OMG - Swim the swim and swim

Today I was in the gym again swimming.

I finally found my stride.  After some warm up followed lengths working on my technique a little, and a few trying to get front crawl going, I just started swimming.  People were mulling around a little, and I didn't really want to stop, so I didn't.  Then I continued not to, and just kept going, and going, and going.

I don't know how many laps I ended up swimming, but at one point I attempted to recount them in my head and counted at least 10, so I'm guessing somewhere between 10 and 15, but it could have been more.

I have swum 10 continuous laps before (500 yards), but this time was different.  I swam the entire set breast stroke, and at the end, I stopped only because my foot was starting to feel a bit off, not because I was gasping for breath.  If not for my foot, I think I could have continued on for some time.  They weren't small slow kind of lengths either, they were good solid strong lengths.  Not race-horse speed or anything, but not a snails pace either.  I only wish I'd had a lap counter to tell me how many and at what pace.

The realization yesterday or maybe before, I forget, that when I was pulling up, I was doing so poorly, seemed to relieve me of a great deal of tension in my stroke, and now I'm pulling up more effectively, I'm dropping down more effectively, so the whole stroke feels more relaxed and even.  My leg motion is still all over the place, but, I'm improving it slowly.

with 2012 on the doorstep, I'm hoping that I can keep it up in the coming months.  At least it has the advantage that it's indoors and very low hassle.  I keep my bag in the car mostly, lay my towel out on in the back to dry, which as long as it's above about 40, it does, so mostly all I have to do is stand up, open the front door and drive to the Y.

I really need to get back into yoga class though.  Yoga improves both my core strength and perhaps more importantly my posture.  Too many years tense and hunched over a keyboard has left me rather round-shouldered.  My grandmother warned me of such, but of course, I was young and did not listen.

Swimtastic

Got in the pool again today, it was awesome.  I swam 500 yards non-stop breast-stroke at a reasonable pace, not too crazy, not too lazy.  I had to pause because another swimmer needed to double up in my lane, but then I kept going.  It felt good to be able to swim that far in one go at something other than a snail's pace.  Once I stopped for a bit, I decided to start working on my stroke for awhile.  My leg action is kinda messy yet, and way too wide.  I'm not retracting my legs well, and that's slowing me down a good bit.  So, I worked on that for a bit, and that actually seemed to help a good bit.

I paused for a breather, and noticed a lady two lanes over swimming breast stroke very well.  Looking at what she was doing, I could see that her stroke pulled her higher out of the water, then she seemed to drop down and glide very effectively under.  I realized that like anything else, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.  Pulling higher inherently caused her to drop down lower, and thus swim faster.  The motion of pulling up created a natural gravitational potential which then pulled the body down harder and more quickly into the glide position.  I gave it a go, and it did seem to be more effective, though of course, more work.

I've also realized that I'm arching my back too much pulling out of the water, and after a few laps, my back starts to hurt.  When I pull up arching my back less, I get better form, and swim faster.  It also means I don't have a killer back-ache after about 4 laps.  I guess doing so means I'm not creating a situation where I'm creating poor glide by having my hips almost level, and my head upright, causing a shape that is not very slippery, I'm imagining kind of a right angle bend between my thighs and my shoulders.  I guess it also means I keep better forward motion between glide parts, instead of using the pull to just lift my head up, I'm using it to direct my torso into a rising line, and therefore still moving forward instead of snaking my back which seems like a good idea, but is resulting in me coming to almost a dead stop.

Overall, I'm guessing I did at least 20 laps, so not too shabby.

Christmas is now over...

Thank goodness too. Schedule got all kinds of messed up. I managed to get in the gym here and there, but nowhere near enough. I have managed to get in today and Monday. I had my wife take a video of me swimming breaststroke in an effort to help improve my stroke. I thought it had helped, then I was in the pool today, and it felt like I was swimming well, but apparently not. The lady in the lane next to me seemed like she was moving pretty slow, and it turned out I was moving at about the same pace. Slow. I'm so tired of being fat right now, and I'm tired of not being able to find the time to sort it out. I guess an hour in the pool about four days out of seven is just not having any impact at all. Feel like I haven't been eating crazy lately too, but the weight is just sitting on me not going anywhere. Add to that the further insult that my knee just doesn't seem to be getting better. I've considered going back to the doc, but it's almost January, and the last time I went to the doc in January, I went to physical therapy for awhile, then the weather got really bad, and the schedule got messed up and after a few missed appointments due to weather, they were closed etc., and another with the doc, I just didn't continue going. The reality is that my knee is massively better than this time last year, but, it's still weak, and almost seems more creaky not less. I failed to go to Hawk Mountain this year at all, and that makes me pretty sad. Ben of Ben does life went from 270lbs, and in three years had done a couple of Iron Man events. I started at 270lbs, I'm now at 250lbs, and I'm certainly nowhere near an Iron Man. I talk about a triathlon, but at this point, I can't imagine actually being able to complete anything like that. I can't run, and I'm not sure I'm ever going to be able to, I just don't see how that could be possible. After a year of on again off again exercise, and eight weeks of pretty good swimming attendance, I'm still just as fat, and though fitter, still not what I would classify as "fit".

Long week, but managed to swim

Managed to swim again today. Did pretty good. Didn't have as long as I'd have liked as it was getting toward the end of the day and the Y closes at 7pm on a Saturday, and I didn't managed to get my butt into the pool until 6. Still, got about 40m in there, so not too bad. I pushed the last 50 yards out in 1:19, so I'd count that as a pretty good success for the last week or two given how much I haven't been in there due to the hackathon etc. Still seems like I'm not getting as fit as I'd like to as quickly. In fairness though, it maybe that I just have an unrealistic expectation. I can't say I'm exactly turning the laps around at the same speed I was six weeks ago, even when not trying for a fast lap, so I'm guessing my overall fitness has increased, but not close to where I had wanted it to be. Not much I can do about it but press on.

Some more swimming

Got into the gym yesterday and today, though today was brief due to the current hackathon, it was exceedingly good.  I feel like I am starting to get more breath again, and am able to dial it up a notch.  My breaststroke is almost making sense, and I can feel the water moving by me faster.  I seem to be at the other end of the pool much quicker.  Perhaps it's just that I'm tired and time always seems to pass more quickly when the attention wanders.  Backstroke today was pure awesome.  I feel like I'm starting to relax more, and finally my feet are doing something other than being a dead weight behind me.

The whole kick when I'm on my side thing turned out to be a winner.  Each lap, I've been stopping the main stroke before reaching the end, and turning onto each side and just kicking.  It seems to have helped immensely.  Much improvement in the position of my legs, they seem like they might actually be assisting in propelling me now, and my butt doesn't feel like it's hanging to low in the water.

My final length today, I pushed hard, and it felt like I positively flew down the pool (at least compared to other laps).  I'm hoping to get a bitchin lap counter for Christmas, them I hope I'll be able to get a better bead on how well I'm actually doing!

Finally Back in the Water

This has been a long week, and I've tried to find time almost every day to get back into the pool, just wasn't to be. Today was almost worse, so much going on so many fronts, but I did finally manage to steal away for a bit to swim. Was in the pool maybe 40 minutes today, it was interesting. I'm finding I'm starting to relax a lot more, and it's not such a panic to swim, I'm almost relaxing and simply enjoying the sensations. No panicy breathing, or sudden gulps or anything. I wasn't swimming real fast, but it was a good session.

Swimming Today

Swimming again today!  Swum ten laps (500yrds) continuous at the start today, which is unusual for me.  Swam the first five all breaststroke, then alternated between breaststroke and backstroke for the last 5.

After that, worked on drills mostly.  Swam a couple of lengths just doing breaststroke kick.  Tried to do 3-4 kicks head down at a time.  Was really interesting.  There were times I think I was faster swimming like that than doing a regular stroke!

Tried some more front-crawl, less successful than yesterday, but at least interesting.  I think I discovered definitively today that the problem isn't the head out of the water so much as it is the breathing.  It almost seems like I have too much breath.  I can't seem to breath out enough underwater without pelting my face with bubbles so that when I rotate for a breath, I don't still have to breath out.  I tried this on breaststroke, gliding until I actually had blown all my breath out, and it was far too long.  Either I have to figure out how to breath out more underwater, or take less breath, or something, I don't know.

I was hoping to walk a bit afterward, but I was having such a good time in the pool, I didn't have time left.  I must have been in the pool over an hour!

Triathlon on my way, maybe?

Went to the Y today, primarily to swim. My daughter came with today, and my wife was out with her family. After about a hour in the pool doing mostly drills, and trying to swim front crawl, which I actually managed for a few laps. I got out of the pool, showered up quickly and went to find my daughter. She was reading as usual, and I messages my wife. She wasn't back yet, and my daughter wanted to finish the last chapter of her book, so I figured I might as well walk a bit whilst I was waiting. I figure I must have swam about 1500 yards, and ended up walking just shy of 4km, so a pretty workout all in all. I guess all I'd have to do is spend about 30-40m on a bike at a good intensity, and that'd not be a stone's throw away from a mini triathlon! I know I used to fairly easily hit 18mph on a bike, event when I was bigger, and faster when I I was in shape by a good bit. Used to do a 30 mile ride with the bike club in the UK every week, and it was in the evening so I couldn't have been more than two hours, and I know we used to move at good clip, easily 24mph in a pack on e level. I certainly felt I could have done another half hour of something, I wasn't particularly out of breath after walking. In fact it's one reason I don't prefer to walk that much anymore, I'd run if I could, but my knee still won't take it.

I hate the YMCA

I hate the YMCA. Yes. I do. They have a crap website that only has the pool schedule as a download as an Excel file - yeah that's nice and accessible, and they change it every three or four weeks. I have about a dozen copies of this file on my system now, because most everywhere else just has a web page with it on. I go down there today, and of course, I looked at the wrong schedule version, so the entire pool, bar one solitary lane, is being used by the high school. Okay. Two things here. Why the hell do I pay a membership for a "gym" that "has a pool", when it kinda only has a half a pool. The pool is occupied just about the entire half of the day during the week at this time of year! It gets better, the local YMCA group has a few locations, the location that's nearest me, other than being plain nasty, has virtually no regular pool access at this time of year at all! Maybe two hours in the entire day open for general use. And, why is the High School using the YMCA pool at both locations!! (different high schools albeit). They have a football field, and a hockey pitch, and a tennis court, and an auditorium even, why don't they have their own pool? My elementary school in the UK had its own pool, we only went to the nearest pool to do swim exams. My High School in the UK had a pool too. Is there another pool I can belong to that is indoor? According to Google, not, though they don't even list the YMCA under a search for swimming pools! You'd think there'd be a website for that...

Swimming w00t

I swim this morning again. Really beginning to get somewhere it seems, well, at least in terms of continuous swimming. I think I swam 500 yards without stopping, and at least double that besides. Worked on my breaststroke turn for the first time. A few incidents were plain amusing, total mistiming leading to spluttering as I nearly gasp a lung full of water! I worked with a pull buoy for the first time today. It was hard. Really hard. It also doubly showed up my leg problem on breaststroke. Clearly I'm going to have to spend a good bit of time working on that, it's kinda sad how far I was pulling to one side. I also tried to kick with the other kick pattern, as in backstroke. Not a total disaster, but pretty bad. Lots of kicking, not much motion, but some at least. I did discover though that if I kick when I'm on my side, it seems to work okay. Not sure what's up with that. Worked on my wave motion a bit too, trying to pick my head up more gracefully and dip it up under instead of smacking it back down. All in all not a great improvement in time, I ran a 1:25 when I timed it, slightly faster than the previous, but not by much, still slow. Gotta figure out a way to get the chlorine smell out of my nose though. It's more than once I end up snorting water. I'm also noticing a weird breathing pattern on breaststroke that's being a pain. Can't seem to get my head out of the water cleanly so I'm not blowing water in front of my face when I rise. I was hoping to get to Yoga this morning, but I really just wasn't up to driving down to King of Prussia to go to Yoga. Didn't sleep well the last couple of nights, so a few minutes to hold up between dropping my daughter at school and leaving for the gym was a welcome respite. My new swim shorts arrived today too, they are nice, much shorted without being obscene. Much less likely to get pulled off when I push off and less material to get bogged down with.