What is it with old people and warm water?

Gotta love it when fat old people tie an inflatable thing around their waste, move their legs in the water and call that a workout. Then they have the nerve to complain when the water is below 80 degrees. The reason I'm so rude, is today's pool was hot! I asked the lifeguard what it was and he said 85 degrees.

So the Layton pool is now succumbing to warmer water now. I'm telling you what no more am I going to do long swims at Layton. It's fine for maybe an hour swim, but for two or more hours, it's to fatiguing to swim in water that starts to cook ya! I'll be going to SDRC on long swims from now on.

Today's workout was cut short. I planned on 10K and ended up doing 6.4K. I just didn't have the energy.

800 (200 drill kick pull swim)
5500- 1000 :30 rest between sets
900 hold pace
800 hold pace
700 hold pace
600 hold pace
500 hold pace
400 hold pace
300 hold pace
200 hold pace
100 FAST!

My pace on these sucked! My right shoulder was not as good as last night, and I pulled a muscle in my neck this morning and I'm stiff on the left side now. I also had to help Cathi clean the church at 9:30, so I figured 6600 yards was good for today and cut it short (Sorry Coach! But I did do an extra 1500 yesterday too.

300 really, really easy. can use equipment

total 6600 yards

Total for this week is 23,500 yards.

I think I'm going to start taking cold baths. I'm getting nervous about swimming in all this hot water that its acclimating me the wrong way!

1500s

1000 - 4-4-4 w/ drill mixed in
4500 - 3x1500 Descending 1-3 (21:27, 21:08, 20:53)
100 warmdown

5600 yards total @ SDRC. The pool is so much colder than Layton. More underwater lights and the pool is so clean. Layton's pool has dirt and junk at the bottom and the water has a foul aftertaste. If I lived in Bountiful I'd be a lucky man. But I'm happy to have it be my secondary pool. In fact tonight, I got another 25 punch card. Which should last me for another six months or so.

Cathi gave my right shoulder blade some serious deep tissue massage last night. It felt like there was a third shoulder blade in there the knot was so big! But tonight's swim was great! I focused on sticking to bilateral breathing and not making my pace go so fast that it forced me to increasing the frequency of my breathing. I stayed loose and focused on a long, extended reach, and keeping my pace relaxed and strong at the same time. It felt really good. I'm hoping tonight she works just for a few minutes more on it. I can tell it's still there, but so much better.

Tomorrow morning I'm doing another 10K yards at Layton.

Coastal Water Temperature

I will be tracking and creating a weekly almanac of temperatures from the California coast. Here are a couple of links to the areas I'll be tracking and recording. Watch for a graph in a couple months once I get some data. The reason for doing this is so that I can really know what to expect (roughly) what water temps are for 2011/2012 when I really get serious.

This is a great site for getting the current water temperatures from San Francisco area -> http://www.wunderground.com/MAR/PZ/530.html
From LA/San Diego Area: http://www.wunderground.com/MAR/PZ/655.html

Where does this data come from? Well it appears to come from the National Data Buoy Center. I don't think someone goes down to the water an plops in a hot tub thermometer and reads it every day. The link for showing all the buoys in the Southwest California area is: http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/maps/Southwest.shtml

The reason I'm doing this is to get an idea of a location of where to do some serious training. There are many factors to consider, and one of them which I can monitor from my seat here is temperature.

Coach Pedro told me:

The temperatures vary from year to year. By roughly estimating the temperatures until May, because of the montains runoff, can be in the low to mid fifties. By May the temps start climbing to the mid fifties..By June, or July they may start reaching the high 50's. August September and beginning of October some years goes to 60 or low 60's.

Another major thing to consider is support. I'll need to find a group of swimmers, or another support system. Preferrably something cheap. I can't afford $200 - $300 excursions and only 3 miles at that. I just need either a buddy in CA who has OW experience and either has swum or plans to swim Catalina Island. Who lives along the coast somewhere who already has a group established that swims together and doesn't charge people to join.

Is that me being in dreamland?

600 - 12x50 6 easy warmup, 6 descend 1-3 two times. :55
2400 - 12x200 3:00 strong pace bank

I decided to take one extra minute at the halfway mark for rest. I wasn't feeling so great. I was getting these between 2:40-2:45 and banking by just a couple seconds. I first thought I'll split this into fourths, and then thirds, but was able to put off the extra minute rest to the half way point. The second half went a little better. I was able to bank 15 seconds up to the last set. But my times weren't impressive. 2:45. My shoulder blades are stiff. I really need to get a massage, but can't afford the $30 to get one right now. Hopefully Cathi is feeling charitable tonight and I can get some knots smoothed out.

900 - 12x75 pull with ankle band recovery on 1:10
50 - 50 all out sprint be well under 30 (Landed on 28 something).
150 warmdown.

total - 4100

Got in much earlier and was out of the pool by 8:10. Other than my shoulder blades hurting from the start of the 200's, it was a good workout.

I'm worried about getting cold water exposure. The pool is so warm, and I need to get to the point by July that 55 degree water isn't too big of a deal.

Excuses, Excuses

So last night I stayed up late watching Biggest Loser which Cathi recorded for me. It's my favorite show. Didn't get to bed till about 10:30pm. Slept in a little and got to the pool late. Because of that, I had to cut the workout short because I couldn't be late to work two days in a row. I was late yesterday cause I had to install a new dishwasher in our house to replace the one that died and left blood all over the wood floor in the kitchen, which is warping the wood floor!!!!!

Anyhow so today's workout was only 3000 yards. I had planned on doing 4100 yards, but had to leave early. Here's what I did:

500 warmup
2400 - 3x {400 on 6:00 Pulling, 8x50 on :50}
100 EZ

3000 Yards

Now get to bed at a good time and get up when the alarm goes off instead of hitting snooze a dozen times!!!!

Banking 100s

400 (100 swim kick pull swim)

3500 - 5x [5x100 1:30 bank] [8x25 back on :30] take extra :15 between these
300 warmdown, down breast arms w fly kick back breast arms with free kick

total 4200

Some guy next lane over was holding @1:20 bases on 400 free sets. Pretty impressive. Shared a lane with Shiny. Today's workout was kind of easy. I was banking pretty much on every set. And I shortened the rest time from :30 to :15 in between each major set.

Got an email from Neil Phillips last night. He's the first guy to swim the length of Bear Lake. He was warning me about the sun, the currents and the cold. I'm getting excited for it.

Man I'm beat!

I printed out today's workout and even made notes on the second set with the ladder with expected estimates of each time. When I went inside I noticed I didn't have the printout. I went back to the car tracing my steps and couldn't find it, so its a good thing I studied it out. I did the following from memory:

1000 - 4-4-4 1:30/100 yd base
6000 - 1000 moderate :30 rest on all moderates/strong
800 moderate
600 fast! :45 rest on all fasts!
400 fast!
200 fast!
200 moderate :30
400 moderate
600 strong
800 fast! :45
1000 fast! REALLY FAST! record your time.

On the first 1000 (14:32) last 1000 (14:57) What! I totally kicked it on that last 1000. I'm thinking I did 100 too much and here's why. At around 600 yards into it some stupid lady got in when I was on my way back. I was already sharing a lane so I was just to one side the whole time already. Well I almost ran into this stupid lady, but missed her and kept going. I wasn't about to throw away the most import portion of today's workout. When I flipped and came back I passed her on the left. I think she realized this wasn't the lane to be in and she only did one length and moved over to another lane with another senior citizen. I really pushed it and was very disappointed that I didn't keep better track of my yards. I'm thinking I got close to 13:20 or so if I didn't do an extra 100.

(+100)

100 EZ

1600 - 4x400 descend 1-3 and hold. 3 and 4 FAST! Got 5:19 on the 4th set. I wasn't overly pleased with that time, but I'm telling you my arms were beat from set one! My triceps felt like they were full of lead.

100 EZ

1000 - 400 free ez, 300 kick, 200 back, 100 one arm drills

100 EZ

total 10,000 yards

Today's workout was tougher than Mondays! And this was over a mile shorter. I think when I'm required to push myself faster than my base, it really takes a toll. So maybe that's something I need more of is sprint sets that are longer than 200 yards. I'm happy I got the yards in and while I didn't really give up, the times I got were a little slower than I desired. So I'm a little disappointed.

But this week has been a great week. I've put in 38,300 yards this week. Not too shabby.

Friday evening at SDRC

500 - 200 free, 100 back, 200 (50 swim-kick-drill-swim)
4000 - 4x1000 descend 1-4 1:00 rest between sets (14:37, 14:25, 14:02, 13:25)

I really like these sets. As you can tell I really took the sets seriously in their speed. I really took the first one nice and easy. I should have taken my heart rate after each set! Each set was dramatically more intense than the previous one.

500 - 20x25 down fast, back easy on :30 (got :15-:16 on fast, :19 on EZ)
200 warmdown

total 5200

Looking forward to tomorrow morning's 10K swim. Tonight's workout was fantastic! I was pleased with the last 1000. Tomorrow I have another fast 1000 to do and my goal is to get as close to 13:00 even or under as possible.

Swimming tired

Today's workout was tough. My arms felt like rubber. Heavy and tired. I still went hard, just didn't exceed my expectations.

1000 - 400 swim, 300 kick, 200 pull, 100 drill
1500 - 100 on 1:30, 200 on 3:00, 300 on 4:30, 400 on 6:00, 500 on 7:30
1500 - 500 on 7:05, 400 on 5:40, 300 on 4:15, 200 on 2:50, 100 on 1:25

Doing 100s on 1:25 is tough! I got 1-2 seconds rest is all on the first three, but by the time I got to the 200 and 100 I got no rest, and on the last set was at -2 seconds, so I was a little disappointed, but that's the point of swimming with less and less time, to push yourself beyond your comfort zone! I was huffing and puffing on todays workout!

100 Grandpa swimming (fat boy breaststroke)

total 4100

No shiny today.

Texas 25s

I got to watching a couple different Channel Crossings on youtube and started getting butterflies thinking about my day in the channel. It made me eager to get back in the water so I did another small workout this evening.

I prefer swimming in the morning cause lap swim goes from 5:30 to noon and I have more freedom, but in the evening it's only open 9-10 and I can only swim for an hour max. So that leaves swimming more than 4000 yards out of the picture in the evening. So tonight I didn't focus on distance, but on speed and technique.

1000 - 4x4x4's. 100's on 1:30 and 50's on :45 go strong
1000 - 2 x 500 kick with fins.
500 - 20 x Texas 25's - STRONG! on :40

2500 yards (and some change)

Still planning on swimming in the morning so I better get to bed!