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May 15, 2006
Swimming Long Course Style
So I showed up to the pool this morning, very excited for my 2nd session with the masters team. Upon entrance to the pool I noticed that the lane lines were set up the other way - as in the 50 yd way. Hmmm. I guess I was going to get my chance to see if it was harder or easier or faster or slower!
I didn't exactly know where I belonged though. There are obviously a lot less lanes when the pool is set up for 50 yds so more people were in lanes and then I wasn't sure where the slow and fast lanes were. And my tri buddies I had befriended last Thursday weren't there. I stood around for a while trying to figure things out until the coach thankfully came by and pointed me in the right direction. I jumped in and started to warm up and the first time down I felt like I was swimming over an abyss once I got to the deep end! My conclusion? After getting used to it, I much prefer the 50 yd setup over the 25 yd setup. If anything, it's much easier to keep track of how far you've swam! :)
The workout today sounded tough:
500 yd
2x250 yd
5x100 yd
2x250 yd
500 yd
The coach was giving times out to each group but because I have no idea of pace or effort while swimming (or running for that matter), I just decided to follow the people in front of me. The general gist of things was, start out average, end up fast at the end. The coach moved me up a group today. Now I'm not in the slowest group, but rather the 2nd slowest group. :) Actually, I think we found just where I need to be. Right in the middle of the 2nd slowest group has me swimming just right - not too hard, not too easy. Anyway, I heard her giving the times to the fastest group and my jaw almost fell off my face when she told them to do their 100s on the 1:20. Assuming they get SOME rest, they would be swimming them around 1:10 AND the 100s weren't even supposed to be all out! Yikes! Thankfully, our times were much slower. I really didn't pay attention to our rests much because I wasn't leading my group and I didn't have to! I just left 5 seconds after the person in front of me. How about that for laziness?! :) Sooner or later I'll start paying attention to that stuff again - but for right now it's enough for me to just do the workout and remember which interval I'm on, etc...
I felt pretty good today. I swear that pool is faster and the water is easier to swim in. :) I kind of felt like I might not have been swimming hard enough for the earlier intervals but on the last 500 I was hurting so I probably did the workout just right. Through no fault of my own - again, just merely followed the swimmers in front of me. :)
Anyway, with my warmup (700 yds) and cooldown (300 yds) I got in 3500 yds total. I liked swimming before, but now I really like it. I wished I would have joined this group earlier! :)
And now it's time to head home from work. I am super sleepy today (maybe because this is about the 1000th day in a row that it's rained?)! But I only have 2 more days of work and then a nice long 4 day weekend! Yippeee!
Posted by beth at May 15, 2006 4:06 PM
Comments
Odds are pretty good that workout was in meters. I'm told summer is LCM season...
Posted by: pjm at May 15, 2006 7:24 PM