It's been a few weeks since I've been to the pool - the sacrificial workout on account of Thanksgiving and other schedule snafu's. Anyhow, in the interest of not going too long without a swim, and because I had time today - I decided it'd be a perfect time to hit the water.
I wasn't really sure what to expect beforehand - when in a routine, things become predictable (is that redundant?). But I've fallen out of my routine in the past couple weeks - so when I was heading to the pool I didn't know whether to expect some degree of having slowed down or not. I feel like I'm at the point with my swim stroke that minute differences in form can have a noticable impact - and when you are on the edge like that, especially when it comes to mechanics, I've often found that time off can be a detriment. It reminds of when a professional athlete has an extended time off - here's a guy who has been pitching 94 mph fast balls for his whole life, but when he comes back from the 15 day DL, it's not uncommon for him to stink up the field on his first outing. Little differences.
I'm not saying I'm a professional athlete (although I do wish I was paid like one) - I'm just equating the phenomena of performing at the edge of your current ability level with time off.
Anyway - I figured I'd just do what I had been doing - 54 laps, and if I was a little slow, so be it. Before I started, I checked my sportcount and saw my average lap time last time out was around 50.8 seconds - so at least I had that frame of reference. During the first couple laps, I realized that I didn't even know what my main takeaway(s) were from the last session. I try to at least have something to take away and work on next time, but I had no idea what that might have been. So I just did what I could remember: keep the head down, extended arm low during the catch, avoid tilting the head up when taking a breath. For the first bunch of laps, I felt like I was flying through the water. Afterwards, when I checked my sportcount, it wasn't until lap 24 that I was more consistently over 50 seconds per lap - aside from 3-4 laps in that span, all laps were under 50 seconds. So that was good. I just with I could remember what I did. The mid to late 20's through around 40, I was around 50 seconds per lap, afterwhich it crept up to 51 per lap. In the 40's, there started to be a fair number of 53 second laps - but it was also inconsistent, because there were lows in the 49s range as well.
Total Distance: 2700 yds
Total Time: 45:09
Avg: 50.18
So the average of 50.18 is good for about half to almost 3/4 of a second faster per lap than last time. I'm not sure whether it was due to the extended rest relaying fatigue, or what - but I think that sets a new bar for me.
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