My Triathlon Adventure

Last evening I was tired and actually somewhat disoriented.  I was scheduled to go spin and do a swim, but I really just wanted to lay down.  I ended up going anyway.  I needed to get a good swim in so I figured, if I’m going out, I should just go for it.  By the time I started on the spin bike I felt much better.  We had a substitute instructor, and I would qualify this class as an easy recovery ride.  It hit the spot because I’m not sure I had an all out ride left in the tank.

At any rate, when I finished the spin, I moved to the pool and tried one more time to have a good swim.  I was a bit more organized in my swim.  Ok what I mean to say is that I didn’t feel like I was floundering, but I didn’t follow through with the proper breathing.  As the swim got longer I feel back on my old habits.  The result is that I swam solidly, but slowly, really slowly.  It took 13 minutes and change to swim 11 laps.  That is without a break.  I feel like I’m going backwards in terms of performance.

In hindsight I realize that there were a number of factors that contributed to the slow speed.  The first was that I was deliberately moving more slowly than usual, at least at first, so there’s that.  In addition, my stroke is a mess, I am using energy to push myself up instead of forward.  I need to work on that.  I’m hoping to get one more swim in before this weekend’s YMCA triathlon.  We’ll see how it goes.

I have been continuing to work on my swim breathing.  I can do fairly well with breathing when I am just focusing on that.  Unfortunately, when I do that I can’t get my swim stroke going.  Once I start working on my swim stroke the breathing breaks down.  It’s a vicious cycle and I don’t know what to do about it other than continue working hard at one of them until I get it down.

Last night I did some swimming after spin class, and I have to say, things felt much better.  It didn’t feel like controlled drowning, but it wasn’t my most graceful effort to date.  I knocked out 7 laps in no time.  I wasn’t planning on doing laps, it kind of just happened, so I didn’t bother timing it when I started.  By the time I got 4 laps in I regretted it not timing myself.  I felt like I was really moving.  I was able to complete the laps without stopping to catch my breath, and I think it all relates to me slowing the strokes down, and to the new breathing.

Having said that, I do still hold my breath at times, especially when I something goes wrong, like I take in a little water, or I don’t get much air.  But I manage to recover while swimming, and then spend some time focused on breathing.  All in all I do have to say I feel like last night’s swim was a good start in the right direction.

My next goal is to start swimming for distance.  I’d like to get to the point where I can swim for 30 minutes straight with no stopping and see how many laps that works out to.  I am also considering buying a lap counter just because it gets hard to figure out where you are after a while.  Next swim is probably going to be Sunday.  I also have my first ever cross counter skiing adventure this Saturday, I’m looking forward to that!

I have slowly begun the training process.  It hasn’t been easy, I was getting used to slacking off.  The last couple of weeks I have mange to get some spin classes and swimming in.

In terms of swimming I am working on my breathing technique by doing superman style drills.  I lay on my stomach floating in the water with my hands out over my head and overlapping.  The whole time my face is in the water I am exhaling with my nose and mouth.  When I need to breath I take a stroke and take a breath.  I do this a length at a time, and it works well.

Last night I tried to incorporate the breathing into my new swim stroke.  It was awkward to say the least.  If I had to sum up the event, I would say that it resembled controlled drowning.  It is really hard to get everything synced up, and there was more than one time where I got a mouth full of water instead of air.  The good news is that I was able to recover and get a good breath on the next stroke.  So it seems that as long as I don’t panic I should be ok even if I get a little water in my mouth when I go for air.

Later on I tried to slow everything down.  Slow my arms, slow my pace, and then things seemed to feel much better.  Look at that, slow down to go faster, it almost makes sense.  At any rate, now that I am getting better at breathing, I don’t have to breath every other stroke, so I can be a bit more efficient.  The next step is to get my stroke straightened out.  Lots of work to do there, but I’m optimistic.

Incidentally, I had the first triathlon of the year a couple of weeks ago.  It went ok, and I’ll dedicate a post to it when I get a little time.