Sunday Funday - Solo Style

This week was supposed to be the launch of my triathlon club's new Sunday Funday weekly swim session.  Unfortunately, our local community center had other plans for us.  The lap swimming pool was closed due to chlorine levels.  The center has a leisure pool with 2-3 lanes in it but it was overwhelmed with families and playing kiddos.

Lucky for me, I have a corporate gym facility with pool options.  I headed over to my gym to get my swim on but it wasn't the same without the rest of my training buddies.

Here's the workout that I did...keep it simple and fun!

Warm up - 1000 m
400 - free
300 - drills as 4 x 75 swimming in IM order, drill, free, drill
200 - pull
100 - kick

Main set - 1000 m
400 as 4 x 100 with 10 sec rest interval
300 as surging 75's - swim continuous and every 3rd length of short course pool swim as a surge
200 as 4 x 50 sprint/cruise swimming back stroke on the cruise length
100 as 4 x 25 swim from the middle of pool as a sprint into the wall and coming off the wall back into sprint with breath control

Cool down - 200 m incorporating stroke work

This incorporated my favorite warm up ladder and then utilized the same ladder concept to build a set with some variety.  It was good to get back into the pool after taking a little time off to rest after my TriFest for MS race weekend.  Going into that race, my hip was feeling tight and it just felt like I needed to take a little rest break.  I took two weeks off and my body and mind are ready to get back into training now.

Up next...laying out my Fall and Winter race plans.

2014 One Hour Postal Swim

It's nearing the end of January but on Friday my friends and I still managed to sneak in our annual One Hour Postal Swim.  The Postal Swim is a national swim meet that you hold at a location and time of your choosing.  Once complete, then you mail in your results and that is how the meet becomes Postal! There are various postal meet events through out the year with US Masters Swimming but January is known for the One Hour Postal Swim.

This year, we gathered again on a Friday evening to hold the swim.  Our pool has lanes in use after work for one of the local swim club teams.  We managed to get the final two lanes in the pool except we had five swimmers.  Luckily the next lane over was a pro-triathlete who was willing to split the lane with us.  There isn't much fanfare to the one hour swim.  Our timers sit in chairs at the end of the lane.  They each have a stop watch/ iPhone to time with and a split sheet to track the splits for each swimmer.  The splits are kept per each 50 yard lap of the pool.

Lori, Jeff, Me, Brent, and Jeff

We select a time to start and then with a jump into the pool everyone is off and swimming.  Once again, Lori and I shared a lane this year.  I think Lori and I have shared a lane for almost every year that I have done the one hour postal swim.  She is much faster than me and that provides me with mental entertainment during the swim as I try to calculate how many laps it takes her to lap me or other silly things.

This year I made the decision to count laps for every 500 yards.  It helped me gauge the amount of time that I had been swimming and stay mentally focused.  I went into the event without a goal and very fearful that my distance was going to be much lower than I wanted.  My swimming this fall has been hit and miss as work has sometimes overtaken my life.  Counting the laps led to me doing some math to try and calculate out what distance a 50 sec 50 yard pace would cover which was equal to 3600 yards.

I had asked Jon, Lori's husband, who was timing for the two of us to give us a 10 minute warning.  His warning came and I definitely felt like I had to pick up the pace to try and get my remaining laps in and try to hit 3600 yards.  I ended up with 3560 yards in the one hour time.  This equates out to a pace of 1:41 per 100 yard which I was happy with for the most part.  My distance in 2013 was 3580 yards so it was a little disappointing to miss that distance by 20 yards or less than one length.  That equates out to 1/3 yard per minute which is so negligible in the long haul.

Below is my distance history for this event.  Every year I am so happy when it is over! With that...12 months until I have to do a solid hour swim again! The best part of this event is definitely the dinner and social time afterwards with my buds.

2014 - 3560 yards
2013 - 3580 yards
2012 - 3440 yards
2011 - 3295 yards
2010 - 2935 yards

Cinco no Sinko!

Today is Cinco de Mayo and in the midst of my swim warmup I decided it was important to come up with a holiday themed workout.  Now we all know that once you have started a workout, math becomes challenging.  I jumped out of the pool to quickly sketch out some workout ideas on the pool whiteboard.  My idea was simple...5 sets of 5 intervals! But we needed a workout that would hit our goal distance for the workout but also was something we could complete in 45 minutes.  Our Sunday Funday swims have just one  requirement...they must finish at 5:00 so we can have maximum hot tub time before the pool closes at 5:30!

Without any further delay here is the Cinco no Sinko workout...and I'm happy to report that no one sunk during the workout so our mission was accomplished!

#1 - 5 x 100 on the 1:50
#2 - 5 x 75 on the 1:20
#3 - 5 x 100 on the 1:45
#4 - 5 x 75 on the 1:20
#5 - 5 x 50 on the 1:00

My workout partner and I swam differently during each set based on our abilities.  Brent is faster than I am so he did more IM work where I spent most of the workout swimming free and adding in some pull as well.  We ended with a slower interval on the 50's so that I could swim stroke and still have recovery time.

During the 50's set I realized that outdoor swimming is just around the corner.  Our pool is set up as long course during our lap swim hours which means that I need to get to work on swimming 50's of each stroke.  Normally I just do stroke/free in order to stay on the same interval as my faster friends.  Today I did the first 4 in that manner as back/free and then on the final 50 I did it all back.  It was pretty painful towards the end so I will definitely need to work on that over the next few weeks.

This week was light on swimming for me since I have accepted a new position in my department.  The transition is going well but on three days this past week I missed my lunch swim due to meetings.  I really hope this week will be better.

This Cinco no Sinko workout was followed up with a hot tub and then the awesome TriSwim products to get the chlorine out of my hair and skin.  I'm so grateful to be sponsored by TriSwim because it keeps my hair soft and healthy even though I swim 4-5 days a week.

Updating a Swim Workout with a Twist

Congratulations to Angela...winner of my Three Year Blog-iversary giveaway!

Our swim bunch always does workouts on Friday's that focus on 50 yd repeats.  We make changes to the workout each week but you know that if it's Friday then we are swimming 50's.  We even call it Fifties Friday! 

This Friday there were just a couple of us for the workout.  I had been thinking about a twist to our repeats for the last few weeks so I brought it up as an option.  One of our standard workouts is to do a set number of 50's like 4 on a descending time interval.  For example, 4 on the minute, 4 on 55 seconds, 4 on 50 seconds, and 4 on 45 seconds.  My idea was to make the descend but do it a little mixed up. 

In the new version, we would start on one minute, then go to 50 seconds, then back up to 55 seconds, and then down to 45 seconds.  The theory that I had was that by alternating between the ladder I would go into the 45 second set with a little more rest and thus be more successful at achieving the interval. 

The normal swims that we do for each interval is as follows:
1 minute = 50 stroke depending on your ability this could also be swam stroke/free.
55 second = Stroke/free (sometimes I do pull)
50 second = all free
45 second = all free

So our workout looked like this...
Warm up
4 x 50 on 1 minute (stroke/free)
4 x 50 on 50 seconds (free)
4 x 50 on 55 seconds (pull)
4 x 50 on 45 seconds (free)
Cool down

It would have been fun to take the ladder back up by adding on 4 x 50 on 55seconds, 4 x 50 on 50 seconds, 4 x 50 on 1 minute.  But instead we hit up the hot tub! It was a short workout for me since I got to the pool a little later than normal but I was pretty happy to finally stay on the interval for the 45 seconds.  I was touch and go for them but at least I made it.  In the end I think my theory worked out pretty well.  The variety between each mini-set was nice too compared to the straight descend that we normally do. 

I owe my training partners a ton of credit because without them I wouldn't be trying to hit 45 second intervals.  Over the past year, I have made a ton of improvement in my swim times.  Swimming more consistently during the week and swimming with fast friends has made a big difference for me.  If you have the chance...push yourself and try to swim with the faster swimmers.  Maybe sometimes you'll have to take a breather break but maybe sometimes you'll surprise yourself and hit times that you didn't realize that you could. 

A Tough Swim

Today I headed to the pool thinking it was just a normal Friday.  I began the day by cleaning out my swim bag (side note: I found 2 suits, bra/underwear, 6 pairs goggles, and tons of swim caps in my bag!) and so I was ready for the new year of swimming! I didn't know that I would be kicking off the first 50's Fridays for 2013 with one of the hardest workouts imaginable. 

This workout has been our lunch crew's nemesis since Thanksgiving.  We screwed it up the first few times that we tried to recreate it until Brent put together a spreadsheet with the send off times. This makes it easy for us to follow the workout and is how we have finally mastered the workout.  Truth time...it took us a few times to even write out the send off times correctly!

Brent got the inspiration for the workout from his daughter's college team.  They swim it in a 50m long course pool and we swim in a 25yd short course pool.  The workout is a descending set of 50's.  You begin at a 1 min interval and then work down by 5 seconds until you hit 40 sec. That's one set.  The first set requires one extra 50 but all of the remaining sets contain just 5- 50's.  We did six sets for 31 total 50's.  Once you get started it is pretty tough to keep track of the interval times...your brain just gets fuzzy from the oxygen deprivation!  One person usually calls out the next couple send off times during the sets and that helps out a lot too. 

My water logged send off sheet...it's generally a good practice to put your workout in a plastic zip bag!

I did an okay job on the workout today.  I sat out on 2 of the 50's when I fell off the interval and needed rest to get back on track with the group.  I will not lie...I don't hit the 40 sec interval.  I end up swimming that as touch and go on the 45 sec but it works out that the extra time I need just comes out of the 1 min interval for the next set. 

It's a tough workout for me but I can tell that the rest of the crew is working pretty hard during the workout too.  There is hardly any talking during this workout and normally our crew is always chatting during our rest breaks.  There just isn't much rest so that makes the workout go by quickly. 

So far 2013 is off to a great start since I survived more of this workout than ever before! Plus, I signed up for the Nike Go the Distance challenge and selected 250 miles for my goal.  I officially ended 2012 with 203.7 swimming miles.  I'm excited to see if I can maintain consistent mileage throughout 2013 and continue to improve my times.  Without my goal to swim more in 2012 there is no way that I would have been able to hang on and complete the workout today!

Go the Distance Challenge

Earlier this year I signed up for the Nike Go the Distance Challenge through U.S. Masters Swimming. 

I had never tracked my swim mileage before and had no clue what to select as my goal.  In the end, I decided that 150 miles for the year would be a good goal.  I had no idea that I would surpass that distance and then some!!!

Today I met my modified goal of 200 miles for the year.  It has been so much fun to work towards this goal and my swimming really improved a ton this year.  The additional time in the water has definitely paid off and I can't wait to continue the challenge in 2013. 

Here's the workout that got me across the finish line today!

Warm up - 350 yards

1 - 4 x 150 yds on the 2:30 (I swam all free and was touch and go on this interval)

2 - 3 x 100 yds on the 1:50 (slow, medium, fast)

3 - 200 yds pull

4 - 200 yds kick (4 x 50 under/overs on the 1:10) Under/overs are swim underwater on one breath for the 25 yds then swim easy over water on the return 25 yards to recover.

5 - 4 x 50 yds on the :50 and 1:00 (I dropped to the 1:00 interval after the first 2)

6 - 4 x 75 yds on the 1:30...I took plenty of rest since my interval should probably have been the 1:20.

7 - 100 yds cool down

Total: 2250 yds. 

My workout buddies ended after the 5th element of the main set.  They helped me gauge the math on how much I had left to reach my goal since I knew that I needed 1.22 miles to hit 200 miles.  I was on my own and needed at least a 350 so I decided on the 4 x 75 plus a 50 cooldown.  In the midst of my set I got nervous about the distance so I added on another 50 for cooldown.  Better to be safe than get home and be a couple of 1/100ths short on my goal!

I've got a few more days of swimming for the year so I will probably end the year around 203-204 miles.  This challenge has been one of my favorite aspects of my USMS membership this year.  It has been so motivating to work towards a goal and see just how much swimming I could fit in.  I had a much stronger back half of the year than first half so I can see plenty of room to improve on my monthly consistency for next year. 

There are approximately 3400 participants in the Go the Distance Challenge and together we have swum 704,000 miles in 2012.  Isn't that amazing!!!!  My club, Arkansas Masters, had 21 swimmers and we have covered 5000 miles!

Wooohooo...here's to accomplishing one of my goals in 2012!!!!

Swimming and Math just don't mix!

I have been doing a good job of consistently swimming at lunch the last few months.  It's really helped me increase my mileage this year and I'm on track to hit 200 miles for the year!

One of my swim buds spent Thanksgiving with his family visiting their daughter at the University of New Mexico.  She is a freshman there and is competing in her first year of collegiate swimming.  During the holiday visit, he got in the pool and swam during the team's workout a few times.  He came back with the idea for a workout that he got from one of their coached sessions.

The workout sounded very simple...in theory! It's a set of 50's done on a decreasing interval time.  You start at the minute, then subtract 5 seconds until you hit 40 seconds and then start over again at the minute.  Two weeks ago on a Friday, we decided to try out the workout.  Fridays are our 50's Friday theme and we always do different workouts that are focused on 50's.

We got the workout started on the top and did okay at first.  Somewhere in the middle of the 3rd set it all fell apart.  We started getting our send off times confused and it was a mess.  We lost track of which interval we were on and how many sets that we had done.  It was mayhem in the pool!

Fast forward one week...we had learned our lesson from the first week and had written out the send off times for the sets.  We stayed on our workout sheet for about 3 sets again before it again fell apart.  At that point, we had a shift change...two of us were finished with our swims and another getting started so we switched out who was swimming the set together.  It worked out great and the final two restarted the intervals and seemed to hold it together for a couple sets. 

I got back to my desk and later that afternoon got an email from my friend asking me to try and figure out the math of where we had gone wrong.  What I came up with was that this:

Order: Stroke on min, Stroke/Free on 55 sec, Free on 50, Free on 45, Free on 40
Set 1 - top, top, 55, 45, 30, 10(stroke)
Set 2 - 10, 5, 55, 40, 20
Set 3 - 20, 15, 5, 50, 30
Set 4 - 30, 25, 15, top, 40
Set 5 - 40, 35, 25, 10, 50

So in the first set you actually do 6 repeats in order to capture starting on the top.  Then as you end each set, with the interval on the 40 you are basically finishing as a touch and go.  When you send off after the touch and go, you are going back to your stroke on the minute interval.  It feels really strange to come off of a sprint and then cruise...this is where we kept getting confused.  We were swimming this interval too fast and either skipping or repeating the minute to try and get back on track. 

The group plans to try out the workout again this Friday to see if the Third Times a Charm!  I'll be out of town on Friday but I can't wait to hear how it goes. 

So far my December swim mileage is at 7.7 miles and my year total is at 188.58 miles leaving me with 11.5 miles left to swim in the 18 days remaining.  I think I'm going to make it!!!

It's Ladder Monday!

Tonight was a great night for Rush Hour with temps finally lowering to a much more pleasant level than it has been since Spring.  I was surprised that there wasn't a huge crowd out at the track tonight but those that were there got in a great workout. 

I was running late getting out of work and felt very stressed as I headed out to the track.  I stopped off to change into workout clothes and was excited to get to wear a short sleeve shirt instead of a tank.  Yes, it was as if a cold front had come in...short sleeves! I got stuck in traffic for soccer practice and that increased my stress.  I like to get in a long warm up of 1 1/2 - 2 miles and I knew that I wouldn't have the time for that tonight. 

I got started on my warmup and said hi to all the regulars.  The mood on the track was light and you could tell that people were enjoying the cooler temps and overcast sky.  After a 5 lap warmup, Mike called the group in for the workout description.  Anytime the weather turns cooler, he rewards us with a tough workout.  Tonight was no exception!

Tonight we got to do a ladder and we went up then down the ladder. 
400 m at current 5K race pace
800 m at current 5K race pace
800 m at current 5K race pace
1000 m All Out pace
800 m at current 5K pace
800 m at current 5K pace
400 m at current 5K pace

The rest interval was 60 seconds following all of the intervals except for the rest after the 1000m...we got a whopping 3 minutes rest after that one.  And I enjoyed every second of the rest tonight.  The interval distances weren't all that tough but the combination of effort added up as the workout progressed.  After the 1000 m interval, my times picked up a little bit since my legs knew the faster pace that they had just done on the 1000 m.  That final 400 m included some bits with a super quick pace and left me feeling very proud of the workout.

I finished up the night with a couple cool down laps to end at 5 miles for the night.  I was super excited to see my average pace for the 5 miles was around 9:36 per mile including my warm up and cool down distances at a slower pace.  I'll take the cooler weather any day if it keeps helping my pace like it did tonight.  Don't get me wrong, I finished up the workout covered in sweat and worn out from a tough workout. 

I guess it was Ladder Monday since my lunch time swim also was a ladder.  Today we did a 500 m ladder as part of our main set.  This is a fast ladder that is a great workout.  It involves the following: 25 fly, 50 back, 75 fly/back/breast, 100 IM, 100 free, 75 fly/back/breast, 50 back, 25 fly.  I make some modifications since I'm still working on building strength and capability to swim strokes.  For example today I did: 25 fly, 50 free/back, 75 free/free/breast, 100 IM, 100 free, 75 free/free/breast, 50 free/back, 25 fly.  This lets me do 25 of each stroke before the 100 IM and then get some recovery after the IM.  This was just a part of our workout main set.  We followed it up with some 100's and I got in 1800 m total for my lunch swim. 

Overall, today was a good day for Monday ladders!

The last days of outdoor swimming

The last week has been a sad week as the outdoor pool winds down to close for the season.  Every year we have to beg and plead for the city to keep the pool open for lap swimming after school starts up in mid-August.  Many of the lifeguards are high school and college kids so once they return to school there aren't many guards available to work.  One thing that we can usually negotiate is swim time when the school PE classes are at the pool. 

It's pretty funny to share the pool with the gym classes.  One of the first days that we arrived we found out that the pool was having a chlorine problem and we could only swim in the diving well.  Luckily that day we swam in between classes otherwise it wouldn't have worked.   The diving well is a very odd length and contains no lap lanes or lines.  We had a group of 7 in the well and I managed to swim into people a couple times.  We did a lot of different types of intervals since we were working in such an odd pool.  Sadly, that day the guard had to help out 2 kids within one minute of each other in one of the gym classes.  I think it is so important that kids learn how to swim...these are jr high aged kids that don't know how to swim.  That just seems crazy to me.

I took a few days to swim indoors because the locker room with all the jr high kids is a little hectic.  As the week was winding down, I realized that Thursday was going to be one of the last chances to swim outdoor lunch laps.  I met up with the crew and we had a great final workout.  We did 300yd sets so 3 x 100 yds, 4 x 75 yds, 6 x 50 yds, and 12 x 25 yds.  Each set was different but totaled up to 300 yds.  It is a fun way to get some distance in and have the workout go by quickly. 

I got out of the pool just as a class was getting there.  Luckily most of the class had already exited the locker room so it wasn't too crazy.  I really won't miss the bare bones locker rooms at our outdoor pool! 

Obviously designed by a male since there are no outlets by the mirrors!

Stuff everywhere! Not a normal sight just what it looks like during gym class.

This last picture made me remember back when I was in high school and had to take swimming class.  I grew up in West Des Moines, Iowa which is right at the intersection of I-80 and I-35.  Our pool had a separate locker room that was located right next to an exterior door to one of the parking lots.  As you can see from the pic, the school is right off an interchange on the highway. 

Good ole Valley High School...bet you didn't know I'm a Valley Girl!

 

Our gym teacher would always tell us a story to encourage us to properly lock up our clothes and things in the locker room.  He would remind us that our school was just a quick detour off the highway and that the gangs of Chicago knew what a gold mine of stuff there was in our locker room.  So you had better lock up your stuff or else it would disappear to the Interstate travelling gangs of Chicago.  Don't forget that it was a several hours drive to Chicago! Either way I can't remember how many times I heard this story but it was told every quarter before any swim rotation in gym class and usually multiple times in a quarter.  I thought of this story as I got ready surrounded by the mess of the jr high girls' things. 

This year I got in a lot more outdoor swim workouts than ever before.  It was so easy to drive across the street with my new job location compared to last year and I took advantage of that and got lots of lunch time laps in with the Arkansas Masters Swimming crew.  It will be sad to see everyone return to their respective pools since some of the crew are people I only get to swim with during the summer.  Until next year!!!

2012 NWA Masters Long Course Swim Meet

Earlier in June was the Northwest Arkansas Masters Long Course Swim Meet at Memorial Park pool in Bentonville.  This was my second time to do a long course swim meet and it was a great weekend for it.  This year the meet organizers decided to do a two day meet format with the long events on Friday night and the sprints/mid-distance events on Saturday morning. 

The normal meet format for Masters is that you can select five events to participate in but they allowed participants to do one event on Friday and up to five on Saturday.  Bonus!

Some helpful tips if you are new to swim meets like me:
1) Read the meet registration form and look for important details like warmup and seeding information. 
2) If you are unsure of a seed time, speak with the meet director and they will help you get in the right heat. 
3) Take advantage of warmup and cooldown lanes.  Usually 2 lanes will be provided for all the swimmers to use for warmup and cooldown during the meet.  Prior to the start it is generally okay to utilize all lanes for warmup.  Make sure you circle swim since this is the accepted practice with swimmers. 
4) When you get to the meet, locate the heat sheets.  Make note of your events and what heat and lane assignment you have been given.  I usually bring a second registration form to keep track of this.  I also will write down how many heats each event has as well as if any events are scratched. 
5) You are responsible to be at the starting block on time for your events so you have to pay attention! Sometimes there aren't any entrants in an event and it will be skipped.  The heat sheets will help you stay on top of that. 
6) Most meets will post state and citizen records somewhere at the meet.  If you think you could break a record for your age group and event, notify the starter and head timers.  Record attempts require 3 timers to be official and it is your responsibility to tell the officials that you are going for a record. 
7) If you are unsure of starting off the blocks or even diving from the edge, go ahead and do an in-pool start.  There will be swimmers of all ages and abilities at a Masters meet so you have nothing to fear, all types of starts will be used!
8) Have fun and Swim Hard!!!

Back to the meet...this year I elected to do the 1500 Free for my Friday evening event.  There was just one heat with about 5 of us entered.  I put down 32 minutes as my seed time.  This is a mental event more than a physical event for me.  It's a tough distance to stay engaged and focused and keep a consistent pace.  My previous time from this meet in 2010 was 32:35 so I was pretty happy when the timer told me I was under 29 min.  I'm still waiting for the official results to be released but I pretty happy with a 3:30 minute improvement!

I'm in green on the left side just before our 1500 start.

After the events on Friday, I headed to the club's board meeting.  I had reached out to the president about getting more involved and it was fun to attend the meeting.  I especially enjoyed the motion to elect me as Social Media coordinator!!! I'll be taking over the Facebook, Twitter, and Blog feed for the Arkansas Masters!

Saturday morning I got to the pool around 8:30 for the meet start at 9:00.  I was super nervous since I was trying out a new event...50 m Breast stroke.  I decided on 4 events for Saturday which were 50 Breast, 100 Free, 50 Back, and 200 Free. 

First up for me was the 50 breast and I was in the 2nd heat.  After the first heat, the official had a conversation with a participant about her stroke form and it appeared she was being DQ'd.  That increased my nervousness even more.  Turns out she was pulling below the waist which isn't allowed in breast stroke.  My start was a little iffy since I initially forgot to kick properly and caught myself starting to flutter.  Kick fix and I was on my way doing the breast stroke! About half way down the pool I realized that it's a long way, 3/4 of the way down I wanted to be done! My time was just under 1 minute...barely. 

Whoops, bad form with a way too wide kick!

Up next after a quick rest was the 100 free.  I swam in the 2nd heat and managed just over 1:30 for the distance which was a few seconds improvement over my time in 2010. 

The 50 back was stressful since I was assigned lane 1 next to the wall and the official.  In outdoor pools I struggle to stay in a straight line for back stroke.  So I was worried about running into the wall and I was worried that somehow I would make a form mistake with the official watching.  With those two things making me nervous I got started okay.  For the first 15m or so I stayed straight and then I slowly moved to the lane divider on my left and promptly ran into it.  That startled me and I tried to get back on course.  I ran into the divider a couple more times but soon enough I spotted the flags and new I was just a few strokes from finishing! My time was just under 53 seconds which was in line with my previous time. 

My last event was the 200 free.  My finish time was around 3:18 which I was happy with since I stayed pretty close to the other competitor in my heat for most of the race.  Overall, it was a good meet for me and I had a good time swimming the events and chatting with the other swimmers. 

After the meet was over, we headed over to Greg's house for the meet social.  Greg and his wife Kim had a great pasta lunch spread and a beautiful shaded deck where we enjoyed the meal.  It was a perfect finish to the meet since I was starving given my nerves kept me from eating much before the meet!

Release the Beast Open Water Swim

Happy Memorial Day!

I kicked off the morning with the Ozark Open Water Swim at Hickory Creek park on Beaver Lake.  The swim this year was called Release the Beast and is a fundraiser for the AquaHawgs kids swim team.

I participated in this race two years ago when it was in September.  They moved the race to be earlier in the season so that it didn't conflict with the Long Dam swim in August.  The race distances are .6mile, 1.2 mile, or 2.4 mile.  I elected to do the 1.2 mile distance again which is a one loop course. 

The course is laid out as a straight out and back along a buoy line.  The weather conditions today were dramatically different than in 2010.  For starters it was in the upper 70's versus 54 at race time! The water was also a little chillier which made it a wetsuit legal race.  (Side note: I highly recommend TriSlide for any wetsuit races!)

There was a brief pre-race meeting to go over the course and logistics for the different distances of the races.  This was an event that was open for both Masters swimmers as well as Age Groupers (otherwise known as kiddos!)  The Masters got a head start on the kiddos by 5 minutes or so.  We all headed into the water and self seeded ourselves.  The race director let out an air horn and signaled the start of the race. 

The race site and course...the buoy looks a long ways away!

I swam next to my friend Britt for a few minutes and then I felt like we switched sides and was gone.  I was a little panicky for the first few minutes until I could find some open water.  The water was super choppy from the wind and it was a little frustrating at first.  Eventually, I settled into a rhythm and plodded my way to the turn buoy.  As I neared the buoy, I was surprised to be in the wrong lane of traffic! I had drifted to the left of the buoy line and it was as if I was headed into oncoming traffic.  I shifted to the right and was pumped to make it around the buoy. 

There's something about a swim race that is just interesting.  There's so little exterior noise to process...it's just you and the water.  I tend to hear bits of songs in my head and have pep talks with myself.   The first pep talk was during the first few minutes of the race.  The crush of people is always overwhelming and it takes some reminding to know that I can do it.  The next big one was during the return trip.  The distance between the turn buoy and the 2nd buoy just seemed to take forever.  It felt like I was zig-zagging and not getting any closer to the buoy.  I ended up doing some math trying to calculate what distance would be left when I got to the buoy to distract myself and keep focused. 

Rocking my ToughChik hoodie!

The last buoy was about .3 miles out and I equated that to about 10 minutes more of swimming.  I don't swim with a watch and during the entire race had no clue of how much time had passed.  I was really surprised to see the clock at the end and see that I had done the event in 34 minutes and some change.  That was almost a 10 minute improvement over my time in 2010.  I'll take that kind of a PR!!!

Congrats to Britt! She's training for IronMan Wisconsin...truly a beast!

Britt did awesome too...she did the 1.2 mile and killed it for coming off of being sick recently.  After I told her that I thought she had ditched me on the swim since I had lost her after a few minutes.  I think I started pulling left towards the buoy line and she stayed on the outside edge of the course.  Either way...fun times with friends!

2012 One Hour Postal Swim Meet

Every year in January, US Masters Swimming hosts a One Hour Postal Swim Meet.  The objective of the meet is to swim as far as you can in one hour.  It is a national event in that anyone can compete from wherever they want.  You have the entire month of January to swim and submit your results. 

I'm really lucky that our Masters club get together to swim the One Hour swim together.  This year the meet was on Saturday and it kicked off bright and early at 5:30 AM with registration.  I'm not a morning person so this is always one of the most challenging aspects of the meet.  We hold two heats and most people swim a heat and count a heat.  Each swimmer should have a counter and that person is responsible for keeping track of the swimmer's lap splits and distance. 

3rd from the left and I'm getting some last minute coaching from Carie.

My friend Carie offered to count for me again this year.  She is a great friend and she always coaches our Sunday Funday workouts.  My friend Lori and I shared a lane and lined up in the lane next to our friend Brent.  This year was the first time that we filled the pool and had to send people to the 2nd pool.  Pretty impressive turnout with 50 swimmers!!!

Our awesome club President Jeff Spencer kicking off the meet

The first heat of swimmers got started at 6 AM.  Carie and I had agreed that she would tell me when I hit the half way point and also when I had 10 minutes remaining.  My goal this year was to hit the 2 mile mark.  As we got the one minute warming for the start time I slowly lowered myself into the water...it was soooo cold. 

Ready, Set, Go!

As we got started it took me a few laps to feel like I was settled into a pace.  I decided to count laps by counting up to 10 (500yds) and then starting over.  I thought this would help me stay focused and see if I was on pace at the halfway point.  It also helped me to keep track of just how much time I had left after passing the halfway point.  Swimming for an hour non-stop can get a little boring so anything to keep your mind off of it is great. 

At the 30 minute mark I had already made it past the one mile mark and figured I had a cushion of about 50-100 yds.  I couldn't give up my focus or pace.  At the 10 minute warning, I knew that I could easily swim 500yds in the time remaining and that I was going to make my goal.  In the midst of this time, I came upon Lori stopped in our lane.  Right as I passed it she started swimming again.  Turns out someone decided to blow a 5 minute warning whistle and she thought it meant our hour was up.  She wasn't happy about it because it cost her 10-15 yds while she tried to figure out if it was over or not. 

Lori and I after we finished. 

The final minute went by quickly and when the whistle went off I was in the middle of the pool.  My official distance was 3440 yds.  The first thing I did when we were finished was swim down to the bottom of the pool and retrieve a dive toy that had been resting on our lane line the entire swim.  Then I confirmed with Carie that I hit my goal and had a celebratory cooldown.  It was so awesome to do some back and breast stroke since all I swam for the hour was freestyle.  My muscles were ready for something different. 

Arkansas Masters 2012 One Hour Swim

After the cooldown, all the participants gathered together for a group picture and then it was time for the 2nd heat to get started.  Carie had a friend counting for her that is just getting into swimming.  She was curious about the meet but a little scared so counting was a good introduction into what the meet is all about.  Brent, Lori, and I took over the hot tub and enjoyed a nice soak before cheering on our friends during their heat. 

I think the top distance swam was 4800 yds and there were quite a few in the 4000+ range including Lori and Brent.  This was my third year to do the one hour swim and in that time I have added 500 yds to my hour distance.  As one friend said, I can now report that I swim at 2 mph!

Photos taken by Daniel McGurk.