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It was a bit of a chaotic trip to the pool today. I got halfway to the pool to find the road closed. No warnings or diversion signs or anything helpful like that beforehand 🙁 So, I had to turn around and drive about three miles back the way I’d come and then go through all the windy country backroads instead and was a couple of minutes late for the start of the session and not really in the right frame of mind. (It wasn’t closed on the way back — looks like they’d just decided to close it for half an hour whilst they made a fairly poor job of patching up some potholes.)

I didn’t have as many 50m reps below 47 seconds today as I did yesterday, but every single one was below 48 seconds and the 25m reps I did at the end were all nineteen point something, even getting close to dropping into the eighteens at one point. Overall I was happy with the consistency of performance. Day off tomorrow, then I’ll be back on Thursday and drop the interval down to 90 seconds.

An earlier swimming session than normal today, so I could get my hair cut for the first time in four months! How much faster will I be now? 🙂

I reduced the interval to 95 seconds for today as planned and whilst I didn’t feel entirely on the ball the session actually went pretty well. I had no problem with the 50m or 25m reps. Nothing special, but being able to complete them first time having reduced the interval is a good sign I think.

I have no idea if it’s relevant or not, but the pool was slightly warmer today. They’ve kept it at 27C for the last couple of weeks which is fine if you’re swimming fairly hard, but not particularly great for the slower swimmers or children. Today it definitely felt warmer, though still cooler than normal.

Anyhow, back tomorrow with the same set, minus lots of hair…

A repeat of yesterday’s set, which I honestly thought probably couldn’t go any better, but in fact I had around a quarter of my 50m swims below 47s and only a couple in the 48s, so I was both pleased and surprised. The 25m reps were probably on a par with yesterday though I can’t deny that I was getting quite tired by that point, not just from today’s swimming, but from the increase in activity throughout the week.

Still, another successful set means another reduction in interval, so when I return to the pool next week it will be 95 seconds. Still very relaxed by comparison with where I was before Christmas, but I’m quite happy to build things up slowly having not swum for three and a half months.

Having managed the previous sessions without too much bother today I knocked five seconds off the interval, bringing it down to 100 seconds. Until such time as I get closer to having twenty to twenty-five seconds rest that’s all I’m going to change.

Despite some interruptions from a lady sharing the lane who was asking for coaching tips (not that I minded, but it makes it more tricky to stick to the intervals), I managed the full twenty reps with no failures and in fact was getting close to a second faster again then I was on Tuesday, with a few 46-second reps, most between 47 and 48 seconds and a couple just over 48.

Unlike last time however, my 25m reps were also faster today with most being below 20s, so I’m happy enough with that.

I’ll attempt the same set tomorrow and if that goes well then I’ll drop the interval down again.

I stuck with the same plan for today as yesterday and very happily found that for all of my 50m reps I was a comfortable second faster than I’d managed only twenty-four hours previously. Even the 25m reps were no slower than yesterday despite feeling quite tired by the time I got that far.

I won’t be swimming tomorrow, but the plan for the following day will now be to repeat the set with the rest interval reduced by five seconds and we’ll see how that goes.

I decided to work off the clock when I swam today, but still take it fairly easy, so I set myself a target of doing twenty 50m swims in under 60 seconds on an interval of 105 seconds. After that I’d do some single lengths on a 60 second interval until the end of the session, just to see what sort of times I could maintain.

The 50s actually went surprisingly well. In fact it wasn’t that hard to maintain a pace of under 50 seconds for each rep though I did have a brief stray into the fifty-point-somethings around three quarters of the way through.

The single lengths all ended up around nineteen to twenty seconds, which I guess is ok for now. I’m really struggling to get sufficient arm speed to be able to go faster, but that should come back with practice.

I’ll attempt the same thing tomorrow and if that all goes ok then I’ll reduce the interval to 100 seconds for later in the week.