Doing the right thing

There's doing the right thing in the ethical sense, like letting the cashier know you got too much change back, or finding something cool that doesn't belong to you and returning it to its rightful owner. And there is doing the right thing in the legal sense, like stopping at a red light or not parking in a loading zone. Then there is doing the right thing in the workout sense, like reading the paper, listening to the coach, and doing what he says. I'd like to think of myself as someone who tries to do the right thing; yet after today's workout I realized that NOT doing the right thing has consequences. Let me give you the workout first:

250 kick or swim, masters option
6 x 50 count strokes/stroke on :60
4 x 25 fly
10 x 100 on 2:00 FAST
6 x 150 on 2:25
2 x 50 free

Our focus was on the 100s. I somehow missed Bill's explanation of the workout, which was this: Do it in pairs, holding a consistent pace for each pair, but DESCEND each pair also. I missed the descend each pair part so started out my first pair on 1:13. When I got to the wall I got an earful from everyone that now I had to descend from that when I thought I just had to hold it within each pair. This did not make me happy. At all. But I did my best, holding pairs of 1:13, 1:12, 1:11, 1:10 but not breaking 1:10. Everyone else "did the right thing" and succeeded. Well done!

There are always questions to ask yourself when faced with doing the right thing. How will I feel about myself later if I do it? Will it hurt anyone, including me? What does the little voice inside my head think about this? What will the people I respect think about it? No doubt about it, I will do the right thing next time, as I don't like the answers to these questions!!!

Have a great weekend!

tip of the day: if you find a wallet, return it with everything in it. Not only is it the right thing to do, but Dateline may be filming you.

You know it's been a long time when...

Time flies when you are having fun, as the saying goes. But sometimes time goes by and you are simply surprised that things around you have changed. Case in point, the acorns that now attack my car on the drive in. Where did they suddenly come from? Or the little dust bunnies in my spare bedroom, who I affectionately anthropomorphized by naming "fluffy" and "powderpuff." Didn't I just "swiff" last week? Or was it last month? But the reality of this time lapse set in today when I looked at the sheet of 500s and instead of thinking "great!" I thought "oh-no!" That is when I knew lots of time had passed, and much of it was not in the pool. But we persevered, as we always do.

Warmup
2 x 25 free, breast, back, fly
3 x 25 free, breast, back, fly
Most did a fin set here, Ian and I did the following using our "Masters Option" card:
3 x 200 pull
Main:
500 negative split on 7:20
500 pull hypoxic
5 x 100 steady pace on 1:35
500 with fins
500 fastest time of the day, beat 6:31:99

We skipped the fourth 500 and did the fast one. BB and I swam side by side and he won the race (were we racing?) coming in at 6:26. I made 6:28 and was happy with that, but the whole thing hurt.

Now that's a workout!

Field reporter KBB was back "working" again in far away places - this time in Hawaii. An extra special bonus was that he got to see our friend Spence. Spence, KBB, and I swam together on another masters team 10 years ago. Back then, we could each have a lane to ourselves but chose to swim together. Apparently they are continuing the tradition, but without me. Here is the swim workout they did:

Date: Sep 20
Location: Waimea Bay, Oahu.
Goal: Keep up with Spence.
Workout: Dive in, dolphin past the wave, angle right to the rock outcropping. Pause. Turn left and swim parallel to the beach to the rocks at the other end of the bay. Pause. Cut the angle back to the center of the beach. Total distance about 3/4 of a mile.

Is it just me, or does the lady in blue in the picture look like she's in distress?

Juxtapose that with our workout today:
Date: Sep 20
Location: MIT Pool
Goal: Get out of bed, attempt to swim, go to work

Warmup: a bunch of 50s, 100s kick, 25s stroke total of 1200
Main: 12 150s going 1-4 descend on 2:15, 5 easy, 6 fast twice thru

I'll take Hawaii, thanks.

Who's hot?

This was the text at the bottom of the workout sheet today:

You can do this!
You are strong!
You are smart!
You have what it takes!
You are tough!
You are hot!

We were all in agreement on the first five items, but when it came to the last, there was a lengthy discussion and debate. Of course I, being the only lady in the lane, immediately thought Bill was talking to me. Yet given given the collective vanity of my lanemates it wasn't quite clear who was the target of the sheet. So we agreed to disagree and did the workout.

3 x 75 free on :20r
3 x 75 breast, back, free on :20
3 x 75 drill/swim on :20r
2 x 100 IM legal turns or we would be penalized
Main:
400 build on 6:00
5 x 100 on 1:20
300 build on 4:45
4 x 100 on 1:20
200 on 3:30
3 x 100 on 1:15
100 wasy on 2:00
2 x 100 on 1:15
kick set but I left

It was obvious after doing this that Bill was not referring to our good looks, witty nature, or overall sparkling personalities when he wrote that. He was talking about the 100s hard and Dr. Bob was, in my opinion, the hot one today. He is just good at 100s and came the closest to making all of them. I for one can only make 2 in a row before I explode, which happened today. But the good news is that the 1:15s make the 1:20s feel easy. :)

It's Friday and it's beautiful out. Have a wonderful day and weekend!

Ode to E

There once was a girl named Elaine
Whose last year was a little insane
Though she possess great skill,
she fell off the 'mill
But for this year, as Queen she will reign!

Happy Birthday, Queen E!

Flash forward

There is always a moment in the warmup when Bill places the sheet for the next set upside down hanging on the sign board right in front of the lane. It's usually around that time that the warmup is getting a little boring and that little sheet piques our interest. It's an exciting time, if you think about it. What is the next set? Is it distance? IM? Will the intervals kill us, or will we exhale in relief? It's like a mini-present that you get to unwrap every day. Imagine that much fun at 6:40am in the morning. You may disagree, but I think it's true: we all have that anticipation. As I was pushing off for another 50 backstroke today during the warmup I saw IW glance up at the sheet, looking (but not wanting to see) what we might be in for. He didn't see it, but the look was priceless. And then we got the sheet.

Here goes:

4 x 50 count strokes free
4 x 50 back/breast
4 x 50 drill
4 x 50 count strokes free
3 x (4 x 25) on :30 going:
25 sprint
25 stroke
25 underwater swim
25 easy
400 pull
3 x 150 fast free on 4:15
3 x 150 IM no free on 4:45
3 x 150 fast free on 4:10

Nice job, BB and IW. Bill was having some issues with his C-Drive today which oddly enough made him early to practice. I wonder what time he will get to practice if we give him a flash drive? Consider.

Flip flop?

I realized this morning that I don't like the whole being-a-candidate-for-Senate thing. Everything I say and do is being scrutinized by my "constituents." Case in point, when I tried to rally the lane for our 4 x 25 kick set I was accused of flip flopping on the issue of kicking. While it's true I don't like kicking, sometimes we public figures have to do things we don't want to do, like go to parades or ride around in a limo when we'd prefer to use our hybrid. Then, I was accused by SB of cheating the kick set by moving my arm while I was using the board. When I tried to explain myself, all I could hear was "you lie!" from the back of the lane. I am worried now that they are going to go after my tax records. Due to all this stress, I am sorry to report I am dropping out of the Senate race. You won't have Katie to kick around anymore! Okay, you probably will, but you can't see my tax returns and I am still not going to kick. So there.

300 warmup on own
4 x 25 kick on :15r
4 x 50 drill on :15r
4 x 75 descend by 25 on :20r
4 x 50 swim
4 x 25 kick
3 times thru:
200 pull on 3:15
100 back on 2:00
300 on 4:20
300 on 4:10
300 on 4:00
50 easy
200 on 2:55
200 on 2:45
200 on 2:40
50 easy

We only made it through the first 200 because of time. Shout out to BB who not only held a strong pace but conserved his effort until the end. Well done by all!

Intervention

I had a dream last night that my friends and family staged an intervention and recommended that I attend iPhone Anonymous. Of course this didn't sound all that bad so I went fairly willingly while pretending to be mad. At the meeting we sat around, sharing photos and music and saying "apps" a lot. We made videos and cleaned our screens with a soft cloth. We gleefully talked about the poor BlackBerry users in the next room who were doing an exercise on texting without a touch screen. Then my iPhone alarm went off for swimming and I realized that no such happy place exists, so I reluctantly got up and went to practice, guided by my phone's GPS but not before Bumping BB in the parking lot for some info I needed.

Our workout:

200 on own
2 x 100 fly/back by 50
100 free going 25 drill/25 swim
2 x 100 back/breast by 50
2 x 50 on :50
3 x 50 on :45
4 x 50 on :40
3 x 50 on :45
2 x 50 on :50
Main:
5 x 125s fast on 1:50
75 ex on 1:30
4 x 125s fast on 1:45
100 ez on 2:00
3 125s fast on 1:50
75 ez on 1:30
2 125s fast on 1:45
100 ez on 2:00

This was tough, no doubt about it. You must really work the 1:45s to get enough rest to keep up the pace. All lanes did the same interval which was fun. All in all, a great set to set us up for the weekend.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Users Guide

Advice is cheap, and as someone who rarely gives advice, I am always cautious about doing so. Okay, that is a total lie. I love giving advice. And I cannot post the workout today without some helpful hints as to how to make it a pleasant experience for all of you at home. Failure to follow this advice may leave you languishing in the depths of swimming boredom.

First, the workout:

3 x (3 x 50) going stroke, free, drill on :60
3 x (3 x 75) going 50 fly/25 free, 50 back/25 free, 50 breast/25 free on :20r
18 x 100 on 1:30 (this is what the advice is for)
3 x (3 x 50) going 2 back on :50, 50 free on :60

Second, the advice:

Don't do this one alone, because you'll likely get to #9 and bail. Try to find friends or a buddy and convince them that 18 x 100 is fun. My buddy was BB today and if not for him, I would have been at work at 7am. We swam side by side which also helped the pacing. Also, try to mix it up a bit. For instance, we chose to break it up into 3 sets of 5 x 100 doing 1-5 swim with various 50s fast, 6-10 pull, 11-15 descend 1-3, easy 4, fast 5, then hold the last 3 on 1:20. Keep your mind engaged and it makes it more fun.

Campaign update: The response to my possible run for Senate has been remarkable. Thus, I have added a few things to my platform, among them:

1. No more 450 yard kick sets on the first swim day of the week… or any other day for that matter
2. No more 75 flys on the first swim day of the week… or ever
3. Long course only
4. Make it light for morning bike rides to practice

Lastly, I will be developing a patronage system, much like other politicians, and will find a cushy, high paying job for Coach Bill so that the above (minus the whole sunlight thing) can be accomplished.

Big Announcement from Me

Today on the drive in I heard that Joe Kennedy will not run for Senate. That makes it easier for me to make a big announcement on my blog, just like Curt Schilling did last week. Today I announce preliminary plans to potentially think about possibly declaring my candidacy for United States Senate here in Massachusetts! Why not me? Of course my platform would be the usual: education, healthcare, the economy. But what other candidate will think about YOUR concerns, like crime in the mens locker room, environmental problems like mold on the pull bouys, or unfair treatment by the coach when we socialize too much on deck? These are serious issues, and you need a serious candidate. Apparently I need only 10,000 signatures and about 10 million dollars to fund this campaign. I know a handful of people I can count on for the signatures, and I am sure I can find a backer with lots of money (any volunteers?) Hey, if I can bring about compromise in Lane 3, healthcare can't be far behind.

200 Warmup on own
8 x 75 (breast, back, free, fly)
100 breast kick
5 x 50 kick
100 breast kick
Main:
100 build on 1:45
2 x 100 on 1:20
200 build on 3:30
3 x 100 on 1:20
300 build on 5:15
4 x 100 on 1:25
400 build on 7:00
5 x 100 on 1:25

After being out of practice for a week, I (and probably BB, who was sick too) appreciate my health even more now. Good job with a full lane today: E, KBB, SB, R, BB, and me.

Health tip of the day: wash your hands to the song of "Happy Birthday" and cough into your sleeve. And don't kiss strangers!