Swimming, 14th March 2017

Returned to doing a Swimfit session today. In fact it was a session I’ve already done but wasn’t particularly happy with:

14 lengths easy front crawl
Rest up to one minute
6 x 1 length moderate front crawl, rest for 20 seconds
5 x 2 lengths fast front crawl, rest for 20 seconds
8 lengths fast breaststroke
Rest until breathing returns to normal
8 lengths fast front crawl
Rest until breathing returns to normal
12 lengths easy front crawl

The breaststroke is the real killer here and I still struggled with it. I was keeping pace with the person swimming front crawl next to me, but I think that says more about their front crawl than my breaststroke 🙂 I think I might end up repeating this session a few times and I’ll move on when I find it a bit easier.

There was a little time left so I made the distance up to 2,200m with some easy front crawl and whilst I was swimming decided that I’d set myself a target this year of swimming an average of 10km per week, or, given time off for good behaviour, 500km for the year. That probably means I’m a little behind target as things stand, ten and a half weeks into the year.

Total distance for the month: 19,800m
Total distance for this year: 77,400m

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Swimming, 13th March 2017

Another 2,800m front crawl swim with some turn practice. I realised over the weekend that I was not initiating my turns in the same way as we’re taught to coach them. I’ve been leaving out the single fly kick as I start the turn. Doing that kick at the right time is taking a little practice, but when I get it right the whole process becomes much easier. One very big improvement is that the turn seems much more stable and my arms can go straight to the streamline position after the final pull. Needs more practice though.

Total distance for the month: 17,600m
Total distance for this year: 75,200m

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Swimming, 10th March 2017

Didn’t really leave myself enough time thanks to work getting in the way, but I was determined to swim 2km if I could. Had to push quite hard over the last 500m, but I made it with no time to spare, then struggled to get out of the pool…

Total distance for the month: 14,800m
Total distance for this year: 72,400m

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Swimming, 9th March 2017

I took a couple of days off which left me feeling somewhat brighter and it was far easier to rack up another 2,800m this time around. Front crawl and turn practice again.

Total distance for the month: 12,800m
Total distance for this year: 70,400m

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Swimming, 6th March 2017

This was a tough swim. I was feeling very tired, so just stuck to front crawl and did some turn practice, totalling 2,800m.

Total distance for the month: 9,000m
Total distance for this year: 67,600m

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Swimming, 3rd March 2017

Short session today. There’s not much time on Friday afternoons. I stuck to front crawl again, but only did 2km as 8 x 250m. Felt as though I was working quite hard, too. I wasn’t timing myself, but against the wall clock the first 500m was faster than I’ve done it before, as was the full 2km.

On the negative side, when I got out one of the swim school teachers told me that my fingers are dragging in the water on the recovery, which I can’t actually feel at all, and my old habit of having my hands entering the water too early has returned, so I’ll have to work on those next week.

Total distance for the month: 7,200m
Total distance for this year: 64,800m

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Swimming, 2nd March 2017

Another “front crawl only” session of 2,700m, and with only one other person in the pool for the entire swim. I’m starting to get to grips with the early vertical forearm, but I think it’s going to take a while yet. Plenty of turn practice, too. Hopefully I’m not too far from being able to incorporate them into my normal swimming.

Total distance for the month: 5,200m
Total distance for this year: 62,800m

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When your house electrics get a bit too exciting

I had to open up the consumer unit to replace a fuse recently. I’m coming to the conclusion that we really need to get a sparky in and get our electrics tidied up a bit. Looking at this lot makes me feel uncomfortable.

That’s not everything either. There’s the solar PV meter just off to the left of the photo too.

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A new tray for the cider press

Fresh from my success wrangling stainless steel for brewing, I thought I’d make up a new press tray for the cider press also from stainless steel. The starting point was one of those stainless industrial catering trays you see on hot food counters all over the place. They appear to come in sets of standard dimensions so that trays of various sizes can be fitted neatly together on the counter. I chose one just large enough to take my press boards with a little space left over. To that I added a tap, deck fitting, back nut and a connector tail for a pipe.

Just as with the brewery kit I was going to use a Q-Max cutter to make the hole for the drain, so first up I had to drill a pilot hole in one corner.

A nice long Allen key makes light work of using the cutter, and a very tidy round hole is the result.

I fitted the pipe connector to the tap using some PTFE tape to seal the threads.

All that remained was to fit the deck fitting to the tray using the back nut to hold it in place and then screw the tap onto the end of the deck fitting, again using a little PTFE tape to seal the threads.

And here it is in action. Very much neater and cleaner than its wooden predecessor.

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Championship Swim Training Book

I’ve had this book, by Bill Sweetenham and John Atkinson, sitting on my desk for a few weeks. It was recommended on the Swimming Coach course. I’ve started it a few times and struggled, largely I think because it comes across as being very prescriptive with inadequate information to back it up, but also because there are quotes such as “full recovery is not the same as complete recovery” that are left unexplained when to many people it would seem perfectly reasonable to consider them the same.

Anyhow, last night I couldn’t sleep so I got myself a drink and sat downstairs with the book (having handily left my glasses on the bedside table) to make another attempt. I still struggled with it for the above reasons, but also found much that was useful, both in terms of explaining the origin of the planning information I get to see and providing descriptions of many drills that I’ll attempt to make use of in the future.

I can see myself returning to this book on a regular basis for ideas about session plans and sets, just ignoring the bits that I feel don’t work for me or my swimmers.

I have a couple of other swimming texts to work my way through at the moment. “Science of Swimming Faster” arrived this morning and there’s an e-book by David Salo (who has coached the likes of Sarah Sjostrom and Katinka Hosszu amongst many others) that looks interesting. As someone with a background in science and engineering the former appeals to me. Backing up the demands we make of swimmers in training with scientific evidence (or even seeing that it’s open to challenge) is something I feel very comfortable with. The latter was recommended to me as an alternative view to the high volume training proposed in the Sweetenham book. That’s also potentially interesting as we have relatively little pool time as a club, so it’s important to make the best of that which we do have.

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