The Bodyguard.

2000m tonight !! Woohoo!! So aside from the swimming which was really good - I finished the endurance training and then swam another 400m (16 lengths) to make it up to 2000m. Wednesday's are good day for training apparently.

What was funny about tonight was Channel Swimming Lady was there again. (must ask her her name next time) We got in the pool at about the same time and there were a couple of other ladies swimming very slowly on the other side of the pool. Not a problem, we had our space.

The problem came when three more girls got in and wanted to swim at various paces in and out of mine and Channel Lady's water. Now, if I had been there on my own I would have just carried on swimming and probably got very cross with them and moaned when I got home. However, I apparently have a new bodyguard come swimming partner it would seem, as Channel Lady then instructed the Lifeguard to lane off our bit of the pool.  We were swimming front crawl and training and did not need to be slowed down, she informed him. We then spent the rest of the session swimming up and down in our own private section of the pool. No one was going to mess with her and consequently me !

However, there was a downside to all this in that if it is at all possible to send off bad vibes through the water then that's what these girls did to me. I was rope side of the lane and one of the girls kept insisting on swimming directly the other side of the rope. When she wasn't trying to prove a point and race me up the pool (she didn't win), she was practicing butterfly turns just as I got to the wall and consequently drowning me. As far as I was concerned though, I took on the thought that when it gets to Lake Windermere there's going to be a lot of people and consequently it will be choppy, so tonight was good training for that too.

I had to smile in the end when the girls admitted their defeat and got out and left us swimming in our lane. Victory was ours !

Gemini6x

Growing Gills

One of my pupils said today 'Miss, you're turning into a fish' and I think he might well be right! Swimming again tonight found be back in the pool. I have to say it wasn't quite up to standard in that I didn't swim the distance tonight but it was probably because I was trying to keep up with a lady that looked like she could swim the channel and back in her sleep. I think I might be becoming a little bit competitive. 

It was a good workout and it was good to talk to the Channel Swimming Lady (she didn't actually swim the channel but for argument's sake I'll call her that) .  She told me about lots of places to go swimming. Who knew there was an 50m open air heated pool in the middle of Hackney that's open all year round?

Driving home I thought about my conversations with the lady in the pool. I believe that you should should try and learn from the people you meet, even if it's the smallest thing. Channel Swimming Lady made me think about the race at Windermere. I have been thinking about the route that I will take on the day. I naturally thought that I would swim wide of everyone to get some clear water but actually she pointed out that this was madness, why take the long route round? Go for the most direct, head straight for the buoy at your pace, the shortest route possible. Seems obvious now but I hadn't thought about like that. So I am very grateful for my chance meeting with the Channel Swimming Lady, both for my workout tonight and for my pre-race tactics talk. (I am however slightly concerned that I have started calling it a race!).

Gemini6x

Scary Weeds.

What a lovely day for a swim in the lake. It was so warm. As predicted I did not do it all freestyle but I did complete the mile course in 35 minutes. Still having a few issues with the water. Today I got attacked by the weeds which on reflection is quite funny now but I did panic at the time :-) Lots of splashing around followed by a good telling off and I soon got over it.

I was really pleased that I managed to get the whole way round. It had become a mental Mount Everest and I was wondering if I would actually be able to climb it, but I have. Now it's all down to more training to get my fitness levels up more and perhaps swimming a bit further away from the weeds next time.

 

This is the route that I did today.

Friday and the Weekend is here :-)

Tonight I did session number two of Endurance training and after Wednesday's frankly rubbish session I was a little dubious as I entered the pool.

However, when I got poolside I was one of only two people in the pool and so it was lovely to get into a practically empty pool. I started off with determination to really get the hang of this breath holding and I actually managed to do the  0 breath length 3 times. Success! It feels like a mini victory. I can also see the benefit for when I get in the lake as I think it's going to help me control my breathing a lot more which has been a huge issue. So after that I went on to do the pyramid set and actually completed the whole lot in my hour. I got out feeling really good, if a little wobbly as my legs didn't like being back on dry land :-)

Tomorrow, I'm going to the lake again. I think I am going to do the mile tomorrow. I'm not going to push it and will no doubt end up doing breast stroke a lot of the way but I need to get over the fear of swimming that distance non stop. Wish me luck.

Gemini6x

Endurance Training 101.

Tonight was my first session in the pool doing the endurance training, courtesy of my coach. It was hard! No I mean it , really hard.  I have to start by breath holding training which involves doing lengths and for each length you decrease the number of breaths you take. So 25m - 6 breaths, 25m - 4 breaths, 25 meters - 2 breaths and then 25m - 0 breaths ( yes that's right, 0 breaths!!) From there you go backwards - 2, 4 , 6 and then repeat for 400m! I managed the 2 breaths length but not the 0 breaths. That is going to be a challenge.

From there I went on to more 'Pyramid' training. 8 lengths - 30 sec rest, 8 lengths- 20 sec rest, 8 lengths - 10 sec rest then do it in reverse !! This was sheer torture and I actually couldn't complete it. I'm told it will get easier, so here's hoping. It can't get much harder! I did keep looking at the life guard to check if they were noticing that I was quietly drowning :-)

So now it's Wednesday night and I am shattered and off to bed. Those of you that know me, know of my daughter, Amelia, who will be 3 in August. We watch Disney films a lot and her favorite is 'Finding Nemo' or as she likes to call it 'Neno'. Today's mantra is from Dori:
         


"Just keep Swimming, Just Keep Swimming!"  

Gemini6x

BBC and the Great Salford Swim

So I have just watched the Great Salford Swim on BBC 2.   Quite disappointed that we didn't get to see more of the men and women who are swimming for the charities like I will be in a few weeks time. It was great to see the elite swimmers who swam the 1 mile in 17 minutes. (so fast!)

Come on BBC get with it! They did the same for the London Marathon. Lovely aerial views of London when we , the customers, wanted to see the runners, the men and women who have trained for months and months and who were raising thousands of pounds for worthwhile charities.

So that's my moan for today. Maybe I'm moaning because underneath it really did look so cold and secretly (or not so secretly) I am beginning to get really nervous.

Oh well head down tomorrow. Back in the pool for some endurance training. Interval or Fartlek training (yes it made me giggle too ) is the plan for my session alongside a bit of spotting practice to ensure I don't get lost on the big day.

Gemini6x

Lady of the Lake

Well it's Saturday afternoon and since my last post I have been to the pool again and had a really good training session yesterday. This morning I got up and headed for the lakes.

Lovely sunny morning and there were quite a few swimmers in already when I got there. So lovely to see my colleagues from work too. So today I managed to get round the 750m course and then the 550m so not quite a mile but almost. It was better today, really clear and even saw the car that is sunk in the lake. It's a very odd feeling swimming over the top of a car.

Saw my coach who has kindly given me some more drills. (thought I was going to get away  with just continuing my current drills but no! Apparently it's all about the pain :-).

So although better today, I still have loads of work to do and the thought of the swim so close now, is really beginning to get very daunting.

Oh well, I guess it wouldn't be worth doing if it wasn't a challenge.

Onwards and upwards.

Gemini6x

Assessment day

A week and a half on from lesson

So now I am up to date with this blog. I have spent the last week and a half training furiously. I was in the pool 3 times last week and at the lakes on Saturday. This week I've been twice.

Going to the lakes on Saturday turned out to be a bit disappointing. I'm finding the green, dark water really hard to cope with. Something I never expected. I ended up swimming the 750m course in 15 minutes which is far too fast and I came away feeling quite dispondant.

However, my pool session on Monday was really good. I found my rhythm and really made a point to slow down. A combination of that and the drills that Gi gave me,  I was suddenly swimming up and down the pool endlessly. I was able to breathe and I swam nearly 2000m without even thinking about it. For those of you that don't realise it, that is well over the mile.

I went again tonight which was slightly more chaotic due to half the pool being laned off. It made doing my drills hard as I was crammed in a lane with some quite fast swimmers and I felt I needed to keep up. At least it was a good fitness workout.

Really beginning to notice a change in my appearance now and feeling good for it too. These have been added bonus' for me but I will be keeping up the training after the event because I think I am addicted now. It's so good to be able to swim freestyle up and down a pool for an extended length of time. In all the years I have been swimming this is something that I have never been able to do.

So now really my biggest problem is the dark water thing. If anyone out there reading this has any tips I would really appreciate your input.

More swimming tomorrow and then Lakes on Saturday.

Gemini6x

Swimming lesson

So the swimming lesson day arrived and I turned up at Leybourne lakes feeling quite nervous. Here I was, complete amateur about to swim with a woman that likes to do Triathlons for fun! However, she reassured me and in I got. I might just add at this point that the wind had picked up and she said that the lake was like swimming in the ocean. I was pleased that we were not swimming any distance and just staying close to the jetty.

So Gi, the swimming coach, spent time watching me then got in the water with me and talked me through small changes that I could make to become more efficient and less like a barge boat hauling myself through the water! She actually called me " a little pocket rocket " as I was swimming much to fast. (So perhaps I wasn't as unfit as I had originally thought)


Anyway the hour went on and then we got out and although cold I felt really good about the session. Gi wrote me a program for training in the pool and I was set to go and retrain my body to swim more like a dolphin.

Best £35 I have ever spent. Now the serious training had started.



Gemini6x

5 Weeks to Go

OK, so apparently I am terrible at blogging but as an example to my English groups at school and because they now want to include the blog in the school website here is the latest update on my training.

Where to begin? Since starting to train last year I have been going fairly regularly despite finding it difficult to find the time to go. I also had to find another pool as the one I was training in began to really annoy me with access. At one point I was doing widths across the diving pool which was just ridiculous.

So I have found a 25 meter pool at North West Kent College in Gravesend which is not open to children during their public sessions and people go there to just do laps. Brilliant!I was using the training program published by the Great Swim website and was finding the front crawl part hard to sustain. Felt very unfit despite my training efforts.I began to get worried that actually this wasn't as easy as I had first imagined.

However, just before the Easter holidays I ordered my wetsuit and things have started to become more real. I then thought it was about time to get some experience swimming in the open water and so I booked in for an assessment at Leybourne Lakes on Easter Friday. Thank goodness for the recent warm spell!

Actually to be honest the assessment went well. Lots of good advice and safety checks and then swimming around the lake. What came as a surprise was not the temperature of the water, you get used to that quite quickly, but how dark it is. When your head goes down you really can't see a thing. Panic.

During this session I met a lady who was a coach I was able to book up a swimming lesson. I figured I needed as much help as I could get. Every time I got in the lakes I found I was really struggling to breathe and all of a sudden that mile seemed a long long way!

Gemini6x