We had the Tropical Splash meet this past Sunday--that's the meet my team hosts every year.
When I've done this meet the past few years, I've done mostly short events like the 50 back and 100 IM. This year I decided to go for the longer events--I did the 200 back, 200 fly, and 200 breast, in that order. I'm going to swim the 100/200 back, 100/200 fly, and 400 IM at Nationals in May, so I figured I should probably start competing in the longer events... :-)
200 back
I felt decent while warming up, but had noted that my legs didn't feel 100%. I know, I know, walking around all day the day before at the auto show wasn't a great idea, but whatever. I thought I'd be able to muscle through it without too many problems.
Nope.
I took it out at what I thought was a decent pace (I wanted to take it out faster than last weekend, since I'd been too slow on the front half then), but then crashed and burned at the 125. My legs completely disappeared, I couldn't breathe at all, and I dropped from doing my normal 6 dolphin kicks off of each wall to 3, and then 2 off the last two turns. On top of that, my lats were on fire. The last 50 was my own private hell, and I watched the girl in the lane next to me, who I had at least a 1.5 bodylength lead on at the 100, inexorably eat up the space in between us. I did end up beating her, but not by more than a second or so.
My splits: 32:30, 34.80 (1:07.10), 37.05 (1:44.15), 38.41 (2:22.56). Terrible, simply terrible. The first 100 wasn't too bad, but I'd have liked to have been under 1:07. I don't know what happened on the back half. While my overall time was about a second faster than last weekend, and my first 100 was about 3 seconds faster, this was a horrible race. I completely fell apart and felt way worse than I did a week before. I think it was mainly a combination of two factors--being on my feet all day Saturday and allergies (I got really bad allergies on Wednesday and am pretty sure I literally coughed up a lung at Saturday's practice).
On a side note, my splits last year prior to Nationals were usually in the region of 32, 35, 35, 35. I was right there for the first 100 this time...and then just a wee bit off for the second 100...
200 fly
Man, during the last 75 of that 200 back, I was sure that I'd actually die if I tried to do a 200 fly! I've done almost zero physical training for the 200 fly. I'd done maybe a total of 500 yards of fly over the last month or so, but had psyched myself up enough to think I could do it without absolutely killing myself...
And I was right!
Sure, it was slooow, and I went into survival butterfly in the last 50 or so (3-4 kicks per pull), but I made it without stopping and am pretty sure I could have kept going indefinitely.
My splits were 34.73, 41.02 (1:15.75), 44.47 (2:00.22), 46.19 (2:46.41). Just looking at the spread without paying attention to the actual times, the spread wasn't too bad. A 5 second difference between the 2nd and 4th 50s is fine by me. However, the overall speed wasn't there. That was also fine by me--I knew I would require the services of a lifeguard if I actually tried to race a 200 fly without training for it, so I made my main goal to just finish and swim a legal 200.
Honestly, it hurt far less than my 200 back. I still had legs, I still had arms, the only part that really hurt was my upper back. I was about 13.5 seconds off of my time from 2 years ago, when I'd actually spent 3 months preparing for the 200 fly. I'll take it! I figure if I spend the next three months training for the 200 fly, I should be in good shape for swimming it at Nats.
200 breast
This is the event I'll do once a year, at the Tropical Splash. I don't train breast in practice and don't particularly like the stroke to begin with. That being said, I felt really good for the first 125 of the race. This wasn't too long after the 200 fly...and it hit me like a dump truck full of bricks at the 125. I went from feeling efficient and smooth to having no energy or ability to move in a coordinated movement. I went a 2:48.71, with splits of 37.04, 42.52 (1:19.56), 45.20 (2:04.76), 43.95 (2:48.71). I was exactly 1.1 seconds off my time from the same meet last year. There were three big differences between the two races:
1) Last year, I'd actually trained for breaststroke--this year, I'd done even less breast than fly in practice
2) Last year, I'd swum it in order to really race--this year, I just swam it
3) I wasn't coming off the 200 fly last year
All that said, I was quite surprised. Discounting the 200 fly hitting me at the 125, I felt really, really good in the water. It almost felt like I could swim breaststroke! I had enough fun with it to briefly consider swimming it more often, then realized that I'd have to drop a TON of time in order to make the Nats cut in it. Not gonna happen...
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
First meet of 2014...hahahahahahahaha!
Had the first meet of 2014 this past Sunday in Annapolis.
Overall, not as terrible as I thought it'd be. I've only been swimming regularly for the past few weeks, so I figured I'd have an awful meet with slow times and lots of crashing and burning. I swam three events, the 50 fly, 100 back, and 200 back, in that order.
50 fly
Sigh. This could have been so much better. My back foot slipped a bit on the start and I didn't enter the water at the right angle, causing my goggles to flood as soon as I hit the water. I almost would have preferred them to have fallen off, since I would have been able to see when breathing, at least. Anyhoo, I couldn't see crap with them filled, and when I came close to the wall for the turn, the refraction in the water made me think I was at the wall. I dove forward thinking I would touch the wall momentarily...and had to kick for a second or two since I had to be at least 1-1.5 strokes away from the wall. Oops. Lost at least a second on the turn and couldn't make up for it in the second half. I could see the vague shapes of the other people in the heat when I pushed off the wall and I think I would have been in the lead if I hadn't boffed the turn. Sigh. I went a 27.9. On the plus side, this is the first time in over a year that I've felt like I've been able to sprint fly. I didn't have any problems with establishing a body rhythm, which has been my big problem with the 50 fly for a long time. If I'd nailed the turn, I probably would have been a mid/high 26.
100 back
This was only about 10 minutes after the 50 fly, so I wasn't very rested going into the event. I was in the lane next to Dan, so my only concern was beating him. Had an only so-so start and he beat me into the water. Caught up to him underwater, but he pulled a little ahead of me on the surface. Pulled ahead again underwater off the first turn and then extended my lead from there, although I reallllllly stretched out the second turn (had a brain fart and only took one stroke inside the flags instead of two). Legs gave out at about the 85 yard mark, but went a 1:03.9 and beat Dan by about 1.5 seconds.
200 back
Wow, this was a pretty hilariously terrible race. I had a ridiculously hilariously awful start--my left wrist locked when I was positioning myself (sometimes my wrist will lock into one, usually painful, position and I can't apply any weight to it without it hurting) and then my left foot slipped off the pad right before the start, so I just flopped back into the water and had zero push off the wall. On top of that, I psyched myself out and had convinced myself that if I took it out too fast I'd burn out, given my lack of conditioning at this point in the season. Took it out too slow (around a 1:10, versus the 1:07 or so I should have been) and ended up dying at about the 125. On top of that, I choked on water at the 150 turn, so I almost went into full panic mode trying to get to the surface. Came back in a 1:13 for a 2:23. Should have been around a 2:18. I almost wish I'd had Dan video tape this race, cuz it would go perfectly with a laugh track!
*****************
Overall, this could have been a much, much worse meet. I've only been swimming regularly for about 3 weeks now. With the exception of the 200 back, my times weren't that far off of where I was at this point last year with a much higher training and conditioning base. I've got what should be a pretty stable next three months at work, so my schedule should allow me to get in the pool much more than I did in the fall, so I hope to maintain my current training through Nationals in May.
Overall, not as terrible as I thought it'd be. I've only been swimming regularly for the past few weeks, so I figured I'd have an awful meet with slow times and lots of crashing and burning. I swam three events, the 50 fly, 100 back, and 200 back, in that order.
50 fly
Sigh. This could have been so much better. My back foot slipped a bit on the start and I didn't enter the water at the right angle, causing my goggles to flood as soon as I hit the water. I almost would have preferred them to have fallen off, since I would have been able to see when breathing, at least. Anyhoo, I couldn't see crap with them filled, and when I came close to the wall for the turn, the refraction in the water made me think I was at the wall. I dove forward thinking I would touch the wall momentarily...and had to kick for a second or two since I had to be at least 1-1.5 strokes away from the wall. Oops. Lost at least a second on the turn and couldn't make up for it in the second half. I could see the vague shapes of the other people in the heat when I pushed off the wall and I think I would have been in the lead if I hadn't boffed the turn. Sigh. I went a 27.9. On the plus side, this is the first time in over a year that I've felt like I've been able to sprint fly. I didn't have any problems with establishing a body rhythm, which has been my big problem with the 50 fly for a long time. If I'd nailed the turn, I probably would have been a mid/high 26.
100 back
This was only about 10 minutes after the 50 fly, so I wasn't very rested going into the event. I was in the lane next to Dan, so my only concern was beating him. Had an only so-so start and he beat me into the water. Caught up to him underwater, but he pulled a little ahead of me on the surface. Pulled ahead again underwater off the first turn and then extended my lead from there, although I reallllllly stretched out the second turn (had a brain fart and only took one stroke inside the flags instead of two). Legs gave out at about the 85 yard mark, but went a 1:03.9 and beat Dan by about 1.5 seconds.
200 back
Wow, this was a pretty hilariously terrible race. I had a ridiculously hilariously awful start--my left wrist locked when I was positioning myself (sometimes my wrist will lock into one, usually painful, position and I can't apply any weight to it without it hurting) and then my left foot slipped off the pad right before the start, so I just flopped back into the water and had zero push off the wall. On top of that, I psyched myself out and had convinced myself that if I took it out too fast I'd burn out, given my lack of conditioning at this point in the season. Took it out too slow (around a 1:10, versus the 1:07 or so I should have been) and ended up dying at about the 125. On top of that, I choked on water at the 150 turn, so I almost went into full panic mode trying to get to the surface. Came back in a 1:13 for a 2:23. Should have been around a 2:18. I almost wish I'd had Dan video tape this race, cuz it would go perfectly with a laugh track!
*****************
Overall, this could have been a much, much worse meet. I've only been swimming regularly for about 3 weeks now. With the exception of the 200 back, my times weren't that far off of where I was at this point last year with a much higher training and conditioning base. I've got what should be a pretty stable next three months at work, so my schedule should allow me to get in the pool much more than I did in the fall, so I hope to maintain my current training through Nationals in May.
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