One Hour Swim Redux

Over thirty-give MIT Masters swimmers participated in the One Hour Swim this year, an annual event where - you guessed it - we swim as far as we can in an hour. That is a huge number of participants, and even coach Bill paid us a backhanded compliment this morning when he said "not bad for a group that doesn't really do anything." I think he is referring to swim meets. I am sure he was not talking about Sarah who is 7 months pregnant or E2 who did it while recovering from bronchitis or Jonathan who did the whole thing backstroke after swimming 7000 the day before. But just when we thought the OHS was over, Hubbard decided to give it one last shot. Coach Bill gave us a workout (below) but H threw all caution to the waves and ended up just swimming a fairly straight set. Heather (a sprinter) also kicked some butt today. So, we have three options for you at home today! NEMers, you have 15 hours left to do your hour swim! We need to keep the championship in New England!

Option 1 OHS: Swim straight for an hour (33 of us last weekend, Heather today)

Option 2 OHS: Do as many 200s on 2:50 as you can (Hubbard today)

Option 3 OHS: Bill's workout:(me today)

8 x 200 on 2:50
2 x 100 on 1:30
3 x 400 on 5:40
2 x 50 fast
2 x 100 on 1:30
5 x 100 on 1:30
5 x 75 on 1:15

Winner

The main set this morning was a butt-kicker, in the best sense of the word. When more than two lanemates (who generally prefer different types of sets) say they like a workout, we have a winner! The important part of the main set is not the intervals, which are generous, it is the honesty by which you swim the set. If you do it right, you will be hurting. In this case hurting = good.  Well done BB, Chris, and Bill G.

650 warmup
10 x 75 on 1:15 going:
odds free/drill/free
evens free/stroke/free
4 x 200 going:
odds pull on:30r
evens IM on:30r
Main set - Twice through:
300 going 100 hard/200 pace on 4:40
300 going 100 hard, 100 pace, 50 hard, 50 pace on 4:30
300 going 200 hard, 100 pace on 4:20
no break between sets!!

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

In any given situation we often have a choice to react positively ("I learned a lesson!") or to react negatively ("this totally sucks and I am going to dwell on it!") An example might be if the plumber came to your house and had to rip up the wall-to-wall carpet in the basement and break through the floor to get to the drain. The negative in you would cry into the hole in the floor yelling "why?!" but the positive in you would realize you needed to clean the basement anyway. Hypothetical situations aside, this morning Hubbard, Joel, and I swam with Jackie, an 18 year old MIT student. We quickly calculated that our average age was 30 years older than our new friend, which had the potential to bring us down and make us complain about our aches and pains. Truth be told, we were likely the same age as her parents. Then again, we were swimming with an 18 year old. That alone was enough to bolster our spirits. And for Jackie, the negative of getting out of bed so early (she is a college student for heaven's sake) was overshadowed by the funny old people she got to swim with.

200 warmup
4 x 25 free :15r
150 kick/drill/swim
4 x 25 free fast :15r
150 kick/drill/swim
4 x 25 drill :15r
150 kick/drill/swim
18 x 50 going:
1-2 choice on :60
3-5 fast on :40
6-7 choice on1:05
8-11 fast on :40
12-13 choice on 1:10
14-18 fast on :40
Twice through:
125 on 1:55
125 fast on 1:35
125 on 1:55
125 fast on 1:35
2 x 25 easy :40
50 sprint :40
2 x 25 easy :45
repeat

Humbled

I was feeling pretty good about myself after the weekend, when I scored two huge victories, both against a 5-year old boy. The first was in a Wii video game (my first ever) and the second was in a 20 yard sprint race up a hill in the snow. You might be asking "what person in their right mind beats a little five year old'? Well, if you heard the kind of trash talking this little man was throwing at me, you would have given it your all too. Plus, nothing gives you more street cred with a five year old than beating him at Wii. Anyway, to say I was feeling strong and confident is an understatement.  Then I went to practice today and was reminded that the big kids are actually big, and they swim fast, and I am barely able to hang on for dear life. So now me and my ego are firmly planted on the ground, where they belong, until I can convince my 3 year old nephew to play the matching game, which I am really good at btw.

Long Course Meters:
100 warmup
150 swim :20r
3 x 50 count strokes
150 IM no free :20r
3 x 50 count strokes
9 x 100 going:
50 fly/50 back on 2:00
50 back/50 breast on 2:00
50 breast 50 free on 2:00
3 x 100 elbow pop on 1:45
50 fly/50 back on 2:00
50 back/50 breast on 2:00
50 breast 50 free on 2:00
200 pull on 3:20
200 free on 3:20
4 x 50 on :45
150 pull on 2:40
150 swim on 2:40
4 x 50 on :45
100 pull on 1:50
100 swim on 1:50
4 x 50 on :45
50 pull on 1:05
50 swim on 1;05
6 x 50 on :45 (ouch!)

The Squeaky Wheel Gets the D

We have it on good authority (Coach Bill on deck this morning to our lane) that someone (SB) was lamenting that we were not taking advantage of our short time with long course to do some distance sets. I don't know where our lamenter was on Friday when we did a 15 minute straight swim, or last Wednesday when we did 3 x 400 free because that kind of felt like distance to me. Anyway, as the old saying goes "ask and ye shall get D", and I for one am glad as it was nice to stretch it out. Only one more week of long course people so swim now or forever hold you peace! And the lesson for today: Coach Bill will gladly throw you under the bus if you suggest a set and people don't like it. He will even throw you under the bus if we like it, as we did today. And that is why we love Coach Bill - he keeps it real.

200 warmup
200 swim/drill by 50
200 stroke/drill by 50
200 swim
4 x 150 going:
1-2 middle 50 stroke :20r
3-4 pull on :20r
800 pace
600 going 300 pace, 300 fast
400 5 seconds faster per hundred than pace (1:30)
200 fast 100, easy 100

Bring on the New Year

While it was only 17 degrees this morning, a whole bunch of us made it to swim practice to ring in the new year properly. And much like a hangover on New Year's morning, we all felt a little sore and beat up after our first day of practice in 2013. I for one was a lazy dog yesterday, watching movies all day and barely making it outside. What I noticed most was how many commercials there were for diet drugs, diets, and dating services (I am sure there is a company that does all three). I expected to see more ads for inexpensive gym memberships, but alas, it was not to be. The most appalling of all of the ads was for this product that comes in flake form and you sprinkle it on your food and it makes it flavorful AND you feel full, so you eat less and lose UP TO 10 POUNDS in just a month. The commercial showed people sprinkling these flakes on ice cream, french fries, and hot dogs. It was so horribly American that I almost thought it was a Saturday Night Live skit. But it was real. While I don't generally make big and bold resolutions, I did resolve then and there never to use those flakes on my fried dough.

Long course today!  Painful but very fun.

100 warmup
2 x 100 drill/swim on :30r
2 x 100 stroke/swim on :30r
2 x 100 easy 25/build on :30r
20 x 50 going
1-4 on :50
5-8 stroke on :60
9-12 on :45
13-16 stroke on 1:05
17-20 on :45
400 free on 6:45
400 free descend on 7:00
400 free faster than your second on 7:00
300 going fly strokes (3,4,5) at the start of each 100 off the wall