My 1st Love/Hate Relationship of 2013

I should say this is the 1st of many love/hate relationships I will have with my training in 2013! It just happens. I think we all go through some point where we have a love/hate relationship with our training. It will be the run, or the bike soon, but for me right now it's Master's Swim Class!

I have been trying to hit a Master's Class  a week now for about a month. For me, it is usually a good chance to get in a lot of speed work and it actually pushes me knowing that here is a coach on deck giving instructions and timing us. The coach also would give me some tips to help my swim stroke. It was always a great swim workout that I remembered in the past.

However, there is a new Master's class coach.

This new coach is not a bad Master's class coach at all, so I am not complaining about the level of coach or anything, but...

We are doing things in there that I am not sure I want to do. For example, we usually start off the class with some 100's on 2 minutes. I am usually the second to finish in the class and have plenty of time to prepare for the next set. Then we move on to kick sets, which is not my strong point, but I try.  Last class, we then went into a backstroke drill called the L drill, where I almost drowned! Again, let me say, I do not backstroke. I train swimming freestyle because that's what I swim when I  race. I understand that learning different strokes will help me be a better swimmer, but we all know a race is not won in the swim right? In the video below, the L drill is demonstrated at the 1:12 mark or so. The only difference is we did not switch hands, we went the length of the pool with the same hand pointing to the sky and then went back with the other hand pointed up! Two things I learned, 1. I hate this drill and 2. When I did get close to doing it right, I can not swim it in a straight line!

It was hard. I thought I was going to drowned, but I tried my best. It was tiring, so I took a break at one point when the coach came over and said she "noticed I only breathed on my left side". I also breath every stroke, it works for me. Well she said she is going to get me breathing bilaterally!

I DO NOT WANT TO LEARN TO BREATH BILATERALLY!

So our next drill, it was a bilateral breathing drill! DOH!! We were suppose to do a 3 count breath for a  length and a 5 count breath back for 400 yards using the pull buoy and paddles. Remember, I breath to my left every stroke, so I knew it was going to be tough, but I also know that this will be good for the lungs somehow (not exactly sure how?) so I tried. For me to go from breathing every stroke (or every time my right hand goes into the water) to a 3 or 5 stroke slowed me way down. It really made me feel awkward in  the pool and yeah,  I did manage to get some breaths on my non breathing side, but I was also took in a lot of water. I basically was holding my breath until I could get to breath on my left like normal.

I guess what I really want is to go back to the days where we swam 3000 yards fast, furious and freestyle. I heard that the others in the class complained that freestyle was boring and that they wanted to learn other strokes. Which is cool, I mean it is a free class for members.  I love the workout I can get, but I hate the other strokes, so I must decide what to do. I am only swimming twice a week because I am good with my boring unilateral breathing freestyle swimming. I guess my options are to dump the Masters class and do my own drills one day and endurance swims the other or to learn these other strokes.

Root Canals, Master's Swim, Feb Challenge, Science Fairs and Stanky Creek!

Root canal!  How many people does that phrase scare? Well, I have the mother of all root canal stories to tell because this thing was a 2 part adventure! Last Thursday I went to my dentist to get the root canal done. Now my dentist does not do a lot of root canals, but he thought he could get mine done in the office. It was to be performed on the very back bottom tooth of my left side (#18 for any teeth weirdos). Long story short, he could not get it all cleaned out so on Monday, I got to go back to another dentist  who specializes in root canals and get it finished. Then after that appointment, I got to go back to my dentist while I was still numb and get a temporary crown! My mouth was numb for hours all the way up to my ear! All in all, both dentists did a really great job because it was not painful at all, it was just tough being in a dentist chair all morning. Thankfully they both had some really good nitro oxide for me, very relaxing!

MASTER"S SWIM!

Let me say this, just because I go to a master's swim class, it does not make me a master at swimming. It has been a long time since I attended one of these classes and I was anxious to go. It started out well, then we went into our kick set. I have a horrible kick to my swim. I went form being one of the first ones done to the back of the pack when we focused on our kicking. The coach on deck came over and told me "most triathletes have a horrible kick, so if you work on it some, you will be that much more quicker in the water". My take from that remark was this:

I SWIM LIKE A TRIATHLETE! BOOM!

I think the Master's class will definitely help my swim, since I am only swimming twice a week for the Olympic race in May, I think I will hit the class a few time a month and then work on my endurance. I was able to swim a 1:35 to 1:40 100.

February Challenge:

I am still going full steam ahead with my challenge in February. I am looking forward to it actually and I have challenged my Brad D to post my before and after pictures on the blog, because he says he is doing the same. (I will give people fair warning on that post, don't worry).

Science Fair

These are the two words that scare me the most, not root canal! I was never very good at science in school and I do not remember ever building a science fair project, but middle 6th grader and I are attempting to build a simple electric generator out of cardboard, a nail, some magnets and copper wiring. Please pray it works!

Stanky Creek 8K

Sunday was the 3rd race in a series of trail runs I have been doing. An 8K race through the trails of Stanky Creek, and yes, the creek was a factor in this one. Luckily for us, it was pretty low, and by pretty low, I mean my shoes did not get wet. The race was going great for me until I took a tumble about 1.4 miles into it. I was passing a guy and just tripped over a root and went flying! It scared me a little and really threw me off my vibe. Trail runs are hard to race. You can never see what is coming up due to the person right in front of you, and this was a narrow trail which made it difficult to pass people. i also twisted my ankle on something at about mile 4 which freaked me out also. Only thing I ever worry about on a trail run is twisting an ankle, and I thought my season was over. Luckily it was just sore for a day, and is feeling better. I finished the race in 45:31, which was good enough for 14/45 AG, 98/433 OA and left me in 13th place for the series in my AG. One more race to go in that series in two weeks!