First, just let me say that I have no idea why - sometime this afternoon of July 19 - Google and Facebook decided to talk to each other and Facebook posted all of my recent blog entries as notes. Sorry if I spammed you. I'm looking at what happened and how to undo it, so the sordid details of my training don't interrupt your life.
Anyways - tonight was a bike and swim night, I had decided yesterday. I had experimented with some stuff this weekend and I wanted to see if it translated to laps of the pool.
View 2011-07-19 19:58 To Gym in a larger map
So, after dinner, I changed and got on the horse to make it down to the gym. And it sucked. The outside of my quads were not happy. Powering down Linwood felt like slogging through mud. I finally got the groove down on Boston. Overall, the trip took 10:14 with 7:45 of that moving; 1.46 miles with a moving speed of 11.27 mph, topping out at 19.45mph.
Locked up the bike, got inside, changed into swimsuit, and headed for the pool.... to find all the lanes taken and several of them doubled up. I figured, no problem, I'll do some stretching and then work on some of the breathing stuff I was sort of doing at BBC and wait for a lane to free up. And I did that - taking about 4 to 5 laps in the foreshortened end of the pool. If each length is 25 meters (and I just discovered something GOOD), then this was probably 20 meters or so? So, call it 80 meters of warmup.
And I was feeling pretty good. I realized that - taking it nice and easy - breathing every other stroke gave me a good amount of air, and kept me from going too fast. I even tried doing every three strokes - effectively switching breathing sides - and that wasn't too bad. It became more and more apparent that I really am comfortable with one side over the other, however. Breathing left was kind of like batting left; I can sort of do it, but it's all very intentional and obvious and doesn't look or feel natural. I tried moving my head side to side, but that didn't work nearly as well as when I was trying NOT to put my head under water.
A lane came open - the second lane, so pretty deep, but I didn't even care after the weekend - so I did my best Frogger impersonation and got into it (on the far end) and started.
The first length wasn't bad; I was breathing every other stroke, and going pretty slow. But man, by the second length.... I was getting tired. I rolled onto my back and did a back stroke for the 3rd length, and probably could have rolled back over and crawled for the 4th, but decided to go another length of back stroke. By then my shoulders were getting tired, so flipping over to the crawl felt good ... for a length. I tried mixing in some 4's and 3's, but I was tired and kind of burning by the time I hit 6 lengths. I took a breather, standing in the pool, and was kinda happy that I had made it 6 whole lengths without stopping, but disappointed I couldn't go more.
And then something kinda good happened. I was going to take a long break - like 5 minutes. But prolly about 2 minutes in, I had caught my breath, and I started feeling good. So, at prolly 3 minutes, I started up again with a crawl. And suddenly, the crappiness that was there for the first 6 lengths and 150 meters was gone, and I was swimming pretty well. I don't remember what my progression was, I think because I got into a groove. I know I flipped on my back and did two lengths of backstroke, but they were separate - so it might have been 7 & 8 were crawl, 9 was backstroke, 10 was crawl, and 11 was backstroke. Somewhere in there I damn near drowned myself on an errant backstroke that came up over my face, but for the most part - I was feeling pretty good.
And somewhere in the 10th length - that's when I got tired again. Really tired. Which is why I think 11 was backstroke. 10 was a struggle, but I was not going to backstroke the last lap. So I started 12 in the crawl. But I was off. My back half was dragging, weighing me down in the water. I thought maybe it was my breathing and tried going side to side and breathing every stroke, but that just made it worse. I was practically doing the doggy paddle. So I put my head down and started going every other stroke, but still didn't have a lot of power. I was getting beat by an older gentleman back stroking. So... I reared back, and powered through the rest of the length in 4, my lungs burning, my legs aching, nothing working the way I wanted it to. It was kind of a disappointment to finish weak like that. I got to the (far) end, and there was someone asking to share the lane. "Go ahead," I gasped, "I'm done." "Oh, you don't have to get out," she said. "No," I said, "I'm DONE."
View 2011-07-19 20:43 From Gym in a larger map
It was then that the old guy was like - "I'm done. You can use my lane." So she jumped into his lane, I think because it was shallower. So, I just stood there sucking wind, and after a minute or so I realized a) I was on the complete opposite end of the pool from my towel, and b) I didn't feel so bad. So, I figured rather than haul myself out of the pool or play Frogger to get to the shallow end and walk out and then walk all the way around the pool - I may as well swim another length.
So I did. And it was a good length. Dispensed with the side to side, just kept it simple with every other stroke, kept it slow, kept it strong, and finished up well. 13 lengths times 25 meters = 325 meters, plus 80 meters in warm-ups.
Got dressed, got back on the bike, and made it home in 8:32 of moving time, with an average 11.8mph over 1.7 miles, topping out at 23.4mph! Uphill, with a 225' elevation gain.
As I was writing this, though, I realized I had one of my stupid oversights - you know where you have all the information and somehow just completely don't put it together right? I knew the pool was in meters - 25 meters to a length. I knew the swim in the tri was in yards. So when putting it all together, what did I do? Transpose the meters to yards, and figured I needed to do 12 lengths (12*25=300) to get to 300 yards. But I don't. 300 yards translates to 274 meters, so I really only needed to do 11 lengths. Which means that really rotten 12th length didn't count. Though it also means I finished with a backstroke. But #12 & #13 were overtraining!
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