With this post I will try and give you a feel for my swim workouts. I find these to be some of the most difficult workouts and that's not just because my normal workout start time is 5:30AM.
First, I will give you some background to my swimming history. It won't take long as I have next to none. I always enjoyed swimming but I have no competitive background. My swims to this point were either back to the pool ladder from a trip off of a diving board or back to the boat after a cooling swim. My exposure to competitive swimming began nearly 7 years ago when our daughter decided to go from swim lessons to a swim team. It was this rather insignificant event then that really puts me in a drastically different place today. Since then our pool activity has been a center to a lot of our life. Rachel has been a real point of pride for her mother and me. Her dedication and work ethic have been remarkable. As being swim parents we have actively participated in all facets of the club. I have become a USA Swimming official and her mother has been a tireless volunteer as a meet chair, team mom, committee chairs, and several other services. We have truly enjoyed the experience and have gained many close friends in this process. Again, its some of these friends and experiences that lead me here today as they are triathletes and several are already Ironmen as well. I will be the first to admit that being an official and watching a lot of meets does not do justice to the true task of competitive swimming.
Prior to my first tri I had been doing some swim workouts. These were an internet based guide based on some arrangement to slowly grow swim time capacity. It did give me progress. I can recall back to my first legitimate times in the water where I found a couple lengths to be taxing unto itself. With time it did get easier but comfortable was a ways off. For reference as to the length of an ironman it is just under 170 lengths of a 25 yard pool. As of now I am targeting about 1 hour and 25 minutes to complete this distance in the Ohio river.
Getting back to my current swim workouts. As part of my plan for training I joined the masters swim club which is part of the swim team that my daughter participates. This is a program for adults older than 18 with varying interests in swimming from just learning to swim up to competing in international events. Our local club has a specific triathlon program as part of the masters group that is conducted by our swim team coaches. This is a great opportunity for me to now build not just swim conditioning for this distance but to also get stroke specific instruction of which is crucial for a do it yourselfer like me. One key to swimming a distance like this is not just endurance with speed but with efficiency. The toll to your body is extensive. Anything you can do more efficiently in the race will pay great dividends later. The last advantage of this program is all my swim workouts are pre set by a person which does it for a living. As a newbie to these, I find the descriptions to be so full of numbers, phrases, and acronyms that its like complex algorithms. To hear them read is like listening football plays in the huddle. Once you get the lingo it all makes perfect sense. Right now, I am that running back who occasionally goes the wrong way because he does not know the play book yet. The other true appreciation in swimming is for the amount of numbers. You have the number of swim sets, count strokes, count breaths, number of lengths, overall swim length, lap time, rest time, all the while you use this clock on the wall clock which just continuously counts up to 60 called a pace clock. Then you throw in these lovely periods of isolation every twenty five yards just to make you fully lose tract. So, right now I am swimming 2 -3 days a week for an hour to an hour and half depending on those numbers again. I actually go twice at 5:30 AM. This works well for my lack of daylight, gets my training done before I even have to be into work, and most interesting of all is my daughter is there practicing at the same time. How's that for a carpool? I can not tell you how interesting this is. First was her complete embarrassment of her father in the pool in front of all her teammates. Second, is this weird deja vu of being back at practice in a high school.
Either way this is working really well so far and it's very efficient. Allowing me to save for later.
smells like victory!
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