Off the Deck

On today’s agenda was something I haven’t done in months: lift weights.

Normally, I cycle through endurance, power and strength-specific routines year-round, with seven days off every 6-8 weeks. 2010, however, has had a mind of its own. First, as you know, I was sick from Christmas through mid-April. Then, right when I easing my way back into swimming and running, I started paddling to support the Catalina 2010 swimmers.

I know it doesn’t sound like much, but that cardio-trio added up to not having time, let alone energy, to lift three times a week too.

Luckily, my attitude also has been shifting this year, so I was able to spin myself a successful “enjoy outdoor summer activities to get back into cardio shape; there will be plenty of time for weights indoors this fall/winter/spring” scenario. Thus, and honestly, while I missed weights (What can I say? I truly find weight lifting fun), I didn’t panic about “missing” this type of training.

I was super ready to get back to it by today though! As always, I turned to Neil, my “worth his weight in gold” PT guy. After an assessment (my condition isn’t as bad as I feared, but my thorasic spine/lat area is super tight. No wonder I can’t snap into streamline position whenever I like!), we went through a new get-back-to-it routine. Not only is it a lot of fun (all cross-multi-muscle-group actions), but it has a focus: build up some base strength while I also loosen up that tight back.

Here’s the pathetic part: after powering through routines with 30s and up as the norm, I was maxed out with only 8s! And, I am still quivery-tired one hour later. “I will practice patience with myself, I will practice patience with myself…”

For the next three weeks, I’ll do the new routine 2-3 times a week. If there is improvement, some of the exercises (the ones that stretch/strengthen my lats/thorasic region) will become my base ones for the year ahead. And, the focus can revert to something like “endurance” again. Keep your fingers crossed!

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

Downhill skiing is an example of a distinct and definitive seasonal sport. No more snow? No more training or racing. Although…I guess if you are super dedicated/competitive, you could do a winterized version of Endless Summer and travel around the world, chasing snow.

Swimming however, with its indoor/outdoor pools, LCM, SCY, SCM seasons, and open water options (fresh vs salt water, ocean, lakes, streams, quarries, reservoirs, etc.), allows competitors to cycle through several different seasons per year.

It’s a blessing and a curse, isn’t it?

On the “count your blessings” side, you can swim or compete most any time of the year, if you choose. The flip side? You can be cursed by burnout, which, if you’ve been reading along, you know I experienced in 2009.

Since then, “recovery” has increasingly become my watch-word. Neil, my “worth his weight in gold” physical therapist, kicked off this trend for me in 2009 via two ways: 1) per his suggestion, I took several months off, and 2) “active recovery” weeks have become a regular feature of the training cycles he sets for me.

Thanks to Coach Mark, my views on recovery expanded into the water this year. I now understand (and value!) the concept, and am working under his guidence to find and maximize the recovery moment in all four stokes. My favorite Coach Mark-ism from this summer? No need to hurry through drills. Slow down. Work through them completely. When breathing, take an extra breath or two and enjoy glimpses of sky, trees and birds.

Now that it’s Post-Catalina and pre-fall season, the past week has been a perfect active recovery opportunity. Based on the fact that I spent my free time during the first three days either watching TV while snarfing cereral, reading or sleeping, I think the “recovery” notion has seeped into me.

By day four I was twitchy, so I’ve been enjoying a non-timed, easy run, bike or walk per day. Yet, for the first time ever, I haven’t felt panic-y about not “training” or missing out on pool time. On the contrary, I’ve been feeling good about knowing that I’ll return to training phsyically rested and excited about the seasons ahead!

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

On Thusday night at practice Coach Mark reminded us that the LCM pool closes in early August. He asked us what we wanted to do about practice until the fall season officially starts.

Of course, my initial reaction to the announcement was: panic! I dread transitioning from outdoors LCM to indoors SCY. For me, any time, whether it be August, September or beyond, seems way too early for the annual pool/season switch.

My second thought however, was, “maybe it would be a good time for an active recovery phase.” This is the “maybe I’m finally learning something” part.

During the rest of the year I normally cycle six weeks or so on, one week of active recovery. But the summer season is so short (note the “panic!” reaction above). I hate to miss any outdoor swim opportunity.

I’ve also added lots o’ paddling to the mix this summer, as I prepare to be a minion for the Math Savant’s Catalina Channel swim this August. And running is on the regular schedule because I signed up for my first ever multi-sport event, a local “Tri My Way” event at the end of July. (“My way” is swim/run/swim).

Let’s recap:
–No active recovery in two+ months
–It’s peak allergy season (don’t even get me started on the yearly “I feel rusted-stiff-exhausted” allergy season backlash struggle)
–I’ve been tired enough from the swim/paddle/run mix that I haven’t picked up a weight since I don’t know when

Hmmmm…sounds like active recovery is in order in August for me.

So, Coach Mark, here’s my answer: I’d like to take the middle two weeks of August for active recovery. But then would it be possible to round up the troops somewhere for “seasonal transition mini-camp” workouts until the fall season officially starts? I would love sessions devoted to dry-land conditioning, drills, strategy, fall/winter goal-setting, etc. What do you think?

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

One of my all-time favorite childhood book series is the Ant & Bee collection by Angela Banner. I’ve known them by heart for decades now, but some days I have to re-read one for the millionth time because something happening in my life makes me think of a particular story.

Over the past winter, I was thinking a lot about Ant & Bee and The Doctor. (Bee catches a cold. A model patient, Bee bounces back quickly. Then Ant catches a more serious illness, a virus, and must be quarantined for a month. He is not such a good patient. I am sure you can see where this is headed — I am most certainly more Ant-like.)

Lately though, I’ve been thinking a lot about my favorite book from the series, Ant & Bee and the Secret a lot. In this book, Bee initially proves to be better than Ant at several activities — hopscotch, jump rope and story-telling. Each time, Bee makes fun of Ant’s efforts and calls Ant “stupid.”

Of course, Ant becomes “cross” and runs away. Except that when he eventually comes back, suddenly Ant is better than Bee at whatever game they were playing earlier. Ultimately Ant’s mystery is solved with the help of Kind Dog (Bee deliberately makes Ant feel stupid so he can have Kind Dog “track” Ant as soon as he runs off.) Ant’s “secrect” turns out to be school.

I think this book is on my mind so much lately because I feel like Ant in a way. I was cross with my old training situation so I ran off to swim with kids under a new coach. Thanks to my new enviornment and Coach Mark, I’m learning something new at every practice. In another month or two (epecially when I have more strength to apply to my strokes — right now I am kind of wiped out a lot from juggling swimming, weights paddling and running) I think I’m going to startle swimmers I haven’t trained with for awhile.

Yep, lots of technique changes take time to assimilate into “automatic and with speed,” but I’m starting to get “aha!” flashes here and there at practice now…yay!

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

Hell yeah, I know streamlining is one of the keys to easy, fast swimming.

But getting my body to streamline 100% in the water (and geez, after last night’s practice we can add “off the blocks” to my “places to streamline” list) well, that might prove to be another story.

The thing that most vexes (scares?) me is that I’m probably starting from square one — I suspect that I wasn’t super-streamlining even as an young, bend-y, quick-to-recover age grouper. So it’s not a matter of “snapping back” or tapping deep into “muscle memory.” Nope, must figure out how to streamline now. As a fossil.

Last night I spied Erica, a young whipper-snapper and summer assistant coach, doing an on-deck demo of streamline position for a kid a few lanes over. Her FOREARMS were criss-crossing. I’m lucky if I can get my hands to touch. And even that takes a lot of warming up.

Which makes me kind of panick-y. What’s it going to take for me to be able to streamline? Will I be able to? Or am I genetically flexibility-challenged and thus doomed for the rest of my swimming days?

If I just keep at it during practice, will everything eventually click? Do I have to find a way to squeeze in yoga, one more activity, to the already tight daily schedule? Do I have to strike it rich and hire two “mashers” to stretch me daily like Dara Tores?

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

p.s. Two shout-outs today:

1) A shout out to Kenny Allen for embracing the “summer suit” spirit with his groovy new “peace” TYR training suit.

2) To the owner of a silver SUV — love your “Swim Taxi” bumper sticker!

If you’re a regular reader, you know by now that I’ve been working on improving my technique a lot lately. Current focus is freestyle, breaststroke, turns & starts, and streamlining, streamlining, streamlining all the time.

So if I am sore in new places, that’s a good sign, right? As in “I am using my body differently in the water.”

My soreness is also movement-specific per muscle group, another sign I think I am successfully making adjustments in the water. For example, the freestyle tweaks refer back to my new lower lat and tricep soreness. Major changes to my breaststroke has brought on inner thigh, glute and outside hip fatigue. And that emphasis on streamlining 100%? I can feel it in my core, all the time.

Perhaps the flip side of this equation is equally important to note too: I no longer have shoulder pain after practice. On second thought, maybe it’s more important. Pain-free swimming hopefully means my body agrees with the “gentler” (i.e. emphasis on recovery phase per stroke) approach I am learning from Coach Mark. Less wear and tear on my body? More years in the pool as I age — yay!

Being sore while training isn’t fun, but I know it won’t last long. And, if a little soreness now translates into less effort but swimming faster later, heck yeah — bring it on!

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

My brain has been super full at practice for the past week. Thanks to Coach Mark, I’ve learned new techniques for starts, streamlining off walls, breaststroke pull and timing, and a whole new approach to free.

Yep, I’m now one-hundred-percent into a huge “change-process” swim phase. This includes but is not limited to:
1) Paying attention to how different old vs new technique feels
2) Trying a different training approach
3) No more autopilot swimming. I’m thinking all the time now
4) Feeling sore in new places
5) Feeling really awkward as I slip in and out of old vs new styles
6) Remaining open to new ideas and the process
7) Trying to ignore the clock again. To paraphrase Coach Mark, I need to “slow down now so I can swim faster later”

An attitude shift towards “being patient with myself during change” and to “stop wasting energy on trying to force things along” is also very much part of this change-process phase. In fact, it’s probably the toughest item on the list for me to tackle. But because it’s incredibly applicable beyond the pool, it’s also proabably the most important one for me to learn right now. Thank God for swimming — it certainly is my avenue to life lessons.

In many ways, I feel like I have snuck off to school summer. I’ve found this great new environment for excelerated learning while most people continue to do the same old same old.

And you know what? After feeling very “just treading water” (at best) for the past few years per swimming, it feels fantastic to have found a great new and challenging environment.

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

According to Coach Mark, the word of the day for me last night at practice was “recovery.” Specifically, that I now will be working on finding those moments during all four strokes.

Recovery in the pool sounds good for three key reasons:
1) Recovery=Rest: So…if I’m able to start saving some energy per stroke cycle, this means I’ll have more power to apply to the phases that matter the most, right?

2) Less Wear & Tear: Not working through 100% of every stroke cycle hopefully means that my joints, bones and muscles will be happier. And have a longer lifespan, sans injury.

3) More Efficient Strokes: Improved DPS translates to fewer strokes per lap. If you can drop your stroke count a few notches, that savings really adds up in a 1500 or a 400 IM.

Moving on to the “swimming is a metaphor for my life” rummination section of this post, I guess it’s not surprising to learn that I’m trying too hard in the pool and rushing through rest phases because I have a tendency to take a full-on approach to life.

Thus, a cross-over take-home message: Maybe I need to start looking for rest phases outside of the pool too. Loosen the reigns a bit and see what happens…

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

Why can’t I be one of those “here now” people?

Nope, I continue to be my own worst enemy. Now that I am looking at the clock again during practice, I can’t help but think things such as “my free base pace is still off.”

I know, I know. It takes awhile to get back. But with a main goal of peak condition by 2011 short course nationals, I feel as if I am extending great patience to myself.

Perhaps for the long term, but not on the day-to-day basis. I really need to remember where I was just one month ago in terms of “condition.”

I’m also learning that comparing current Rebecca to pre-winter-plague Rebecca isn’t aiding the come-back process. It’s self-defeating — negative thoughts beget a negative mind set as well as overwhelm any positive elements.

Maybe I need to broaden the scope a bit. Swim progress can be seen in a lot of areas beyond time: does it feel easier to swim per practice? Am I swimming more (practices, yards, etc.)? Am I learning new things? Am I breaking bad technique habits? Am I challenging myself in new ways? Is my recovery rate improving? And perhaps most importantly: am I having more fun each day?

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist

About one month in now, it’s been interesting to see how the switch to more frequent but shorter practices has had a spill-over effect on me beyond “trying a new training pattern.”

Foremost, my mental approach to practice has been shifting. I might be just as tired, cranky, or out of sorts as on a former 90-minute practice day, but telling myself “it’s just an hour. You can totally do anything in the water for just an hour” gets me to practice most days.

Of course, afterwards, I’m always glad I talked myself into going. I feel better. Nine out of ten times, I suprise myself with how much I can coax out of myself even though tired. And that factor has really boosted my attitude during my current re-build process.

I also really like how the one-hour format lends itself to picking one foci per practice. Here’s a short list of what I’ve been working on lately: 1) don’t fling my arms across my body line in free, 2) keep my arms out and moving in breast, 3) grow tall from the waist while kicking with fins on my back, 4) have my hands locked and my arms in streamline position before I enter the water off the blocks.

I figure once these corrections have become automatic, my coaches will give new ones to work on.

But for now, I’ve already seen some improvement. For example, now I can feel the difference between streamlined and non-streamlined water entry; kicking on my back in streamline position is becoming more less awkward; I no longer have to add ten seconds to the interval to accomodate breast during an IM-order rotation set; and I feel less strain on my shoulders during free sets.

Can’t wait to see what I can tune-up next!

Until next time,
Rebecca, swim evangelist