A discovery

I spent Thanksgiving at my parents' place last week and found that my dad had unearthed something amazing: evidence that, at one point, I did indeed like swimming. Prepare to be astounded.

Just look at that. Ain't I cute? Man, I wish I still had those goggles. And look how happy I am! I'm a little skeptical that this is actually me... I have no memory of ever wearing a swim cap, nor of ever being that overjoyed about being in the water. I do vaguely recall that swimsuit, though; I think it had ruffles on the hips. Memory in general is not my strong suite, so I'm willing to give the photo the benefit of the doubt.

With this image as my inspiration, I went for a swim last night, hoping to find some childlike glee in the experience. I did a few drills and swam 6 or 7 laps before dragging my exhausted self to the hot tub. Did I mention that I'm now swimming a full lap? I still rest... for a long time... between laps, but after a few warm-up lengths, I swim whole laps. In case you're wondering, that's really, really far. Really.

So did the photo help the swim, you ask? Well... maybe. I did imagine myself swimming in a lake with all sorts of fish swimming below me wondering what kind of strange fish I was. Perhaps that visualization helped--I am a fish, therefore I swim like a fish? Who knows. At this point, it's still exhausting and kind of hard on my back, I'm noticing more and more. I had an adjustment this afternoon that helped a lot, but I was hurting this morning. Swimming uses so many core muscles that other activities just don't access at all! The back and shoulders especially are problem areas, at least for me. I don't swim far enough or fast enough for my legs or arms to tire out much, but holding my body horizontal in the water is hard work for my low back; and the side-to-side breathing thing is sometimes a challenge for my neck. I wonder if there are targeted back exercises that are swimming-specific. Anyone know?

Endurance Anxiety

I haven't posted on this blog in a while, quite honestly because I haven't been swimming much. I had zero motivation for quite a while, maybe swam once a week, and then started playing racquetball instead of going swimming. A couple times I went for a run instead of swimming. But now I have returned: I swam twice this past week, and completed my first full lap without stopping! I was about ready to keel over by the time I got to the end of that first lap, but thirty seconds to a minute later, I set off on another lap! I did three full laps, resting between each, before deciding I better quit while I was ahead.

It's definitely the endurance part that's tripping me up right now. I still have to rest often often often. The first time I tried swimming a full lap (two lengths--down to the end of the pool and back), it was bad news. I won't go into detail. A one-mile swim for a sprint triathlon is sixteen laps. In a lake, meaning.... NO STOPPING. Of course, if something happens and I am actually about to die, there are people on boats or whatever around and I would be able to take a rest. But knowing that intellectually doesn't prevent the thought from crossing my mind as I swim: I am going to die. My arms and legs will just stop moving, and I will slowly sink to the nasty gooey bottom of the lake.

I ran the Twin Cities 10-Mile race back in October. That was a completely different feel: If I really, truly, honestly cannot go on at some point in the race, well then, I stop running and I walk. But this: If I really, truly, honestly cannot swim any farther at some point in the race (or in the training, for that matter, once I start swimming in lakes, where there will be no nice people in boats making sure I'm okay), I have no way out.

A friend of mine gave me some great advice this weekend. She was a Division 1 swimmer in college. (I don't actually know what that means, but I know that she's really hardcore.) She recommended a couple of drills that have nothing to do with form but rather focus on just getting comfortable in the water and learning how your body naturally sits in the water. One of the exercises sounds really simple: Lay on your back in the water, arms together straight above your head in a streamlined "V," elbows by the ears, and just flutterkick down the length of the pool. The other drill involved the word "sculling," which I had to look up, and I'm still not entirely sure what it means without a boat; but my friend made a sort of broad gesture with both hands that I will mimic to guide me in this drill. Like I said, this is not about form, just about getting a feel for the water. Feeling anything other than sheer terror sounds good to me! I'm going to give those drills a try and report back here soon!

A Sore Swimmer

It's true... I am a sore swimmer. Maybe I have terrible form, or maybe I'm just a pansy... whatever the reason, swimming is just hard on my body! My muscles don't get very tired, at least not the ones I would expect--my arms, for instance. (I'm not able to swim well enough to actually get a good workout from it yet!) But I feel like I'm putting a lot of strain on my neck, and I have to have my boss Dr. Eric adjust it pretty regularly, otherwise my entire back just hurts. I've never had any major back problems (knock on wood!) so a consistent feeling of discomfort is a new experience for me. It's a good thing in one respect, I suppose--helps me to be able to empathize with our patients more! But back pain is not anyone's idea of a good time, and already I find myself questioning if training for this triathlon is actually worth it. Have I mentioned that I don't like swimming? And now it's making my back hurt. And yet I keep doing it. Does this make sense to anyone?

All right, so that might have been a bit melodramatic. I do think I will enjoy swimming more as I get better at it. And I'm pretty lucky that my shoulders are doing just fine thus far--I read an article from To Your Health magazine that says shoulder injuries are by far the most common among competitive swimmers. (I am far from being either competitive or truly a swimmer, so I guess that lets me off the hook there!)

The article was very helpful. It's short but has some good practical advice that I think will help me with my neck issues. I need to keep my head down, breathe to the side rather than up, look down at the pool floor rather than ahead of me. The first two items are fine; I'm still working on the breathing thing in general, but for the most part I'm getting the side breath in. But that last one! I'm constantly having to remind myself to look down at the pool floor rather than out in front of me... or at the person swimming in the lane next to me, or out the window when I turn my head up to breathe... I am so easily distracted in the pool! I wish I could listen to music or something. I saw a guy swimming once with a waterproof iPod holder strapped around himself, so he could listen to some tunes while he swam. I kind of wish I were hard core like that, but... I'm totally not. I bet those holders are expensive.

Aside from trying to remember where I'm looking as I swim, I also want to be intentional about building up my core muscles--especially my back--and my shoulders. I don't need (or want, for that matter) a bodybuilder physique or anything, but I think strengthening those muscles will improve my form so I'm not straining my neck. I'm going to the gym tonight--I might try a variation of the upper-body workout here to build my swimming muscles!

(On a completely different note: we Fell Back an hour yesterday, with the result that it got really, really dark all of a sudden at 5:00, and I'm a little sad about that. Is anyone else absolutely astounded by this phenomenon every single time, despite the fact that it happens every single year?)

Goggles and how they have changed my life

Despite being a very nonthreatening shade of baby blue, my recently-purchased goggles nonetheless give me a certain sense of invincibility when I hit the pool. I think the real difference comes from wearing  my contacts rather than simply taking off my glasses to swim, which I most often do because it is easy and, when I am not masquerading as a crazy driven triathlon-training maniac, I am really rather lazy.

I wonder if my poor eyesight wasn't a major contributing factor to the childhood trauma of swimming lessons. I didn't get contacts until well after I had dropped out of swimming lessons, so I must have gone through most of my lessons sans glasses--i.e., not able to see much of anything. No wonder I was afraid! Now, however, I am able to clearly see the pool floor three-and-a-half-to-four feet beneath me as I slowly splash my way down my lane. It is glorious.

 Well, at least being able to see is fantastic. The swimming part? I'm still not entirely convinced.

Here's the report: I have gone swimming now four times. Last Tuesday, I swam just a few lengths; then maybe half an hour last Thursday. On Saturday I swam for a solid hour. That was the first day I really felt like I was getting somewhere. I went pretty slowly and took breaks after each length. However, I tried not to rest for more than ten or twenty seconds, and I did attempt one entire lap--down and back without stopping. I made it about two-thirds of the way through the second length before I honestly thought I might drown if I didn't stop. Maybe I was just being a pansy; but also, my feet hit the pool floor without me really intending them to, so I think I was quite literally dragging at that point.

I have a vague memory of this from swimming lessons of yesteryear: My tendency is to swim almost vertically in the water, especially deep water. Logically, the most efficient way to swim is horizontally, but somehow that idea never quite made its way from my brain to my legs. On Saturday I was mostly horizontal but I know that my feet were still significantly below the water's surface.

Yesterday I got some great advice from my friend Laura, who was my inspiration for this whole triathlon thing in the first place. She said if I'm moving forward and I can feel my feet at the water's surface, then my body is parallel, on the top of the water where it should be. I tried to focus on that last night when I went swimming, and immediately I was going so much faster! It was kind of fun--for maybe three or four lengths, by which point I was absolutely pooped. I slowed down considerably for the remainder of the swim.

I think I was focusing so much on my legs that I forgot about the other aspects of swimming. At one point I noticed that my arms hadn't moved in what seemed to be a very long time. There is so much to think about at once! Kick, reach, breathe, don't look up, turn to both sides to breathe, reach, try to go forward in a straight line, breathe, kick, keep your feet up, reach, breathe... That will take time to get used to. Also, an AquaFit class took over the pool and an older gentleman with a mustache channelling Charlie Chaplain (coughHitlercough) wanted to share my lane, the one lane they leave for lap swimming during the class. Apparently pool etiquette in Mustache Man's world means starting a leisurely swim down the very center of a shared lane. Sharing a lane is just one more thing to think about, and I actually ran into the side of the pool, like with my head. Well, so much for magic goggles.