Hood to Coast

Yes, I finally did the Hood to Coast.

Would I ever do it again? Ummmmm.... maybe. Not really my cup of tea.

I did better than I thought I would do. I had leg 6 whose 2nd leg goes uphill for 4 miles. I didn't think I would do well with that but I did. I kept the same pace throughout just a bit slower than my first leg which was downhill quite a bit.

I kept a 10:15 pace for most of my legs. Hilary and I talked about it and he said I am probably a tempo runner in that I will try to keep the same pace regardless of the terrain. So on the downhill I don't push the pace but relax and on the uphill I push it harder to keep it up.

Test Swim Set

Today I picked out the test set workout. I didn't realize it was that workout until I pulled it out.

During the warm up I just did the TI drills working my way up to whole stroke freestyle. Warm up was 100 kick, 100 swim, 100 kick, 200 swim, 100 kick, 300 swim, 100 kick, 400 swim.

Then we did a set of 6 X 100's 75 Build Free, 25 K... Odds Free, evens back.

Test set was
4 X 100 @ 1:55
2 X 100 @ 1:45
4 X 100 @ 1:50
2 X 100 @ 1:40

I made all of them pretty much on 1:40 except the last one. It was a 1:43.

I focused on letting gravity help me. To relax into my stroke and let gravity push me forward instead of strength. I found I was not that tired when i was done although my stroke was falling apart a bit at the end. When you relax it doesn't fall apart. It's when you put all that effort into it that it falls apart.

I also focused a little bit today with exhaling through the full cycle. I think I'll concentrate on this more when I feel a bit more comfortable with all the nuances. I did feel like it relaxed me more so it's worth the effort but my brain can only concentrate on so many things.

I did notice today when my hand didn't hit the right spot which is good. I really felt it when I crossed over so that is huge progress too.

Yeah! Swimming!

It's great to see some old friendly faces back at the old pool! Sybil has returned to be somewhat regular. Wilderness Chris, is back in the pool too! Now if we can get Rob back into the pool and Ann back in September that would be awesome!

Anyway, today was a masters day. I truthfully was not looking forward to it as I felt like crap in the water yesterday. So I went reluctantly hoping that it would feel better than yesterday and it DID! YEAH!!!

I did not do many drills however I have spend about 4.5 hours doing drills over the past 3 days. It's hard to do drills when you are expected to do a written workout. So I incorporate them in the warm up and then try to have a focus for every set.

Todays sets were:
Warm up 800 yards
3 X (100, 50, 50) 100 DPS, 50 Side Kick, 50 Catch up
8 X 50 1:00
4 X 100 1:55
2 X 200 3:40
8 X 50 1:00

The main set was easy. Usually it would be really tiring for me and I would be struggling at the end but I ended the 8 X 50's on the same :50. Things felt good and effortless. I didn't feel any strain in my neck at all. I noticed I let my head relax and my focus was lower than usual and so my breathing was not as big of a turn of my head. I also focused on keeping my hand relaxed both on recovery and catch. That makes a huge difference. No energy just disipating for no reason. I see things now with completely different eyes now. It's good.

Swim

I swam this morning. At first I felt like I had lost "that feeling". However, as I kept swimming it came back. I wish I could describe it in words. Its feeling long but not stretched because when I stretch forward I over rotate. Long and relaxed, maybe.

15 - 16 strokes seems to be my ideal/length right now. If I could keep that stroke count and increase my velocity I think that would be ideal. It seems to be the stroke count where I have the most flexibility of speed.

The other thing I discovered is coming into the walls let the hand float out there longer and then let both arms take you around. Creates a much faster flip.

Today:

90 min Bike
60 min Swim
60 min run

That's the intent anyway.

Workouts this weekend

Run. 2:15
Swim 1:45

Sunday. Swim. 1:15
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Swimming with arelaxed hand

Relaxing my hand is the key for me right now to increse my stroke length. The other thing for me to remember is to allow my should to relax too. Not bunch my shoulders up around my ears.

I have also beedn concentrating on keeping a calm focus. Letting my mind relax and focus on one thing at a time.

Its helping a lot. It is very different for me but I am starting to feel like those people in the video who have smooth beautiful and efficient strokes.


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Total Immersion Ideas and Notes

Perpetual motion Freestyle presentation:

• Practice with Intent: Thinking about not just getting from one end of the pool to the other but everything you do in between
• Improvement Oriented Swimmer: Swim better than ever have in life
• Swimming is a concious act not a natural feeling
• Yard are to imprint correct movement
• Intervals are to be used to accomplish a task. Go when ready to complete the task in the manner of the intent.
• Gap between propulsive force and resistive force need to get bigger
• Resistive force is easier to change and improve

Training so far this week

I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to do this weekend. I'm thinking a 2 hour run tomorrow morning and then a long ride on Sunday. I may ride out to Michelle's party tomorrow too.

Monday: Ride 90, Run 90
Tuesday: Ride 90 , Swim 90
Wednesday: Ride 90, Run 60
Thursday: Ride 90, Swim 90
Friday: Ride 90

So far this week that is 13 hours.

Do Over

Today Barb had to go into the ER again. I noticed however that I was compelled to compulsively eat. I did try to find other things to distract me but noticed that my hand kept going to my mouth.
I did try to control it a bit by just recognizing and acknowledging what I think was triggering it for me. That helped but did not stop it entirely.

Relaxed swimming

Today my concentration was on:

1. Relaxing my hand
2. Splashless entry
3. Figuring out the right amount of roll

The #1 thing for me right now is relaxing my hand when it enters. I notice immediately that my hand and forearm almost double the amount of surface area when I relax my hand. My palm is automatically in teh right position to catch the water. Also my arm is deeper and ready to catch more water at the front of the stroke.

I find that I resist letting my hand go as deep as it will when it is relaxed. The habits in my body are to keep it close to the surface. I find if I just relax my stroke and let my hand "sink" naturally that works.

The splashless entry is really not a huge deal I think at this point except that it really does make you think about how you are placing your hand. I find that I sometimes do not relax however when I concentrate on the splashless entry.

Now the right amount of roll is key. Not too much. Not too little. That requires those midline stablilizers and training them. Again I need to just relax. I can feel when I go beyond my sweet spot. I just haven't drilled the sweet spot in yet. It's coming.

Did long swimming today just focusing on relaxing. My intent was to swim the last 25% of each distance more relaxed than the first 75% yet maintain the same speed.