Swim Progress - March 2012

Here are the goals I set for myself at the start of the year.  I'm not trying to reach them all this year but want to work towards them as much as possible.  Take particular notice of the swim goals:

I've made progress.  Last year I was swimming with a nose-clip because I could not stop water from going up my nose when I put my head under the water.  I struggled to do two lengths of my pool (40metres in total) without stopping.  Not that long ago, 100metres or 5 lengths was a difficult, but maybe achievable goal.  I gradually built up my distance, eventually reaching 400metres, or 20 lengths.  I was very happy with the 400metre distance because this is the distance of some sprint triathlons.  My time of 10-11 minutes was pretty slow compared to those I had seen when looking at results of triathlons but I was getting the distance in.

A few weeks ago, I went to a swim clinic at my local swimming pool.  The idea is that you have a swim and a coach will give you direction and advice if that is what you wanted.  I'm quite anxious about new social situations and so it took quite a bit of nerve for me to go.  I was really glad that I did, I was pleased to see that I wasn't the worst swimmer there and that it wasn't as bad as I thought it might be.  I asked the coach for some advice and got some - I was generally pretty good but try to slow down the kicking of my legs.  This uses up a lot of energy and means that you are less streamlined in the water.  I gave it a try, I tried a few lengths with a pull-buoy between my legs and I wasn't sure whether it felt better or not.

I kept trying to use my legs less and kick more gently when swimming and seemed to be making progress.  On Thursday, I was on a training course.  The evening before we had been on quite a gruelling fell run and so a swim was the perfect form of gentle exercise.  The training finished a bit early and so I got to the pool when it wasn't busy.  I thought I would see how I felt, got in and swam.

And I just kept going:

Yep, I've made progress.  Time to set new goals I think.