Swim Meet!

thanks to Sarah for this:) how true is this, other than the naked ness.

In the spirit of my lovely coach I am finally writing a race report on the swim meet. There are a few things I love about swim meets and a few things I hate.
Loves:
I am not a trained swimmer, so anything I do is just fine. There is no "wow I used to swim.....when I was 7 yo or 17 yo." It's all good.
They move along pretty fast and people are really nice. For the most part.
The water is usually alot colder and less chlorinated than at my pool and getting wall pad splits and seeing your name in lights is neat!

Hates/Dislikes:
Being cold. It can get COLD btwn events. Answer: change of suits!
Even tho "it moves along pretty fast" the 1650 or 1000 is always LAST. And each meet i have closed that place down. ( yes and i like to talk usually so that is partly to blame)
I realize I cant sprint. My 50 split is pretty close to my 100 to my 200 to my 500, you get the point. The longer the better!
I realize that even tho i think i have lats i dont, well compared to some swimmers!

So lets cut to the week before the meet and my swimming build up. I just do what Coach Jen tells me and I would say I turned a corner in Florida this January getting in some solid longer-ish swims without any shoulder or neck issues. I have had a few issues in the past from hypermobility in my Gleno-humeral joint on the left. Couple that sloppiness with a bit of weakness compared to the Right and sometimes things go south and all the sudden my neck is working too hard of my shoulder just needs a break ( and visit to the DC who resets my humeral head back where it belongs)

I had been doing really well! Then that skiing thing got in the way, oh i mean the ice and the downhill cornering we were working on and i fell on my left shoulder. It didnt bother me at all till 24 hrs later.
I moved a few wkroouts around and tentatively swam on the WED before the meet, and it felt ok. Then friday i did a good wko and my shoulder felt ok. Lets go! ( my thought on alot of those "niggles" is they just take time. why push it. an extra training day means nada if you cant compete come race day.)

My first event was the 200. I had no idea bc i hate 200's and I never had done it! But it was the first event and otehrwise my next event was the 500, event 13. That is a long time sitting on cold bleachers after your warm up. So the 200 came and went. ouch. I thought it was like an 800 in track, you wish it was a 400, and you wish it was a mile, anything but what it is!!! No rhythm really just counting walls.

Drank some Ultragen, drank some EFS, ate 1/2 banana, ate some licorice, then realized i had to do the 500 soon! I was talking with a younger swimmer from Florida, 24 yo, she was a breasttroker, eventually she went 1:02 in the 100 free but that was SO LONG for her. She was way out of shape. Cough cough.

I had told myself i really just wanted to break 7. Last year I didnt feel too good and went 7.08. I was sorta mad bc the year before i did 6:58. So i even took a bit of a Powerbar Kona gel. A bit of cafffeine. I dont usually do caffeine as an aid but i thought i would just try it. IT worked, but i also felt like i might throw up the entire 500.

I seeded myself 6:57 bc I figure you have to believe it, if you want to do it. I was side by side with two people for the first 200 and then they were gone. Well I was gone. I had the most even 50's and my fastest 50 around 300, which is unheard of! I felt so light and fast the EASY the first 100 I knew it was going to be good, I knew i could break 7! And when i came into the wall I saw 6:48! WOW! The results i saw had me at 6:47, so not sure how i lost another second but i will take it!

After that the 100, which was about 4 minutes later hurt like crazy but I even went 2 sec faster in that than last year even if Speedo Steve beat me! My quads HURT. They had that dead leg feeling. Which did come to haunt me sunday when i had to do a long run with speed. That was ugly. I didnt FEEL tired but i felt FLAT.

Oh and then i hung around for the cool down 1650. Seeded 24:45 and swam 24:02, which came back in results as 23:57. Like i said not sure why the official results favored a lower time but i wont ask! I do know i would love to do the 1650 when i was a bit more mentally prepared, and maybe thinking more about what i was doing and less about "I wonder when i am going to blow up?" That is one mentally hard event, and if you are a bit sloppy on turns ( me) I likely lost alot of time on the walls. I broke it into 500's and it wasnt till about 300 into the 2nd 500 that i started to lose my mojo.

As much fun as i had i did think, "I wonder if i could drop another 20" on the 500?" I dont know if my tiny lats and puney shoulders could take it. They LOVE LOVE LOVE endurance open water IM training. not sure they are too fond of sprinting which is what i would need to get alot faster. OR so i think, Actually i dont know that for a fact!

Special thanks to Steve H for staying around and Miscounting for me and making me go faster bc he put #59 down twice and didnt put the card down at all before that bc he got distracted:) haha, but i did go faster! And special thanks to my boyfriend Tom who swims way faster than me so I try to swim faster too so that he doesnt have to wait for me afterwards. And of course Thanks to Jen who tortures me and USUALLY has just the right amount of tedium in the swims before the hard stuff comes and I can stop thinking "this is tedious." haha. 12 x 75 "kick drill swim" anyone?

Other than that things are ok. Training is ok., the bike is always a chore this time of year. Running outside is impossible but i continue to try, even if the ice makes my legs all crazy, i need to get out. Skiing has sorta stopped but i would love to get out again as long as i dont fall:) I dont feel super fast, but then again its March and i would rather be fast in July and August than now.
Thanks for reading!

And still spending some time with this guy. Charlie. He needs to meet Ruby:) 

 Charlie realizes how good Almond butter is for you so he has to get it all out of the jar.