Category: Swim

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1. Taxes. Man, I hate taxes. This year was going to be different. This year, I was going to do them February 1, as soon as I got them W-2 forms from all our various employers.

I filed last night.

2. Like the thing that is your spine. I think it’s mostly better. I took it easy last week, including wimping out on the run Sunday morning and just walking for an hour before breakfast. But, I spread fertilizer Sunday afternoon, and didn’t hurt at all this morning.

3. As in Baby Got. After the trauma of realizing I had no physician to go cry to last Monday when I was in pain, I had a physical with Dr. K. this morning. Overall, I’m in good shape – a little overweight (28 on the BMI; should be 25), but the BP was 107 over 73, even with a cup or three of coffee, and the “prostate was smooth”.

I chose poorly. Dr. K’s got big fingers.

4. To the Y. I haven’t swum in, what, two or three months? So I swum tonight, and followed it up with a half hour on the bike. An extremely modest brick, and I was quaking like a little bird when I finished. Not quite sure why. But it feels good. Really good. I’m psyched.

5. To training. So, I’m heading down to OKC in two weeks. I’m down to running the half. It’s going to suck. But, I’m doing it.

In other news, Nike+ has added training programs. I signed up for the “Beginner Marathon” program, starting tomorrow. Mileage will be pretty much where I was in training for the half; it builds up over 28 weeks, so I ought to be able to target any of the fall marathons. I’m interested to see how it works – if it downloads a workout to the iPod, or if it just goes. Y’all can follow my training if you want…

6. Good TV. Battlestar Galactica is phenomenal. Still. Amazes me. I was worried with the first episode this season, but the second episode rocks.

30 Rock is back. Not sure if it’s good any more, but I’ve still got a crush on Tina Fey.

Oh, and I’ve got a thing for Masterpiece Theater on PBS. Possibly just ’cause the wife likes it.

So, the disaster that was last week…

…appears to be over.

So, here’s the scenario: For about a month, I’d been planning a one-day trip to the DC area to iron out an agreement with a client and a supplier. Easy stuff – we’d been negotiating for a couple of months, and this was basically just to finalize a bunch of email and phone calls. That, and their caterer has great cookies. The plan was to leave Wednesday, spend all-day Thursday there, and fly back on the mid-evening flight. Plenty of time on either side of the meeting, plenty of time to do some of the planning I’ve been meaning to do.

Here’s what actually happened: Friday, we got the go-ahead to go pitch a project out in Colorado on Wednesday. So, there’s the flop-and-twitch to get last-minute travel arranged, AND, of course, I cannot drop my existing meeting to make flying 2/3 of the way across the country less painful, as we’ve been working towards this agreement for months.

So, we fly out on Tuesday after half a day in the office finalizing the pitch. Delayed an hour coming out of Dulles, so it’s 10 PM before we get checked in Tuesday night. Did a mile on the dreadmill that morning, but the ‘mill was a crappy one. On site at 8 AM, leave at about 4, and fight to get to DIA (DEN? Not sure which is the right one) in time to catch the red-eye back to the East Coast.

The flight’s delayed an hour, so I call the travel service to make sure my rental car company has been notified. They check the reservation, and say “Hey, that company’s closed after midnight”. Which is interesting, as my original flight was supposed to arrive at half past midnight, even without the delay… Got to the hotel in Maryland about 2AM. Not tragic, as I was meeting my client in the lobby at 9 to travel over to the supplier’s site. Decent sleep, but no running – rainy and tired.

The other opportunity that presented itself was to get a briefing on a R&D project that had direct application to some other stuff I’d been working on. I’ve been trying to meet a researcher for a couple of months – her schedule opened up the week before for the Friday of last week. So, I’d changed plans to fly back Friday afternoon. The wrinkle? My hotel of Wednesday night (the one I spent a grand total of 7 hours in) was all full up for Thursday night. So, I booked one inside the Beltway to be close to Friday’s meeting.

And got creamed by Thursday afternoon traffic.

Bleh. Checked in about 7:30 PM, logged into the VPN to clear the inbox, and jumped on the Metro. Rode down a couple of stops, got off, and walked back to the hotel, stopping to get some Mexican food and Shiner Bock just off of Capitol hill. Didn’t see anyone worth seeing making out with interns, though.

Friday’s meeting was great – good info, but another 8AM start, which meant that, after staying up to watch the Sox somehow not choke (Heh, have I dated myself?), I didn’t run.

Made it back to Mystic in time for supper AND to head down to my bi-monthly meeting with a needle before a lovely supper. Interesting bit of Jank trivia: My hematocrit was 47. I’m kind of bummed that they don’t use the Cu(2)SO4 test anymore (I dug the blue test tube and the little donuts of blood), but it’s kind of cool to get the number. No EPO for me – no wiggle room at all.

The irony? My bit on traveling and running ran on Wednesday. Not that I’m complaining – the week was phenomenal professionally. No major disasters traveling, just a string of minor inconveniences. And it wasn’t a disaster training-wise, not once I got home.

This weekend I ran.

Saturday, we slept in, took the kids to swimming lessons (Nate passed Pike, Jake’s getting to continue working on Pollywog). I went over to the church to help clean up after the White Elephant sale while Nate napped. When I got back, Missy headed out for a quick run (pun intended). She got back, and insisted that I go. A good 4 miles later, I was back. There was a hill about mile 2.5 where i felt really winded. Kind of depressing, ‘cept as I was heading back down, I felt the band-aid on my arm, and remembered I’d given blood (Yep, that kind of week).

Sunday, we left Melissa’s car at church when we headed out for lunch. After we got home, Jake hopped on his bike, I strapped on my sneakers, and we headed down to retrieve the car. Jake was a trooper – wouldn’t let me push his bike up the killer hill on the way, and we made the 3.5 miles at better than an 8 minute pace. The kid rocks.

Swam tonite – I could really, really feel the lack of blood. Can’t breathe more rapidly with your face under water… Will start Run Less, Run Faster-style speedwork on Tuesday.

So, I’m salvaging.

Deene – wish that I’d had more time in Colorado. Maybe I’ll get asked back…

Congrats to the folks from Grand Rapids and Marine Corps. Checked the results – an OCS buddy of mine almost broke 3:20, and to April-Anne.

Blog Devices that never get old

I hit the pool tonight for the first time in a while. The pool was good – I think, after three years of attempting self drowning, that I’m finally developing a little bit of muscle memory. No attempted drowning at this return. Bilateral breathing was working well, and while I was painfully slow, at least I didn’t feel like I was drowning. 25 laps or so – just over 1K. Nothing earthshattering, but nothing to shake a stick at.

Jake got his first book report back from second grade. His teacher gigged him for leaving out a comma in a sentence that doesn’t need a comma. I’m pretty spun up about it – dangling prepositions aside, I care greatly about grammar and good writing. Even the greats who took liberties with the English language knew how to write properly before they bent it. Missy’s not so worked up about it, though she agrees the teacher’s wrong. In her defense, the rest of the comments on the paper were ones that Missy and I made to jake when he was writing, so the teacher’s up overall in our book. The comma, I think, was added just ’cause second graders generally don’t think about things like that.

My kid’s the exception. He’s smarter.

(Just like yours are).

((And, for the record, almost all of my parenting decisions are made out of a pathological fear of being “that parent”))

Anyway, I finally came up with an idea for a blog meme. I haven’t googled it, so I’m sure that it already exists, but for a brief moment let me think that i had an actual original thought, instead of reprocessing things that I read half awake and forget that I read. The theme is:

Literary Devices that you use in your blog. Here’s my favorite five:

  1. Run as a song. Pick your current favorite song. Dissect your run as an embodiment of the song. My favorite use of this personally was when I used jazz as a metaphor for trail running.
  2. Invoke old girlfriends. This one is more dangerous than I give it credit for. Luckily for me (a) None of my old girlfriends read my stuff; and (b) Missy didn’t go to high school with me
  3. Stuff as a solution. We know it’s not really. But stuff gives us something to blame for our failures besides ourself
  4. Dialogue. It’s as old as people trying to fill pages – enlisting someone as a literary foil to make the protagonist (and, in a blog it’s always one’s self) look handsome, erudite, and sexy.
  5. and finally The list of 5 things. Pick a topic. Make a list.

So, what did I leave out?

World’s Shortest Marathon

(N.B. – Mark and Jeanne: I’m not avoiding you, I forgot to tell you I was going on Vacation)

Hey, dig this – After a bunch of years of pretty much working and going to see family, we’re on vacation! A whole week up in Stowe, Vermont, with nothing to do but enjoy the mountains, and run, bike, and swim.

Actually, it’s breaking down kind of like this: Missy is doing a TON of running. Well, not a ton, but, as expected, she’s hewing well to the whole marathon training plan. Run faster with less.

The boys and I have been doing a ton of swimming. But by swimming, we mean fooling around in the condo pool. Diving to touch the bottom, playing “Monster”, and soforth. I tried a couple of laps, but jammed my finger touching the wall. Who’da thunk that those lines on the bottom could be so useful?

And I’ve been biking – one time seriously, and a bunch of times with the family on the bike path. Good stuff. Friday, during Missy’s long run, we’ll bike down to the river that runs through town and spend a couple of hours crawling along the river bed looking for trout.

Oh, and I ran a race: Each July 4, there’s a race from Stowe Center up to a bar at noon. 1.7 miles. Missy talked me into running it – I was pretty much just aiming to go out and meander for an hour or so, but sitting at the starting line got the old competitive juices flowing.

The course is up VT 108 from the covered bridge in the village center to Gracie’s Restaurant. It starts off with a decent grade, and then kind of levels off. The initial climb felt good – I started mid-pack in the 100 or so runners, and pretty quickly got to about #25 or so. There was a woman a couple of years older than me who I used to set my pace, right on the edge of really sucking wind but not really being able to recover to a one breath (In and out) every 4 steps sort of pace.

Life was good until she passed me by kind of cutting a corner. Not an illegal move, by any means, but I stayed in the westbound lane, and she cut the corner across the eastbound lane and passed me and accelerated. All was not lost – before the finish, I picked off a guy in a blue shirt who’d gotten up to 200 yards in front of me.

After the race, I decided to try to tack on another couple of miles, but it just didn’t feel right. After about another 1.5 or so, I knocked it off and walked back to the condo. Sprinted up the hill, but slowed when I thought I was going to chunder.

Need to run more…

Come on everybody, let’s dance, swim like a fish

Coming off of Terramuggus, I took Friday off. Saturday, I ran home from the Y after swimming lessons – 5-ish miles, and mostly good ones. I kind of pooped out on a couple of steep sections before I got home. And my Asics are betraying me – not sure if it’s a bad pair, or not enough miles on my part, but they’re consistently giving me blisters on the ball of my foot. Not good. There’s a new pair of shoes in the mail, but we’ll cross that bridge when they arrive.

Yesterday was my first day in the office in two weeks, so, naturally, it was a zoo. I skipped the lunch run in favor of socializing (Darn friends). Called the Y before leaving the office, and the pool is still open until 2130 – SCHWEET!

Supper, kids in bed, and off to the Y. Not crowded tonight, which was nice. And, after dealing with Fort. H’s evaporatively cooled pool, the Y’s pool finally felt warm-ish. Still gave me a tad bit of shrinkage when getting in, but not what I had remembered.

And the swimming was good – opened with 5xbreast, and then started swimming freestyle. The crawl just clicked, and the laps rolled by. I lost count somewhere between 5 and 10, and just kept swimming as long as the strokes were long, smooth, and strong. About lap 15 or so, I flubbed a flip turn in the shallow end, and figured that was as good of a breakpoint as anything. Finished up with 5 laps of both side rotary breathing (which still kills me – Even though I’m right-handed, whatever obscure muscle is used to give enough “oomph” to keep my mouth clear of the water while I’m breathing on the right side is underdeveloped after years of left-side breathing) and another 5 laps of free.

But for a couple of laps there – man, swimming was amazing. No world, just black tiles, bubbles, turn, suck air, and black tiles again.

Terramuggus Tri 2007 #1

Ah, ladies and gents, life is good. I raced again,and, once more, I avoided the dreaded DNF at the first Terramuggus Tri of 2007.

In fact, I set a PR for the course! Shocked, shocked!

Let’s roll back the clock and look at my overall results (and get a chance to use the cool HTML “Table” tag, which I haven’t yet attempted!)

Race Swim Bike Run Overall
2005 #1 11:14, 61/74 40:29, 55/74 26:34, 41/62 1:18:17, 52/62
2005 #2 11:02, 90/104 39:15, 90/104 26:48, 76/104 1:17:05, 83/104
2007 #1 08:47, 78/114 38:40, 77/114 25:11, 58/114 1:14:37, 71/114

How this happened, I don’t know. I don’t exactly feel powerful, like I did during the 2005 races. Maybe it’s just that my baseline expectations for feeling “good” about running and cycling have increased over three years of relatively consistent training. Or it could be that I’ve got a better engine than I’ve ever had.

My personal theory is that I’ve become more accustomed to suffering, so I’m able to push further into the red.

Oh, and the huge improvement in the swim is probably mostly from having used a wetsuit this time around. Sure, I’ve been swimming more regularly, but two minutes is a LOT of time. I still would have PR’d, though…

I will admit that my pre-race routine was a little bit off, but for good reason. On the way to the race, I stopped off to have beer with one of the guys I’ve worked with in the Reserves. F’n awesome guy – he made First Class Petty Officer in the last exam cycle, and this week got notified he’s been accepted into a commissioning program. Couldn’t happen to a better guy. Since I’m in class up in Hartford, I had absolutely no moral choice but to buy him beer.

I got to the race later than I’d wanted, and had to head to the car three times – forgot wallet, forgot license, and then to carry my stuff to the Transition. Got set up, and got into the wetsuit just in time to get to the start.

The swim – Well, open water swimming still sucks. Within 100′ of the start, I’d gotten both run over and swam into someone’s leg, losing my goggles. So, I kept well to the outside during the swim. Saw a bunch of perch – it was kind of funny to see them looking up at me and the 100+ other people thrashing up the water.

T1 was good – I unzipped coming out of the water, and it was much easier getting out of the wetsuit than getting in. Socks, shoes, shirt … And I had to go back for my bike helmet. Could be worse, I suppose.

The ride was – well, not the greatest. I was winded from the swim, and my legs were cold. I got passed by about 5 people heading down the first hill. But steady wins the race, right? Despite re-tasting beer, chips, and salsa for the first big hill, I started reeling in people on the second lap. Felt good.

Off the bike and onto the run – no problem; and fiddling with the iPod (got to get credit for Michelle’s challenge) gave me the chance to catch my breath and get into a good stride.

Again, I got passed a couple of times in the first half-mile, but then got my rhythm and had negative splits the rest of the way in. 8:30 for the first mile, 8:00 for the second, and forgot to stop Nike+ at the end of the run, so I’m not sure what the last mile was. (looks like less than 8, as the run time includes T2).

I hung around at the end, and got a free C02 cartridge. The ride home? Wonderful, thanks to the VDub’s heated seats.

Fun, fun, fun, in the warm Arizona Sun

First, head over and wish Deene luck for her first tri.

You’re back? Great.

Overtraining appears to be working. I went and rode again last night, and was able to clear the climb (Though I did stop a couple of times to take pictures). On the downhill, I could feel that I was tired, but it was good to have actual muscle soreness associated with physical activity.

On the way back to the hotel, I stopped and jumped in the pool. 1000 meters, and amazingly, I was able to pull off three 5-lap sets. Wonder if the lungs are stretching?

But it seems to be working. I’m going to do one more day of beating the snot out of myself. Try to get in a run in addition to the bike, and enjoy the pool one last time.

Cannot wait to be home, though.

By the time I get to Arizona

So, I’m down in Sierra Vista, Arizona for a week. And life is good.

All that crap you hear about “a dry heat”? Well, it’s true. 90 degrees up here in the high desert is way different from 90 degrees at the coast. That “evaporation” thing that scientists talk about? It really does carry off a ton of heat.

I’d thought I was adjusting well to the altitude – running and biking haven’t been an issue, but I went to hit the post pool at lunch today. Running and cycling – I dunno, I suppose I’m either slowing down or just breathing faster – but moving about the same rate. Being three orders of magnitude higher than my usual average altitude doesn’t matter much.

Swimming, though – two strokes between breaths is two strokes between breaths regardless of how dense the air I suck into my lungs is. Wow, it killed me. Five laps was a stretch, and I was breathing every stroke near the end of most laps.

The pool was nice – at noon they kept the sliders to the outside open, so there was tons of air moving across the surface of the water. That evaporation was working again, and the top inch or two of the pool were frigid. The rest was great, just absolutely great, other than feeling like i had no air in my lungs.

I’ve rented a mountain bike; will write about that later. The short is that riding out here is like riding on the East Coast, ‘cept instead of series of rollers, there’s one huge climb followed by a roller coaster ride. Excellent.

Look at all the people

Wow, so the pool was PACKED Thursday night. What the heck was up with that? Don’t those folks know that’s MY night to swim?

Just kidding, but MAN, was there a difference. Usually when I get to the pool between 8 and 8:30P, after the kids are safely tucked into bed, there’s me, the lifeguard, and maybe one other person. Tonite? The entire place was packed, and all but 3 lanes were completely full.

I picked the older and similarly shaped guy one lane in from the far wall. He said “Sure, I’ll share”. So we did.

It was kind of good swimming in traffic again. Not sure how many laps I did – probably 4×5 and 1×10. But there may have been another 5 lap set in there somewhere. I was tired when I finished.

—–

In other, cooler news, my FatCyclist.com jersey is in. Man, is it cool. In hindsight, I should have ordered a large, but the medium is not uncomfortably tight. I will take it for a spin this afternoon.

Feel your spine extending through the top of your head and touching the wall of the pool…

So, I’m pretty sure I’ve made the connection before, but am too lazy to google my own site to find it.

But, while swimming tonight, I found myself channeling Ana Caban and continually trying to “radiate energy” from my fingers and toes, and to “engage my powerhouse” while kicking. Good stuff.

Lest there be any misunderstanding, I am even more of a hacker (in the sense of a really, really poor golfer who “hacks” at the ball) at Pilates than I am a slacker at running. I do maybe a half-dozen sessions a month. Usually, I’ll be really good for a week or so, and then decide to sleep instead of work out. Fancy that…

So, I haven’t experienced the “10 sessions to feel better, 20 sessions to look better, and 30 sessions to a whole new body” that seems to be in the first 5 minutes of any tape.

But, in my flirting with it, I’ve noticed that if I do a Pilates workout the day before I swim, the swim goes much better.

Tonight – amazing. After a short warmup, I just started swimming freestyle, and kept going. There was rhythm, there was fluidity – it felt GOOD

So, maybe I am learning something from the DVDs. Which makes me feel less like a dirty-old-man when I watch them…

Eh, I’m falling asleep as I type. This post lacks pop. Go check out my bit on the Georgia Satellites from earlier this week. It kind of got buried, and, I’ll admit, I think it’s really great. Also, looking at Nike+ the other day, I realized that I’m haven’t had baked goods in a … wow, where did baked goods come from? No, I realized that it’s going to be a tiny stretch to hit 500 miles in my first year of Plus-itude. But, it’s a goal. 92 miles to go by mid-July…