last water, slow lane

I took another hit of Albuterol before getting in the pool last night. It made a little bit of a difference. My 100m free times were a touch faster than usual, but any good feelings I may have experienced from that were eclipsed by the level of talent of the human fishes next to me. Apparently yesterday was the day abnormally fast swimmers chose to workout at the Los Banos Community Pool. They were fast. I am not. Though I felt good for me, I got totally smoked, and realized I am a fat loser. Actually, that's not even accurate - there was a fat guy there who was faster than me. I'm whatever is worse than a fat loser. Maybe I'm fat on the inside.

da numbers:

• 400m easy free/zipperswitch
• 6 x 100m free @ 2:30
• coming in between 1:35 - 1:40
• 200m IM
• This hurt. But that's good cuz I've never finished an IM in long course. Yay! - Here's a cookie now stop sucking.
• 300m kick

total distance: 1500m

last water, kick or treat

Lots of kicking last night. After a quick 1000m of freestyle, zipperswitch, zipperswitch with fly kick, and butterfly, I kicked for 500m. That's probably more kicking than I've done for quite some time. It felt good, and kept feeling better the longer I went. Note to self: do more kick work. By about 200m my legs were cramping, but that went away before 350m. Towards the end I felt like I could go forever, until they closed the pool. Rad.

last water, good times

Last night's pool session was pretty good. Butterfly feels good, my freestyle is all stretched out from zipperswitch drills, my legs are hammered from lots of kicking, and I'm feeling pretty comfortable throughout the duration of my routine. I did 1300m. Good times.

last water, better every time

Wednesday night's pool session felt good. And it's about time. I wasn't too psyched on swimming for a couple months there. What with winter weather and reduced sunlight hours, I was contemplating leaving the water indefinitely. But after a few positive sessions I'm glad I stuck it out. Wednesday's focus was on freestyle, stretching out my stroke, finding a balance in the water where I can pause after the catch while not feeling as if I'm fighting to keep high in the water for a breath. The result was a strong 6 x 100m freestyle set with splits around 1:40. That's not bad considering freestyle has not been a focus lately. And to keep the intensity down with the pace up is a clear improvement over last week's iteration of this same set. Another benefit to smooth, focused technique is to relax me. When the pool feels comfortable I stay in longer and look forward to the next workout. If you're going to perform a sport a few times a week for 20 years, I believe you need to find something enjoyable in it's execution.

da numbers:

• 400m easy free/drills
• 6 x 100m free @ 2:30
• times: ~1:40
• 50m fly
• 50m easy free
• 300m kick

total distance: 1400m

last water, kinda good

Last night's pool session was kinda good. There was some freestyle and butterfly going down. Things felt smooth but I wasn't keeping track of time. And at the end I did a bunch of kick work, which brought the cramps out like a mother. Total distance: 1200m.

last water, still strugglin'

I'm strugglin' to get pool sessions over with lately. The motivation is has left me, presumably because it's winter and that's how it goes for swimmers during the dark months. Anywayz, did some freestyle last night.

da numbers:

• 300m easy free/drills
• 6 x 100m @ 2:30
• coming in around 1:40
• 100m free w/ paddles
• 200m kick

total distance: 1200m

last water, motivation issues

Bridget met me at the Los Banos pool last night for some hyper-unmotivating sets. I don't know what my problem is lately. Winter just sucks away my motivation for swimming. Evening sessions are hard, and forget about early morning routines. Anywayz, I did 1000m of drills and IM stuff then got cold and left.