Another short Friday session, again due to school sessions seriously overrunning. I just kept working on stroke length and head position in front crawl, but ran out of time after 1,800m.
Total distance for the month: 19,600m
Total distance for this year: 434,800m
Distance compared to annual target: 38,800m ahead
Had a break yesterday because I was so tired. Today I spent the entire session working on front crawl head position (particularly during breathing), body rotation and stroke length, doing 20 x 100m followed by 10 x 50m. The latter two are quite tiring to work on, but experimenting with my head position was quite interesting. My legs naturally sink (I can’t float on the surface), but pushing my head down into the water (similar to Sun Yang, of all people) lifts my hips and ankles closer to the surface and massively improves my streamline to the point where I can actually feel the water flow changing across my skin. In turn this makes life much easier and I’m also less inclined to lift my head to breathe to the right. It’s consistent with some suggestions I’ve read that swimming at a very slight downwards angle (four or five degrees from the horizontal, say) may actually be beneficial.
I’m going to have to experiment with this more.
Total distance for the month: 17,800m
Total distance for this year: 433,000m
Distance compared to annual target: 39,000m ahead
Given the information from the coach yesterday I spent today swimming two lengths at a time trying to extend my stroke and getting more rotation during recovery. It was very hard work and quite tiring, but there was a clear improvement in distance per stroke. I kept pushing it until I’d done 2,300m by which time I’d really had enough.
As Better don’t seem to want to fix the broken pace clock I’ve bought a SportCount stopwatch and lap counter (the red model) so I was also trying that out. It took a little while to get used to, but seemed to work pretty well in the end. More of that in another posting sometime.
Total distance for the month: 15,300m
Total distance for this year: 430,500m
Distance compared to annual target: 41,500m ahead
Back for the tri session this evening. The session was:
8 lengths changing stroke for the 4th and 8th lengths
4 x 4 lengths swimming single-arm on the even lengths
2 x ( 5 x 2 lengths steady, 20 sec rest, 5 x 2 lengths fast, 30 sec rest )
6 lengths swim down
I struggled a bit with the lengths that weren’t front crawl and the drills. I’m coming to the conclusion that it’s because my legs naturally sink unless I’m going fast enough to overcome it. Other than the last two lengths of the swim down I did complete the session however, covering 2,200m, so I was fairly pleased with that.
Towards the end of the session the coach informed me that she’d come to the conclusion that I wasn’t getting enough distance at the front of the stroke possibly because I’m not getting enough clearance for my arm recovery due to insufficient body roll, so there’s something else to be working on…
Total distance for the month: 13,000m
Total distance for this year: 428,200m
Distance compared to annual target: 41,200m ahead
Felt as though I worked hard today, but didn’t really get very far in what was a short session anyhow. I’ve come to the conclusion that when I breathe to the right (my weaker side) I’m lifting my head slightly which causes my legs to sink, so I started working on that and need to keep on at it for a while. Covered just 1,600m in the end, all front crawl.
Total distance for the month: 10,800m
Total distance for this year: 426,000m
Distance compared to annual target: 41,000m ahead
Really struggled today. Arms felt very heavy. Eventually got out early having done 2,100m front crawl.
Total distance for the month: 9,200m
Total distance for this year: 424,400m
Distance compared to annual target: 41,400m ahead
Work interfered with my usual daytime swim so I had to go this evening when only half the pool was available and there were more swimmers to dodge. So I kept things simple again with 8 x 250m followed by 10 x 50m by which time I felt like I’d done enough.
Total distance for the month: 7,100m
Total distance for this year: 422,300m
Distance compared to annual target: 41,300m ahead
Simple session because I was still feeling a bit tired from the previous evening. I did 8 x 250m front crawl working on extension of the stroke followed by 200m fly kick and finished off with some 50s with a turn at each end for a total of 2,500m. I’m feeling happier about the turns at the shallow end now.
Total distance for the month: 4,600m
Total distance for this year: 419,800m
Distance compared to annual target: 40,800m ahead
It’s Monday, so it must be the tri fitness session. The plan (all front crawl) was:
2 lengths swim
2 lengths catch up
2 lengths kick using a pull-buoy as a float
Then four repeats of
2 lengths pull, breathing every five strokes
2 lengths as half a length doggy paddle, half swim
on 20 second rest intervals
2 x 12 lengths, 30 second rest
2 x 6 lengths, 30 second rest
2 x 4 lengths, 30 second rest
2 x 2 lengths, 30 second rest
walkbacks
6 lengths swim down
I really struggled with the kick. My minimal buoyancy makes it very hard to lift my head out of the water to breathe when only using a pull-buoy as a float. I also found the doggy paddle quite tricky. As a result I didn’t get through the first part as quickly as necessary and had to drop some of the repeats from the second section (and even had to do some of those breathing to one side only). I didn’t even get close to doing walkbacks.
It was an enjoyable session though, and in the end I reckon I covered 2,100m.
Total distance for the month: 2,100m
Total distance for this year: 417,300m
Distance compared to annual target: 40,300m ahead
Today’s session didn’t start well as Friday is a short session anyhow and the school using the pool immediately before the public session were late getting out. Given that I wanted to be sure of making 50km for this month I just knuckled down into 8 x 250m front crawl.
Off the wall when swimming front crawl I normally take four strokes and breathe as my left arm recovers after the fourth stroke. After that I’ve been dropping into a pattern of breathing every three strokes. I discovered today that for the time being at least, life is much easier if I take a second breath to the left after the first and then switch to bilateral. I might experiment a bit with this over the next few weeks — trying to take my first breath one stroke earlier, for instance.
Anyhow, target achieved. 2km for the day, over 50km for the fourth month on the trot. Happy enough with that.
Total distance for the month: 50,400m
Total distance for this year: 415,200m
Distance compared to annual target: 40,200m ahead
