Distance Swimming

Every Monday (and Wednesday, but I play water polo Wednesdays so can't go) there is an extra swim workout for the die-hards. Or for the swimmers. I don't consider myself a die-hard but I do consider myself a swimmer.

Anyway, it's been a bunch of middle-distance stuff, ladder workouts, strole drills. I've been wanting to get in some solid distance swimming, just a get-in-and-go kind of a thing, and last night we finally had it.

The pool, because it is a holiday week, is set up long-course (I don't get the correlation, but whatever), which means instead of one length of the pool being 25 yards it's now 50 meters. Awesome! Except that I am REALLY good at flip turns, so less turns = more/slower swimming, but it's great training for this tri thing we've all signed up for.

Anyway, the coach/mentor brought red plastic cups that we all wrote our names on, and he brought hershey's kisses so at each lap we could stop and drop in a kiss as a counter. That was a great idea, but after two laps and two kisses in my cup, I realized that stopping so much was defeating the puropse of the swim and I gave up kiss-counting. I tried to keep track with my watch but ended up screwing that up too, and lost count at something like 18 100s (so 1800 meters). I swam for almost an hour solid (years ago I finished a 2.2-mile/3540 meter ocean swim in 56 minutes, but I am not as fast as I was then so...), and when I stopped the people in my lane were all laughing because the coach had run out of kisses. He'd been adding them to my cup for me and they were staying all the kisses were in my cup. Actually, they were joking that they were going to make me stop and eat one after every lap to slow me down. I didn't actually count but was over 3000 meters by then, so was pretty happy about that. It's nice to be relatively good at something, I have to admit, especially since I am so slow at the other two legs of this thing.

I ended up hopping out and doling out my kisses to the other swimmers, since I didn't want to actually eat a cup full of chocolate. I mean, I wanted to, but my jeans don't want me to.

I'm enjoying those workouts, but because there are so many ability levels we're not doing interval-based swimming. So, instead of saying, "Do 10 x 100 on 1:40" we're doing 10 x 100 (or whatever) with 10 seconds rest, or 20 seconds rest, between. It makes cruising a lot easier and I find myself not working super hard. I have my swimming stuff with me today but don't know if I'll have time to fit a quick workout in, but if I can I'm going to really focus on interval-based swimming and push myself. I'm certainly faster than I was when I began but my arms feel heavy and my technique feels sloppy. I think I need Master's swimming to fix me up.

Tonight is also a track workout - those are always a challenge for me, mostly because I hate going in circles and also because I hate it when the super fast people go blowing by me. I guess that's what I get for passing people in the pool though, huh?

I am still in my size 8 jeans and I tried on a bunch of my other pants this morning only to realize that I now only have three or four pairs that fir properly, and only two of those I deem work-worthy. The other two are too nice to wear in here, even if I do wear a lab coat! I might treat myself to one more pair that I like, we'll see.

Now, back to work! Gels are running and there is writing to be done!

Longest Workout Yet (Distance-Wise, Anyway)

This morning there was a bike/run workout. The plan was to meet and ride for an hour out, then turn around and get about an hour back, then run and out-and-back 20-minutes out (so 20 minutes back, or 40 minutes total).

I felt pretty darn good. A two hour bike ride plus 40 minute run is the longest I've gone so far, and could have kept running if I'd had to, which is good because in the real deal I'll have to.

I just mapped my distances:

26.6 mile bike ride
3.4 mile run (and I negatively split the run, meaning I went out in 20 minutes and came back in less than that, in this case by 30 seconds!)

Yeah! Those are 11-minute and 36 second miles people! AFTER a 26-mie bike ride! Holy crap, I'm getting better at this.

Now, a nap.

Progress

Tuesday night I went to an extra track workout run by one of the mentors for Team in Training. We warmed up with a 3/4 mile jog (well, I warmed up with a 3/4 mile jog, others did en entire mile) and some stretching, then some core work. Lots of crunches and "plank" (holding a push-up position), then "side plank," which seemed like it should be described in the infamous memos as torture along with waterboarding, some push-ups, you get the idea.

Then, the main set. Here was the plan: run one lap at race speed, then run one lap at "recovery" speed. Two laps at race speed, one lap recovery. Three laps race speed, one lap recovery, four laps race speed, one lap recovery. Then back down the ladder (3:1, 2:1, 1:1), or until 45 minutes was up. I voiced my concern as we were in the "plank" position: What if your recovery speed is your race speed? Well, it seemed that meant 45 minutes of straight running!

45 minutes of running is fine, but 45 minutes of going in circles is really hard for me. Yes, I understand this is ironic given my penchant for swimming, where you're stuck staring at a black line underwater for an hour or more. But there is something about the track that is just hard for me - I am constantly thinking about how much further, when I can stop, how much this hurts. Not so on the trails - on the trails I can get totally lost and then the next thing I know I'm finished and feel great.

Somewhat surprisingly, perhaps given the broken-up nature of the workout, I ran the 45 minutes without too much internal arguing about when I could next walk. I forgot my watch, so I relied on the guy running the workout, and when he said 45 minutes was up I stopped. Fortuitously I was at the part of the track where we started, so I got a pretty exact distance to figure out my pace.

Wanna know my pace?

10 minute and 35 second miles! For 4.25 miles! WOO HOO!

Yesterday I was delinquint and skipped water polo, but I was SO tired. And Rob and I accidentally killed a bottle of wine after that track workout the night before so I was moving a little slowly anyway and needed the rest.

Today I hopped in the pool to get some yards under my belt. I went 2700 yards (it was supposed to be 3000 yards but I just realized I screwed up and didn't do one of the 300s. Stupid.) broken up into 300 yard increments as follows:

300 warmup
300; 50 drill, 50 swim
300 pull (I hate pulling)
6 x 50 yards with 10 seconds rest (my pace was ~40 seconds per 50)
3 x 100 yards with 15 seconds rest (my pace was 1:20! YEAH! But there were only 3 of them so...)
2 x 150 yards with 20 seconds rest (I cheated and rested 30 seconds, but my pace was between 2:00 and 2:05, right on target!)
(THIS is where the other 300 was supposed to be, at the pace of the 150s. Oops, this was the most important one too.)
3 x 100 IM
300 kick (free, breaststroke, backstroke)
300 warmdown

I am thrilled that I held a very constant pace for that middle part, and that my pace has increased by ten seconds. I wonder if that's fitness or stroke technique? Let's call it fitness.

I am also wearing my size 8 jeans. They're tight, but they're on, and that counts. I treated myself to another size 8 pair of pants from The Gap that are my new favorite pants (but I won't wear them to work because they'll get ruined). Lovely side effect of training for a tri is that you just start dropping weight. I actually am looking forward to getting on the scale, if you can believe that.

There is no great plan for workouts tomorrow or this weekend yet, but I'm sure something will pop up. A run tomorrow probably and a bike/run Saturday morning, followed by a nap. Woo!

Practice Tri Feb 28!

Tonight was a swim workout, in the rain (sensing a theme here?), which really doesn't make much of a difference when you're already in the water. It was the usual type of workout - drills at the front end and a ladder set at the back end. I felt pretty good, and am confident about the swim part of things. I registered for a sprint-distance triathlon that's hosted by Stanford (this sprint distance = 500 meter swim, 20K bike, 5K run) on February 28th - excited and nervous about that! 500 meters of swimming is just about what I do to warm up, so it'll be enough swimming to ge tmy arms feeling good and then I'll be done. Of course, it's also in cold water (break out the wetsuit!), so I might just call it a 500-meter sprint!

Had a lovely weekend with my friend Tiffani, who flew in Saturday morning for a quick weekend. I was glad to have attacked the paper I'm working on (for work) on Friday before she got here Saturday morning, because Sunday night after she left was not my most productive after our eating and house decorating extravaganza! We have a history of decorating our living spaces, and I helped her paint her apartment before she got married, so she returned the favor by watching me spend money at Pottery Barn and Ikea. But now the house is colorful!

Tomorrow is an evening track workout (hopefully it won't rain on us!), then water polo Wednesday evening, and I haven't gotten as far as the rest of the week yet. Saturday will be a big long workout, I think it's a bike/run, which I need and have been trying to work on... Should be a good week! Glad to be back in the swing of it!

Two Hours...

Yesterday I worked from home. I find it nearly impossible to write at work; there are too many distractions. Also, I have a friend coming to town this weekend and wanted to get in a longer workout in the morning. The weather report called for a deluge of rain, so I spent two hours in the garage on my bike/trainer and on the treadmill.

We have a TV and a DVD player in the garage, so I put on Slumdog Millionaire and rode for 75 minutes, with 10 x 2 minutes of hard pedaling and a 2 minute recovery in the middle (so a 40-minute "main set"), then hopped on the treadmill and ran 11 minute-30 second miles for 40 minutes, with a 3-minute warm-down fast walk at the end. I felt really good! Of course, I needed an afternoon nap, but otherwise was pretty productive.

This weekend will be too much eating and drinking, and some shopping I'm sure, and I can't wait!

Ruuuuuunnnnnnning in the Rain!

Just got back from a 4-ish miler on the trails above SC. I didn't want to go (sensing a theme, are we?) but of course, once out there I felt fantastic! Very bouncy, the uphills didn't make me shuffle, my strides felt longer... My upper left hamstring still hurt a bit so when I got back to lab I took a block of our "packing ice" that we keep in the freezer and sat on it for 20 minutes. That was pleasant.

I love those trails! It was gray and stormy, and the heavy cloud cover along with the huge redwood trees made for a dark run - but it made my running-induced hallucinations even more fun! Allow me to explain.

When I run those trails, the trees and rocks form these funny shapes from afar - my eyes pretty much stay on the trail in front of me so I don't trip (I have almost eaten in a bunch of times on those trails and have friends who've come back bloodied from falling), so in my peripheral vision I'll see movement that turns out to be a simple perspective change, or a tree-stump that I swear looks like a huge (like dog-sized) frog, or snakes on the trail... It's actually kind of fun. I use the "frog stump" as a marker - I know when I hit it on the way up I've run the first unpleasant uphill, and on the way down I know I'm almost home.

It started to rain on me with about a mile left, which was quite pleasant, and I'm still sitting in lab (scanning data and updating this) in my workout gear. I'd better get a move on if I want to beat the traffic/rain-induced accidents on the 17!

We laughed, we cried, it was better than Cats...

Last night, water polo. I DID. NOT. WANT. TO. GO. But I did. And what a rollercoaster of an evening it was!

Our regular coach wasn't there, so a woman who sometimes plays with us was coaching for us - and I get her more than I get the other coach (although he's awesome too!). We didn't do much swimming, but I squeezed in ~500 yards before we started the workout. There were some quick warm-up sprints, then we paired up and did a "steal the ball" drill, which was great. In the water with us was a woman who used to play for Cal and is just amazing. Kind of intimidating, but I am usually able to avoid guarding her in the water. She's also like 5'11" so that makes it hard.

Anyway, we spent quite a bit of time doing passing/shooting drills, and my passing sucks! I just can't get the ball to go where I want it to go, but seemed to improve after a bit of practice last night.

Then, we scrimmaged. Scrimmages stress me out because everyone is so dependent on you to do your job properly - you screw up, the team is screwed. So I took a couple of shots early in the scrimmage and both hit the post instead of going in, so I decided to stop shooting. The coach was yelling at me - like a lot - and at one point after I got a quick pass and passed it right back, she just screamed at me. At which point I was so frustrated and sick of hearing "Meeegan!" yelled across the pool that I smacked my hands on the water and yelled, "Well then I don't know what to do!" Turns out I had done the right thing, but my execution sucked.

That I can understand and work with.

She also yelled at me for not swimming down to set up early (I am a lefty, thus play onthe right side of the pool because that's where my shot is strongest, so getting down early to take a pass will increase my chances of shooting), and for passing the ball instead of taking the shot (see part above where my shots sucked).

So I scored two goals.

:-)

Wednesday water polo is great because a group of the ladies go to The Dutch Goose for food and drink afterward and it's great fun - peanut shells on the floor, GREAT burgers, beer and wine (including Chappellet, my new favorite winery) - and talk and laugh. There's an Oscar party in the works that I'm excited about, and it's on a Sunday so it won't interfere with any of these crazy workouts I have going on!

I still smell like chlorine today - I love that.

4.25 reluctant miles and weird pains...

Tonight was a track workout. Not many people showed up, and who can blame them? It was cold and rainy, the track was wet, it was dark. Just kind of miserable overall.

However, before the workout, we had two "honorees" (people who have or have survived one of the blood cancers) speak about their experiences with TNT and LLS, and both benefited from a drug that was discovered and developed through an LLS grant, and both are now completely in remission. We are doing good work, and that was motivating.

Another however, maybe TNT could schedule these for nights when it's not raining, so we're not standing in it for 20 minutes before the run starts. Just saying.

The workout was simple: run one lap, do a set of exercises, run one lap, do a different set of exercises, go for 50 minutes or until you fall over. For example, after lap one we did 20 lunges. After lap two we did 10 push-ups (10 guy-push-ups is REALLY hard, by the way). After lap three we did the plank for 30 seconds (holding a push-up position, works your shoulders and abs). After lap four we did 20 sumo squats (imagine the start of a sumo wrestling match. That was us on the field. Yeah, we looked really cool.). After lap five we did 10 Toyota jumps (imagine the old Toyota commericals where you squat down and then jump as high as you can over and over. It hurt!). It was a really, really good workout, and they busted out an iPod and speakers so we were rocking out at the end of it. Of course, the whole point was to work on pacing and I forgot to wear my watch. Actually I had a day of forgetful - my wallet is at work, so I have no ID, no money, no credit cards, and I had to scrounge quarters to pay for gas. And I left my phone at home. Idiot.

Anyway, I squeezed in 14 laps, or 3.5 miles, in the 50-ish minutes. Added to my 3/4 mile warm-up and that's a whopping 4.25 miles of what for me was pretty hard running. I think it probably looked like shuffling, but it felt like hard running. My legs tell me it was hard running.

Speaking of my legs.

The back of my left leg hurts. Kind of hamstringy but way at the top. I've been stretching the hell out of it before these runs, and it doesn't hurt in the pool or on the bike, or on runs that come after the bike. I wonder if I have a high hamstring strain and I haven't been properly warming up? Of course, if I do have a high hamstring strain that means no working out, and that's just not going to work with my schedule. I know, I know - I'm a bad athlete ("athlete" used loosely) - but all this work! All this training! I can't stop now! I'll stop when I hit the finish line!

(Actually it's not that bad, it's just a little twinge but it's starting to piss me off. Suggested treatment for high hamstring strains involve icing the area - which would involve, no joke, sitting on a bag of frozen peas. They're supposed to be malleable and, well, cold.)

And that brings me to my most interesting injuries for the season.

I'd forgotten that in swimming the lane line is always to your right, as we swim what's called circle-pattern. Essentially it's like driving - you swim on the right side of the lane at all times. This puts your right arm next to the big, chunky, hard plastic lane line for the duration of the workout.

Apparently, while I am a strong enough swimmer, I can't seem to keep my right hand and arm off the damn lane line. I've whacked that thing with my wrist on my forward stroke so many times I have a huge bruise right where my thumb meets my wrist. Also, a bruise on the inside of my right elbow from accidentally hooking the lane line with my arm while swimming pretty hard. That was cute - it stopped me dead in my...tracks? Swim? Anyway, you get the idea. And the last bruise is on the inside of my upper right arm. That one's from hanging on the wall or lane line by hooking my arm over it. At one point, I was about to push off to lead a set, and I pulled the skin on my arm getting off the wall. It left an awesome mark and now every time I hang in between sets I can feel it getting worse.

Awesome. I don't get the real injuries, I get the supid annoying ones that I feel to embarrassed to even complain about. Maybe I'll post bruise pictures for you.

For now, I am going to bed. I am TIRED!

Tired!

As in I am very...

Yesterday it was all I could do to drag myself to the swim, but I did it and once in the water I felt... tired. After I was out my energy level was boosted, but during I was just exhausted. Tonight is a track workout and I'm still tired - I wonder if I didn't have too much fun this weekend and those three days ruined my months of training? I know that's not the case, but come on! I need an energy boost here!

I kind of remember the middle of the high school swimming season, where we were doing twice-daily workouts and I was in the water for probably four hours every day, and I can remember just being exhausted. I wonder if I'm in that mid-season slump at the moment, how long it will last, and how I can get myself out of it!

We only have six more weeks of lengthy workouts before our two-week taper, and I am getting really nervous about my training. I keep hearing about people going on these 11-mile runs and I wonder if I'm behind in that area, but this week I am crazy at work and this weekend I have plans (fun plans that I am not changing!), so I am wondering if I should work from home again and go for a really long run in the morning on Friday to assuage my fears about this.

Clearly, I am starting to get nervous. It might be because I just got an e-mail confirming my enrollment in the event. It's very real now! Ack!

Wicked

I spent a lovely weekend in SF with Rob where we ate and drank too much, saw Wicked with some friends, and didn't work out one little bit. My gym bag lying on the floor of our lovely hotel room made me feel guilty, but it was nice to take those three days and not think about fitting in a workout. I think my body needed a little break as well.

Tonight it's a swim workout, and I'm looking forward to getting in the pool. Until then, it's work work work!