren’t your feet cut up?) They’re like wearing a wetsuit during a 75-degree open water race, but worse. Either way, when this swimmer wears fins (which is every practice, every set), they always go ahead of me. When they don’t, I plow past them. Which is why I need to up my training a bit so I can start consistently swimming in the next lane up. (Yes, I will be at the very end, but that gives me something to work toward. I really don’t mind going last as long as I don’t constantly get lapped.)
Anyway, I stayed on the swimmer the whole time, except when they took breaks. I was determined not to take breaks. Coach got all my splits and added them up. He was getting only the leader’s, but I became the leader (until the swimmer jumped back in). Gah! By the 100’s (the set was 4 x 200’s @ 3:20, 3 x 150’s @ 2:30, 4 x 100’s @ 1:40) , I was 5-10 seconds slower than my normal pace, but I still got 5 seconds of rest. I was coughing at the walls after every interval. (Didn’t I remind myself every day this week to take Tussin BEFORE practice?) But the end was in sight.
I finished, coach added up my splits, and they came to 26:00 even. I was surprised and happy, considering a) my hand collided with a swimmer’s at a turn, which slowed a 200 down, and b) at points I had to lap someone, which is tough to do if another swimmer is swimming up the lane (two across work, three definitely do not). There were a lot of spots where I could have cleaned and tightened things up, but the fact that I’m recognizing what these things are is very, very good. In awe, watched a high school kid in the next lane do a REALLY fast turn. My turns are good, but are kinda in pace; in practice, I feel like I use them as an opportunity to rest rather than an opportunity to put that “umph” in and get ahead. Another area I’ve been working on is dolphin kicking off the walls and trying to start my stroke as far past the flags as possible. It’s hard to do this when you’re looking up to make sure you’re not swimming into or on the person in front of you. (I don’t take any chances after the eardrum incident.)
I was really glad he got my times. I need to start doing this at every practice instead of being apathetic. Well, I’m never really “apathetic”; it’s usually just too hard to remember times that early. Guess I need to work on those brain cells, too. 🙂
Coach told us to take an easy 50. I let the teammates go in favor of coughing at the wall. Next was a 500-yard kick set, which I did all breaststroke. My shins started to feel it toward the end. A teammate’s knee bothered her. I guess breaststroke affects everyone differently.
A quality sprint set awaited at the end of the workout. I wanted to do freestyle, but my arms were REALLY tired out from the broken mile, and I knew anything I did here would disappoint me. So I did one of the sets back, and one of the sets breast. On the 4 x 25’s, my 25’s breast were faster than my 25’s back. Sad! Referring to the sprint sets: “This is where you’ll get faster,” said Mark. He was impressed with my descending the back/breast 100’s-50’s-25’s, and that I plowed out that whole broken mile, considering “On Monday, you looked like death burned over!” Gee, thanks. 🙂
I ended the swim with a grand total of 4,500 yards! That’s the most I’ve done in a single workout post-Bay Swim training 2007. You know you really like a sport when you want to keep going after doing that much yardage. I don’t feel sore now (I’m also on Ibuprofen, but I’m stopping that tonight), but I bet I will tomorrow.
Soon, I hope to begin longer swims on Saturdays. I’m a little sad that OW season is over, but deep down I know I have so much I need to work on that open water technique and an OW workout that purely builds endurance really would be less beneficial than focusing on my stroke over the next couple of months.
Lastly, I found out today that our annual meet is on Valentine’s Day weekend. Awwwwwww. (gag)
Get back in the water 