2018 USMS Spring Nationals...best Masters meet of my career!

Actually, on second thought, I think that might have been the best meet of my entire swimming career!

I came out of the meet with 3 lifetime best times, 1 Masters best time, and 4 Masters second best times. I can't recall any meet, either as a Masters swimmer or as an age grouper, where I swam so consistently well across that large a variety of events.

I swam 8 races over my 3 days of competition (the meet is 4 days long, but I didn't do the 1000 or the 1650 that were on the first day):

• Friday: 100 back, 50 free leading off our mixed 200 free relay
• Saturday: 200 breast, 100 IM, 50 back leading off our men's 200 medley relay
• Sunday: 100 breast, 50 free on our men's 200 free relay, 200 back

Side note--the video quality is pretty terrible, I have a defective camcorder that I'm sending in for a warranty repair/replacement.

Friday events

100 back

This was a pretty good race! I went a 1:01.19, my 2nd fastest Masters time and my fastest since 2013 Nationals, which was at IUPUI, too. My backstroke start wasn't terrible, but I definitely need to keep working on using the bars. My 50 and 75 turns were a bit long, but all things considered, I was very happy with the race! I haven't done any real backstroke speed work since the 2012-2013 season, when all I trained for was the 50/100/200 back, so this was a really good time. I'd gone into the race just hoping to break 1:02, so I'll take it! Side note--I've perfected the art of coming up right at the 15m mark off the start! :-)

Mixed 200 free relay

Another great race! I went a 24.95, just .03 off my Masters PR set at 2012 Nationals, and my fastest since then (my next fastest was a 25.44 from 2013). I had a bad turn...started the turn stroke almost a full stroke too far away from the wall, so I tried to salvage it by lengthening the turn. Looks like I managed it!

Saturday events

200 breast

Thankfully no video of this one... :-)

I set a new lifetime PR with a 2:31.00, which dropped my former PR of 2:32.50 that I set at Zones last year! That being said, technique-wise it was a sloppy race. I made the utterly boneheaded decision to try to pace the guy next to me for the first 75 after we were even at the first turn, which came back to bite me in the behind on the last 50--I'm pretty sure I looked like a little kid sprinting, taking 50 strokes, and barely making forward progress by that point (my stroke count for the 25-150 of the 200 is usually 7 strokes...I took 14 on the last lap...). I probably should have taken it out about .75 slower for the first 100, but it was still a new LPR, so I'll take it and count it as a lesson learned.

100 IM

This was my most ideal race of the whole meet! I went a 1:00.59, crushing my former lifetime PR of 1:01.42 from Zones last year. There was only one technical error, I was about a half stroke too close to the wall on my back-breast turn, so I lost some time and air trying to recover from it. Besides that, I can't think of anything else I'd have done differently!

Men's 200 medley relay

I led off the relay and went a 28.65, my 2nd fastest Masters time and fastest since 2013 Nationals. My start was again only ok, but hey, this meet was my first time using either the bars or the backstroke wedge, so I'm not complaining! Felt like I was spinning a bit, but the race as a whole was good, so no complaints from me!

Sunday events

100 breast

This one was a bit of a mixed bag. I went a 1:08.38, .4 off the lifetime PR I set at Zones last year, but my 50 split was a 31.47...which is a lifetime PR by .4! I just took this race out too fast and was hurting at the end, and also was really long on the 75 turn. Probably should have been out around a 31.8 or so, but it was all in all a decent swim. As a side note, it's really apparent in this video that I'm not a natural breaststroker. I've got a weak kick and my underwaters being better than most people I race is the only thing that keeps me from getting trounced by my competition.

Men's 200 free relay

Whoo boy! I went 2nd on the relay and went a new Masters relay split PR with a 24.63, despite a glacially slow relay start. Despite having never jumped and DQed a relay in my life, I've got a deep seated and utterly irrational fear of doing so, so I've got sloooooow relay starts. Conservatively, I'd say I probably left half a second on the block. Ya know, that means I'm like Caeleb Dressel! Both of our relay starts are only marginally faster, or no faster, than our flat starts! 'Course, the time difference in his is just because his flat start is that good, not because he's slow off the blocks on relays, but whatever... :-D

200 back

This was my last event of the meet and I was tired! I still went a 2:16.60, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time and fastest since 2013 Nationals. Frankly, I'm surprised I swam it that well. I've apparently forgotten how to swim back without a beard, since I had water washing into my mouth pretty much the entire time. I swam the race with 8 full breaths, the breath on the start and then the turn stroke breath at the end of each lap, every stinkin' single other breath I took resulted in at least a partial mouth full of water! I had to cut my underwater butterfly kicks down during the race--I've spent all season training to be able to hit 6 kicks consistently off every wall, but had to drop down to 5 and then 4 during this race. All that said, I'll take it!

Thoughts and path ahead

This was all in all a fantastic meet, very possibly the best meet I've had in my 20+ years of competing! I've had meets in the past where I've done better in a few events, but never had a meet that I can remember where I've done so consistently well across every event I swam.

Looking forward, I want to keep expanding my repertoire of events. Up till 2 years ago, I would not have expected to do anywhere near as well in the breast events as I've done over the past two seasons, setting lifetime PRs in all three distances. Over the next 5 years, I plan to spend at least one season focusing on each event from the 1000 on down (for example, this season I focused primarily on the 100 and 200 breast, with the 100 and 200 back as a very secondary focus...probably an 80/20 split between my breast and back training focus this season).

To help achieve those goals, I want to keep training with the NCAP senior prep group in the fall-spring season! I started swimming with them in late January/early February this year and it really paid off, so I plan to swim Monday/Tuesday/Thursday evenings with them again, starting at the beginning of the fall season this time instead of waiting till past the midway point of the season. I'll also aim to hit 1-3 Masters practices a week, possibly Thursday/Friday/Saturday mornings, or Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday mornings. On top of that, there is a free gym at my office, so I plan to start lifting twice a week over my lunch breaks this summer and maintain that moving forward. I'll focus primarily on legs and core, since that's where my strengths are as a swimmer and I'll want to capitalize on those strengths as much as possible, and then upper body for the rest, maybe a 75/25 split.

Most importantly, looking at my training plan moving forward, that is all actually reasonable! The NCAP practices are sandwiched between the practices I coach, so I don't have to add anything to my schedule to continue swimming with them. Same with weights, I'm already at the office and it doesn't add any time to my day, so those should be feasible. I've consistently been hitting 2-3 Masters morning practices each week since February, so I'd like to think I can maintain that moving forward, as well.

If I can maintain this kind of schedule starting from the beginning of the fall season in September, I think it will pay off much larger dividends than the abbreviated training schedule did this season, and I was quite happy with how this season turned out!

Zones last weekend...wow, what a meet!!!

At the age of 30, and about ~50 pounds heavier than I was at the peak of my swimming career in high school, I had my best meet ever last weekend!

I wasn't able to go to Nationals this spring, so Zones became my shave/taper meet of the season. Since January, I've averaged 6-7 practices a week (3-4 in the morning, 3 in the evenings on my own), which is a level of training I haven't hit since my first season on the team back in '11-'12. It's definitely paid off! I've been able to hit intervals in practice I haven't hit since high school, and my overall endurance and speed is way up from the past few years.

During the 7 meets I did this season before Zones, my swims were overall trending quite positive. I had a few less-than-satisfactory swims, but by and large, I was hitting typical shaved/tapered end-of-season times at random in season meets.

Going into Zones, I wanted to make sure I didn't do what I've tended to do in the past, which is overload myself with individual events and max out on relays. A perfect example of that was Zones a few years ago--over the course of Saturday and Sunday, I swam a total of 9 individual events and 8 relays, which was an epic disaster! This time around, I swam 7 individual events (counting the 1000 on Friday) and 7 relays. With the combination of spreading the event load over three days and my being in significantly better shape, I didn't crash and burn at all! I had a couple swims that weren't as stellar as I was hoping for, but this still stands as my best meet ever.

Friday

1000 free

I haven't done the 1000 since I was 16 or 17. Just to make it clear up front, I don't like distance. I *can* do distance, but I don't have the patience for it and it bores me, and I don't train for it in practice. That being said, this was a complete throwaway event. My three goals were to break 12:30 (that's a 1:15 pace per 100), not embarrass myself, and not kill myself for the rest of the meet. It was a surprisingly good swim! I stayed in cruise control till the last 50, only doing flutter kick off the walls and pretty much not kicking on the surface, and I finished the race without feeling tired in the slightest, feeling like I'd just finished a 1000 pull. I went a 12:10 and think I could easily shave off another 15-20 seconds, if not more, if I ever decide to swim it again.

Saturday

100 free

I'd set my flat start MPR of 56.51 in this event last spring, leading off the 400 free relay at Nationals. I usually only do the 100 free a couple times a season, and have usually been in the 56-57 range. Last month, I did the 100 at a short course meters meet and my time converted to a high 55. After that swim, I decided to see what I could do at Zones. I don't train for free in general, and definitely don't train for sprint free (or sprints of any stroke, for that matter), so I just wanted to see what I could go. It was great! I was about 6 inches too far from the wall on two of the three turns, but everything else was about as good as I can remember ever doing in the 100. I went a 54.65, which blows my previous MPR out of the record and puts me in contention with my lifetime PR of 54.4! I'm very happy with how my first "real" event of the meet turned out, and am considering adding it to my event rotation for next year.

200 mixed medley relay

I swam the fly leg on this relay. Remember what I said earlier about not training sprint free? Well, I hadn't done the 50 fly in well over a year and haven't done a lick of fly speed training in practice in probably 2 years. As soon as I started swimming, I could tell! Stroke tempo felt awful, I felt completely out of whack compared to the slower tempo I'm used to in the 100 and 200 fly. That being said, I split a 26.3, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time. I'll take it!

200 IM

IMs in general are another event I don't train for--I train for the individual strokes (well, fly, back, and breast, not so much when it comes to free). The 200 IM has been a bit of a nemesis over the past few years--I went a 2:19 at my first Zones in 2012, but didn't get back under 2:20 till January, when I went a 2:19.9. In fact, my most recent 200 IM prior to January was a 2:25 I did in January 2015. My one goal was to beat the 2:19 from 2012. I did it quite well! I went a 2:15.2, and almost all of the time improvement came on the back half. My breast and free were both a bit over 2 seconds faster than on both of my 2:19 performances, which is great, since that's historically where my IMs have fallen apart, even back in the day.

200 breast

This was the first of the two events I was most looking forward to at this meet. I've spent the past two years improving my breaststroke, putting lots of time and effort into it in practice to try and have it not be such a drag like it used to be back in the day. I had a great 200 breast last spring at Nationals and got to within 4 seconds of my LPR of 2:32.51, so my goal this time was to try and go sub-3:35. I blew that goal out of the water! I crashed and burned pretty bad on the last 35 yards or so, but I broke my LPR and went a 2:32.50! Only a .01 drop, but that's the first "real" LPR I've broken as a Masters swimmer! I broke my 50 fly LPR in 2012, but I don't really count that one, since I only swam the 50 fly a handful of times as a teenager, always at one of the first meets of the season, coming off the break after long course. I was ecstatic with how this turned out! My goal for next year is to aim for 2:30. I think if I can clean up that last 50, it's definitely within reach.

800 free relay

This was about 20-25 minutes after the 200 breast and I was still hurting. Energy level was low and my left bicep and pec were really tight from the 200 breast, so I didn't expect much going in. I still went a 2:04.5, which is only .2 off my flat start MPR from last Nationals. I'm now very interested to see what I can do in the 200 free without all the other stuff going on, and think I could hit a 2:02 or better. My LPR is a 2:00 and change, so I'm not that far off!

400 medley relay

This was about 10-15 minutes after the 800 free relay and I was dragging by this point. I wasn't in pain at all, but man, I was tired! I led off the relay and knew I wouldn't be able to throw down a great 100 time, so rather than crashing and burning, I decided to swim it like the first 100 of the 200 back. In that aspect, it wasn't bad at all--I went a 1:05.2, which is right at what I wanted to take the 200 out in.

Sunday

100 IM

My MPR going into this meet was a 1:01.5 from 2012 Nationals, and besides going a 1:01.7 at 2013 Nationals, I hadn't broken a 1:02.7 since then. Back in January, I went a 1:02.9, so my goal for this meet was just to break 1:02. I went a 1:01.42, a new MPR! My back to breast crossover turn was too long (I was about half a stroke too far out at the flags, so I had to lengthen my last couple of strokes to be able to execute it), but the rest was good. I'll take it!

400 mixed medley relay

I swam the fly leg on this relay. My goal was just to put up a respectable time, I still had two individual events and three relays to go after this one. I put up a 1:01.2, which isn't a bad time at all, in my top 5 Masters times. I cruised it and bungled the finish pretty badly (thought I was about a stroke closer to the wall than I actually was...which led the next swimmer to dive early, DQing us...oops).

200 mixed free relay

This was 5-10 minutes after the 400 medley relay, and I'd had all of a 75 to warm down. Wasn't feeling great, but threw down a 25.00 with a bad relay start and a slightly off-target turn. As a flat start, that would've put it as my second fastest Masters 50 (just behind my 24.9 from 2012 Nationals), and I think it's my fastest relay start, back to back with another relay, to boot!

100 breast

This was my other main focus event, besides Saturday's 200 breast. I really, really wanted to do well on it and see if my 1:09.1 relay split from a 400 medley relay in February was a fluke, since my fastest Masters flat start was a 1:11.3 (and my 5 fastest Masters times were all 1:11s!). I had some trouble on the first 50 getting my stroke rate up, but ironed it out for the second 50. I was utterly shocked when I saw the time! 1:07.99, nearly 3.5 seconds faster than my MPR, and almost .75 faster than my LPR of 1:08.6! I was completely flabbergasted, my highest hope had been to break 1:10 going into the meet! The biggest improvement came on the back half--while my first 50 was about a second faster than usual, the second 50 was almost 2.5 seconds faster than the norm. I'll absolutely take it!

200 back

This was my last individual event of the meet and one that I was totally unsure of how'd I'd do in. I haven't trained much back at all this year, and haven't really done so in 2 years. I'd thrown down a 2:19 in the 200 in January, which was my fastest in-season, non-2013-backstroke-season time, and threw down a 1:01 in the 100 back in March, which was my fastest in-season time, so I was just curious to see how I'd do. I paced the race poorly, started with too strong a kick and paid for it on the back half, but pulled out a 2:17.7, which is my 2nd fastest Masters time. All that said, my splits weren't terrible, out in a high 1:05, back in a high 1:11.

400 free relay

Despite being 20-30 minutes after the 200 back, my legs were still toast. I went second on the relay and gave it my best shot, but I didn't have much left to give right then. Still, I busted out a 55.8, which was still well under my previous MPR, so it wasn't a bad swim at all.

200 medley relay

Less than 10 minutes after the previous relay, I got back up to lead off our relay. I threw down a 28.8 in the 50 back, which is my 3rd fastest 50 back as a Masters swimmer, with the two faster times coming from Nationals in 2013 and 2016, when I hadn't swum 13 events in the previous 48 hours. I'll take it, I thought I would've been lucky to crack 29.5 with how I was feeling!

Overall

All in all, this was a phenomenal meet! While I wish some swims had been even better than they were, I didn't have a single bad event, and managed to take down two LPRs that I hadn't thought were even close to within reach this year, one of which I hadn't thought was in reach at all. Definitely the best meet I've ever had, either as an age group swimmer or as an adult.

Looking forward to next season

Looking forward to next year, I really want to hammer the breaststroke training! I'm in uncharted territory now, and know I still have plenty to work on in breast. Who knows where I will finally top out, but my next goals are 31.5/1:06.5/2:30. I also want to get back to working on backstroke--it's still my favorite stroke, but I've neglected it the past few years to focus on fly and, to a much lesser extent, breast. I'd like to get back down to the 2:12 I went in the 200 in 2013. For fly, I'm not going to focus exclusively on the 200 anymore. I've swum it 13 times in the past few years and have topped out at a 2:22. I'll continue to swim it at meets from time to time, but I'm going to be spending too much time on other strokes in training to really devote myself to that event. I'd also like to actually add the 50/100/200 into my event lineup rotations at meets. I'm quite pleased with how I did in them this season and think I could get down to my LPRs if I spend more time working on them at practice. I will be doing the 200 free at a meet in May to see what I can do when I'm rested, and would love to hit a 2:02. Beyond that, I'd like to hit 24.5/54.0/2:00.

Beyond all of that, I want to continue training the amount I am. I don't want to go through this cycle any more where I get in shape for Nationals, then stop swimming more than 1-2 times per week during the summer and fall and pack on the pounds, then cut (most of) the weight in the spring. I cut down from 211 to 188 as of last week, and want to stay in the 180-190 range. And I really want to keep the time in the pool. During the summer, sure, I'll cut down a bit, but my goal is 4 practices a week. Once we go back indoors in the fall, I want to kick it back up to the 6-7 practices per week from the start, and really put the work in to have next season capitalize on this season's many successes.

Great last meet before Nationals!

All in all, I had a great last meet of the season before Nationals yesterday! I swam the 200 fly, 50 free on the 200 free relay, 50 breast, and 200 back. Except for the 50 free, they were all very solid swims.

200 fly

This was great! I wanted to take it out hard and just try to hold on, and I did much better than I expected! The official splits aren't out yet, but watch splits had me at 31, 35, 37, 39. That's only about a second faster than my front half at Nationals last spring, but 4 seconds faster on the back half, including the first time I've been under 41 on the last 50, haha.

I've been really pushing hard in practice the last month or so to maintain 6 kicks off the wall all the time. While my brain reallllllly wants me to come up after 3-4 kicks towards the end of the race, my back and shoulders feel much, much better at the end of the race when I stay underwater for those extra kicks. It paid off! I did 7 kicks off the start, then 6 off every other wall, putting me past the near 15m marker on the lane rope each time! Tried to keep it to 7 strokes per lap, too, but slid to 8 each on the last 50. Gonna try to tighten that up for Nationals.

Anyways, onto the race itself. Before the race, I'm guessing I drank too much water and swallowed some air in the process, because my stomach was seriously unsettled. Bending down on the start, I was legitimately worried I was going to throw up because it did not feel good at all. Pretty much just fell off the block at the start, because I didn't trust my stomach. It was sloshing around on the first 75, and I did big, sloppy turns in an attempt to keep pressure off my stomach and to not do an imitation of Old Faithful. It settled down a bit around the 100 mark, but definitely had me worried for the first half of the race!

My stroke felt good! I think I could have taken it out 1-2 seconds faster on the front half without killing myself. I felt long and relaxed through the 150. Started to tighten up a little bit on the last 50, and kept expecting to feel the piano land on my back, but I never reached that point! Definitely tightened up at the 190, but nowhere near as bad as I normally tighten up during the race.

I figure through the lack of a jump on the start, the slow and sloppy turns, and not taking it out quite as fast as I wanted, I left about 3-4 seconds in the water in this race. That would have put me right at the Nationals cut. My goal for Nationals is to go out in a sub-1:05 and hold on for a 1:10/1:11 on the back half, while keeping to only 7 strokes per lap. I think it's an achievable goal!

50 free on the 200 free relay

Ok, this was the stinker of the meet for me. The block was really wobbly and I went too deep on the start (I led off the relay). I then managed to turn too far out from the wall and hit almost straight legged...and hit with my feet too high on the wall in the process, resulting in me going really deep off the turn. Took forever to get back up to the surface, and I ended up splitting something like a 26.2. Nothing about that race was good!

50 breast

I had 2 heats of the 50 breast between our 200 free relay and my heat, so I had enough time to stretch out for about 1.5 minutes, then was up again. All in all, it was better than I expected! My pullout off the start and turn felt disjointed, and I just felt odd doing sprint breaststroke, given that all my breast training this year has been for the 200. I was long on the turn, too. I went a 32.6, which is my second fastest Masters time behind the 32.07 I went at Nationals last spring.

200 back

This was about 10 minutes after the 50 breast, and about 12 minutes after the 50 free. I'd warmed down a 150, but was definitely feeling the back to back races. My left foot cramped off the start, and was stuck curled inwards until it stretched out on the 75 turn. So not fun! I was really long on the first four turns, then ended up jamming the last turn. Just felt out of sync for most of the race, although the last 50, jammed turn aside, felt pretty darn good. Legs were burning by the 125, but that's normal in the 200 back. I can definitely tell I have done zero backstroke training this year--from the turns being all over the place to the pacing feeling off, those are all things I don't have to deal with when I train backstroke! I'll be interested to see how my splits were, since my last 50 felt like the best one. I wouldn't be surprised if it was faster than the middle two 50s.

Still, I went a 2:22 and change, which is right around the fastest I've been in season since 2013. I went a 2:19 at Nationals last year, and I think I could go under that fairly easily if I were to swim it at Nationals in Greensboro...which I'm not going to. Since I'm not coaching the kids next season, I'll have more time to train, so maybe I'll be able to add in backstroke to my training regimen again.

All in all, this was a pretty darn good meet! Abysmal 50 free aside, I am very happy with how I swam, and this just reinforces the good vibes I'm getting for Nationals in 5.5 weeks!

I'm baaaaaack!

All in all, I've been swimming better at meets this year than I expected, but didn't have any resounding races at meets to prove that point. Until this past weekend, anyways!

Last weekend was the Albatross Open, a short course meters meet held annually in Bethesda. I don't particularly like doing short course meters--since I don't train SCM, the shift from the flags being 5Y to 5M from the wall is jarring on backstroke. That's really the only problem I have with it besides having to do the conversions to figure out what my yards times would be on each race. Except for the flags issue, I don't mind the extra stroke or two I have to take on each lap. *Long* course meters...well, that's a whole 'nuther story!

Anyways, I had decided that I wanted to do a meet this season that wasn't almost solely comprised of my focus events, so I signed up for only events I haven't trained for: 200 IM, 100 back, and 50 free. I ended up swimming the 200 IM, 100 back, 50 free twice on 200 free relays, and then a 50 fly instead of my planned individual 50 free.

My thought process was that I wanted to race (I love racing!), but I wanted a meet of just throwaway events that wouldn't bum me out if I didn't do as well as I'd hoped. And with this meet being SCM, the stars aligned and let me just have fun. In addition, I set out with the goal this season of doing every event from the 400 IM on down at least once, so it gave me a chance to knock off most of the backlog with no impact on my overall training/racing plan.

200 IM

Not only have I not trained for the 200 IM this year, I haven't trained IM period, and for the past couple of months, have only trained for fly. I went in with very low expectations and was very pleasantly surprised!

Fly felt pretty good. Could have pushed it a bit harder, but pacing felt pretty good. Back felt decent, nothing spectacular, although I was a bit long on the flipturn (and didn't get a full breath going into the turn, so came up a bit early), and was a full stroke too long on the transition turn. I totally dropped an F bomb when I reached for the wall and saw how far away I was, haha! Started running low on oxygen on the breast leg, and had probably the two shortest pullouts I've had in a loooong time. Free was very tight, but it felt much less like a dumpster fire than it normally does in my 200 IM, so I'll take it!

I went a 2:37.21, which converts to a 2:21.63 yards. That would be my third fastest Masters time and the fastest I've been since Zones in 2013, when I was 15 pounds lighter than I am now (had a beard then, it just wasn't quite as Poseidon-esque as it is now). I'd also been training IM that year, so I'm very pleased with this swim! I'm not going to be doing the 200 IM again till next season (only have two meets left this season and will not be swimming it at either), but it gives me hope that I could dip back down below 2:20, which I've only done once as a Masters swimmer!

100 back

I was very surprised with how this one turned out! I have done absolutely zero backstroke training this year, and have probably swum less backstroke in the last five months than I did in a single week during the 2013 season, which I spent focused primarily on backstroke. I had very low expectations and just didn't want to embarrass myself too much.

During the race, I thought it wasn't going very well. My underwaters weren't up to my normal backstroke snuff besides the start, and my turnover felt even slower than it normally is. On top of that, I was long on the first two turns and the finish, and started running out of steam around the 70m mark.

I was shocked when I saw my time! 1:10.35, which converts to a 1:03.37 yards! I was half a second faster than that at an in-season meet in February 2013, but haven't been faster than a 1:03.3 since Nationals 2013. I was quite surprised that even with no backstroke training and all the handicaps of a SCM meet, I was right in the mix with my times from three years ago, my best season as a Masters swimmer!

I'm doing the 200 back on 3/20, so now I'm quite intrigued by what I might do in it. It was originally just going to be a throwaway event, the last of my sub-400 IM events left to check off the list, but me being able to throw down a converted low 1:03 here makes me wonder if I'll be able to dip below 2:20 at the next meet. I was a 2:19.03 at 2015 Nationals (and haven't broken 2:20 besides that swim since 2013 Nationals), so I'd love it if I could come in under that in a few weeks!

200 free relays

I swam on two 200 free relays, anchored the mixed relay, and went third on the men's relay. I decided to play around with how I swam the two 50s. On the first relay, I galloped. It's a slower, lopsided stroke, but I get a really powerful pull on my left side, which is the dominant side when I gallop (despite me being a righty). On the second relay, I stayed pretty flat and went for a high turnover. The second relay was three heats after the first relay, so I wasn't at 100% for it. Didn't feel nearly as terrible as I have in the past when I've done relays back to back, so that points to substantially improved conditioning than in the past! :-)

Neither of my starts were quick. Really slow reaction time on the first one and marginally quicker reaction on the second, but definitely nothing to write home about. Despite leaving so much time on the block, I was quite happy with my splits! I was a 27.49 on the first one (probably would have been right around 27 flat with a good reaction time!), which converts to 24.76. That is a Masters best for a relay start, and my Masters best flat start is a 24.92 (and that was me shaved/tapered/178 lb at 2012 Nationals!). I'd like to think I'd have a realistic shot at dropping below 25 on a flat start again, which I haven't done since that 2012 relay! I was a 28.48 on the second relay, which converts to a 25.65 yards. Even not being at 100%, that's still right in the mix with my best flat start times from the past few years, so I also find it promising!

I thought the first one was a better overall race for me. I've been experimenting with staying underwater longer off the dive and turn, and I think it really paid off. Totally geeking out with numbers, I looked at the videos of that 200 free relay from 2012 and these two relays, and despite the difference in length of the two courses, found some interesting stroke count numbers.

-2012: 12 out, 18 back

-2016 #1: 13 out, 17 back

-2016 #2: 13 out, 19 back

I swam flat on both the 2012 and 2016 #2 relays, and think the extra stroke on both laps to be pretty self explanatory with the extra distance of the SCM pool. For 2016 #1, though, I find it interesting that I took one stroke less coming back despite going a further distance. I think that's primarily due to my underwater off the turn! If I can cover that much extra ground underwater, despite being 27 pounds heavier and not shaved/tapered, and be *right there* with my time, I'm hoping to throw down some good times on the relays at Nationals!

50 fly

I had planned on swimming free for my individual 50 free, but completely on a whim I decided to swim fly, instead. I'd already done the 50 free twice on the relays and was quite happy with my times on both, so decided I'd give fly a shot. I haven't trained any speed work for fly yet (switching to speed work in April, up till now it's all been distance and 200 pace work), so wanted to see how it'd go. Even with being my 5th race of the day, it went pretty well! I went a 31.01, which converts to a 27.93. That would tie the time I went at a meet in January 2014, and is the fastest since then. To give some more context, the fastest I've been since 2013 Nationals was a 27.76 in October 2013, and that's when I was still training speed work. I'm not doing the 50 fly again this season, so it doesn't mean anything in the grand scheme of things, but is a nice data point to have.

All in all, this was a great meet, much better than I expected! My in-season success in non-focus events has now got me quite optimistic for Nationals!

Thoughts and rumination on the 200 butterfly

Me and the 200 fly very much have a love-hate relationship. I love to hate it and it loves to torture me, and in return I love to swim it some more.

As a Masters swimmer, it is my own personal 200th circle of hell. At times, I've been this guy. I've blacked out during the race and managed to get DQd not once, but twice. I've had a 31 second gap between my front half and back half of the race. I've choked on water when deep into oxygen deprivation and gone into survival mode.

I've had all those terrible things happen to me in that race, yet I keep coming back for more. That last 50 is usually sheer hell on earth, but the entire race itself is something I just love. That might say something about me, but I don't know if it's good or bad.

I've picked three things as being vital to a good 200 fly for me, based on the last three years of evidence:

1. Conditioning. My closest 200 split to date was a 12 second gap between the first and second halves. Over the past few years, I've been training enough to have the speed necessary to take the 200 out well...but haven't had near the conditioning to bring it back well.
2. Underwaters. The 200 fly is a cold blooded killer when it comes to my back and shoulder muscles. That last 50 usually is so painful because those muscles are knotted up, on fire, and screaming for relief. The more time I can spend underwater, the less stress I have on those muscle groups, and theoretically the less abysmal that last 50 is going to be.
3. Mental fortitude. The 200 fly is a daunting race, no matter how good at it or in shape you are. Some of my races, I've fallen victim to my own mind games and not attacked it as I should. I need to attack the race and stick with it, no matter how much pain I'm in, rather than taking the easy way out and half assing the race. If you're gonna swim the 200 fly, you need to full ass it!

With that in mind, I compared my most recent 200 fly from a few weeks ago with my Masters best 200 fly, from Nationals in San Antonio last spring.

Timewise, I was a 2:28 last year, out in a 1:08 and back in a 1:20. A few weeks ago, I was out in a 1:11 and back in something like a 1:23. There was a timing snafu, so I'm not actually sure what my real splits were. At Nationals I was rested, shaved, tapered, and had a brand new meet suit. At this recent meet, I was none of those, and had a bunch of cramping problems. That said, my splits, while slower, were right in line with my Nationals splits! I'm also swimming much more than I was last year, so I'm hoping to bring that back half split down quite a bit over the remaining two months till this spring's Nationals.

I watched the videos of both races and did some analysis on stroke and underwater dolphin kick count per lap. The first set of numbers is the number of underwater kicks and strokes per lap last year, second set is the kick/stroke count for the meet a few weeks ago.

1. 6/6 - 6/6
2. 3/9 - 5/8
3. 3/9 - 5/7
4. 3/9 - 5/8
5. 3/9 - 4/8
6. 2/9 - 4/9
7. 3/9 - 4/8
8. 3/8 - 3/8

All in all, I did 10 more dolphin kicks and took 6 fewer strokes a few weeks ago than I did last spring. My goal by Nationals is to be able to take at least 5 dolphin kicks on each lap and no more than 8 strokes each lap. I'd love to get it to 5 kicks and 7 strokes per lap, but I don't know if that will be feasible within 2 months, but definitely think it will be achievable for next year.

I'm racing the 200 fly at two more meets before Nationals--one this weekend and one on March 20th. By the March 20th meet, I should be down below 200 pounds (I'm at ~206 right now and was at about the same weight last spring at Nationals). By Nationals, I should be around 190ish, and will have the full shave, taper, rest, and new suit. Combining that with 2 months of heavy butterfly training, and I hope to have a quite successful 200 fly at Nationals!

Goal time is sub-2:19.30. Hope I can make it happen!

Update on 2015/2016 training plan and progress so far

I'm doubling down this season and really striving to have it be my best (training) season since my first Masters season, the 2011/2012 one. During that season, I was getting in shape in the water again and losing weight. I was swimming 5 practices a week on average, and managed 7 a week during that winter, although I hit less during the fall and spring.

I went from weighing around 215 to 178 from October-April of that season, with the 178 being the weight I clocked when I hopped on the scale after doing the full shave for Nationals that spring.

Unfortunately, since then, I averaged about 2.5 practices a week during the '12/'13, '13/'14, and '14/'15 seasons, and it showed in two main ways: performance at meets and weight.

My meet performance has been all over the place. 2013 spring Nationals, my backstroke was lights out, my fly had regressed a bit from 2012 spring Nationals, and my IM was right there with 2012. 2014 summer Nationals was largely a disappointment, and 2015 spring Nationals was only a success in my breaststroke events and the 200 fly, and the latter was only a success because I set a pretty darn low bar for it. During in season meets, I've laid some real stinkers, but also a random smattering of good swims. I attribute that to low yardage and lack of time spent on training the strokes I want to focus on.

My weight has gone up and down in the 3.5 years since April 2012, with my weight at 2013 spring Nationals coming in at 187, my weight at 2014 summer Nationals (didn't do spring Nationals) coming in around 195, and my weight at 2015 spring Nationals right around 200. My weight peaked this summer/early fall at around 215. Over the last month, it has dropped to the 207-210 range (depending on how accurate my scale is--it varies a couple of pounds day to day).

My goal weight for April is 185-190. Unlike in 2012, I'm also doing dryland, so I expect I'll be putting on muscle mass which will counteract some of the weight loss.

Okay, all that aside, now that I'm two months into the season, here's my training plan. Unlike how I've set my training plan before the season in years past and failed miserably to actually execute on the plan, I've been making solid progress towards it for the past 3-4 weeks, and don't foresee any issues with it moving forward.

Weekly training plan

• Monday: 45-60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice if work permits
• Tuesday: 60 minute morning Masters practice, 45-60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice, (solo practice if work permit)
• Wednesday: 60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice
• Thursday: 60 minute morning Masters practice, 60 minute stroke focused evening solo practice, (solo practice if work permits)
• Friday: Rest day
• Saturday: 60 minute morning Masters practice
• Sunday: Rest day

So far I've been consistently doing the Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday portions of the training plan, and added in the Tuesday evening practice this week. That's a total of 5 practices a week. I plan to add in the Tuesday morning practice next week, which will put me up to 6 per week. Monday is probably going to be the iffiest practice to make, since I coach from 6:00-8:30 in the evening, and that really cuts it close as far as my potential work schedule goes. It'll be a stretch goal--if I can get my work schedule to permit it, it'll be a great additional practice that'll let me train for another stroke.

To date, I've been using my solo practices to do fly training, specifically focused on bulk fly yardage to get my endurance up. I've been doing a lot of fly yardage with fins on, specifically focused on approximate 200 pacing, underwater kicks off the wall, and distance per stroke. Besides doing general fly yardage, there have been three fly fin sets I've used as my target sets to see how I'm doing from practice to practice (I rotate through the sets, don't do them all every time I swim on my own):

Set #1

4 x 50 on 1:00, trying to hold 200 effort level/pace

3 x 100 on 2:00, trying to hold within 1 second of 50 pace

2 x 150 on 3:00, trying to hold within 2 seconds of 50 pace

1 x 200 on 4:00, trying to hold within 3 seconds of 50 pace

Set #2

6 times through

1 x 100 on 2:00, aiming for 200 effort level/pace

1 x 50 on 1:00, aiming for 3 seconds faster than pace on 100

Set #3

6 x 150 on 3:00, aiming for 200 effort level/pace

I've failed both times I've attempted Set #3 so far. The first time, I made it through number 5, then physically was unable to complete the last 150 without breaking stroke. I'd held a pretty consistent pace on the first 3, with the third one being about 5 seconds slower than the first one, then added about 5 seconds on number 4, about 10 seconds on number 5, and didn't make the last one.

The second time I failed was last night, when it was my third practice in 24 hours. I did the first 150 and was just so sluggish in the water that I knew I wouldn't be able to make it past the third 150, so I switched to doing Set #2, instead (only did 5 rounds, though, instead of 6)

I did pretty well on it! I went 1:05, 1:06, 1:06, 1:06, 1:06 on the 100s, and was :30, :31, :30, :29, :29 on the 50s. I've really been working on the underwaters and distance per stroke the past few weeks. Of course, when the fins come off, I'll have to work on it all over again, but building that muscle endurance base with fins works pretty well for me. Anyways, my 100s were consistently 5, 5, 5, and 6 strokes per lap, with 8, 8, 7, and 6 underwater kicks per wall. 

If I can get the DPS and underwaters to where I'd like them (no more than 7 strokes per lap, and at least 5 underwater kicks, all without fins), that should go a long ways towards getting me to the point where I no longer feel like I have an entire cargo train's load worth of pianos falling on my back on the last 50 of the 200 fly.

If I can maintain the practice schedule going forward, I intend to keep the solo Wednesday and Thursday practices fly focused, and rotate between back, breast, and fly on the Monday and Tuesday solo practices.

Pending my work schedule (tentatively start at the new job next week), I feel like the training plan is definitely achievable if I can keep my motivation up.

With all that said, here are my focus events this year, along with my recent best time (from spring 2013 through the most recent meet), goal time for this season, and stretch goal time for this season. I'm standing by the goal time, and have set stretch goal times in case my training goes even better than I expect and I blow the doors off in the spring. The bolded goal times are the events whose goal times are the Nationals cuts. The 400 IM is a stretch goal for me this season. I'm not going to do it in a meet till January or February. If it's a bad swim at that meet, I'm not going to go for it this season; if it's a good swim, I'll try to fit it into my training regimen, although I won't do it at Nationals.

Realistically, the 200 fly is my primary focus event this season. I'm not doing much backstroke training (at least compared to the lead up to the '13 spring Nationals when I went lights out in my backstroke events and spent that entire season almost solely training backstroke), so the backstroke goal times for this season are off my best times. I really like the breast events, but it's a matter of devoting time to training for them, time that will be taken away from my fly training. The IM training is primarily my training for the individual strokes and building up my aerobic base, not doing much specific IM training.

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Event	Recent Best Time	Goal Time	Stretch Goal Time
200 fly	2:28.71	2:19.30	2:15.00
100 fly	1:00.18	59.75	59.50
200 back	2:12.90	2:15.00	2:12.90
100 back	1:00.40	1:01.00	1:00.40
200 breast	2:43.20	2:40.00	2:38.50
100 breast	1:11.41	1:11.00	1:10.50
50 breast	32.07	32.00	31.75
200 IM	2:20.25	2:19.30	2:17.00
100 IM	1:01.56	1:01.16	1:01.00
400 IM*	5:09.40	4:59.93	4:55.00

I've got my work cut out for me!

First (awesome) meet of the season, baby!

Yesterday I had my first meet of the season. Every October, there's a sprint meet at George Mason. The longest events are the 200 free and 200 IM, with their being 25s, 50s, and 100s of all the strokes, and the 100 IM, as well. It's a fun, fast meet, and usually serves as a pretty good barometer for how I'm going to do that year.

Well, I had a great meet! Hopefully this year will be a great year!

I swam 7 events: 100 breast, 100 IM, 50 back, and then all four 25s in IM order. Here's how they went down.

100 breast

While swimming the race, I was disappointed. I'd had some fantastic starts in warmup, but it felt like I basically just fell off the block in the race. Good reaction time, but no explosiveness, and I was merely middle of the pack on the first underwater pullout, versus leading the pack as I normally do. Finally felt like I was picking up speed going into the first turn, though, and the middle 50 felt phenomenal. My biceps started to lock up really bad on the last lap and I could feel myself slowing down, but I kept at it. I did way better than I was expecting with a 1:12.84. That's my fastest in-season 100 breast time and is only 1.47 seconds off my shaved and tapered time from Nationals in San Antonio. My two other in-season 100 breast times are a 1:13.77 from this past March, and a 1:14.18 from February 2013.

After watching video of my breaststroke races from San Antonio and watching the pros swim breast, I've been working on shooting my hands forward faster than is habitual for me. This was the first race I've done that at, and I feel like it really made a difference.

Maybe there's hope for my breaststroke after all! :-P

100 IM

This was another great race! I had a great start, fly felt like I was stuck in 6th gear instead of 7th gear, but body rhythm surprisingly felt good (on a side note, for the past few years, I have had a really hard time getting the proper body rhythm on fly when I sprint--I'm fine on the 100 and 200, but body rhythm has been all out of whack on the 50 or 25). Back was good, although I botched the timing of the back-breast turn--I had the timing down to do the crossover turn, but had a brain fart and ended up doing a slower open turn. Breast and free surprisingly felt great. That's where I always fall apart in the IM, no matter if it's a 100, 200, or 400. I was going to be happy if I swam a 1:05 (last time I swam the 100 IM, February 2014, I went a 1:06 and change). My gast was truly flabbered when I looked up at the scoreboard and saw that I went a 1:03.48! That's my second fastest in-season time, with the only faster in-season time (1:02.78) coming from February 2013. The 2012-2013 season was my best season to date, so to see that I'm just a shade over half a second off my best in-season time from my best season, and it happening 4 months earlier in the season, to boot, is awesome!

50 back

This was my only "disappointing" swim of the meet, and it was only disappointing in that it wasn't as good as the other swims. I had a simply rotten start and turn, resulting in me being stuck underwater for way too long. I may or may not have surfaced past the 15m mark off the start, but there were no judges on the side to look for it, thankfully. On the turn, my feet hit too high on the bulkhead, so I went straight down. Came up before the 15m mark that time, but stayed underwater for 4 dolphin kicks longer than I wanted to. Even with all that (I figure I lost half a second due to being stuck underwater, at least), I went a 30.07. In season, that's the fastest I've been since this same meet in 2013, when I went a 30.06. My best in-season time is a 29.32 from February 2013, when all I was training was backstroke. With better underwaters, I would have been in the ballpark for my best in-season time, so I'll take it!

25 fly

Meh, I can't sprint fly. Let me rephrase that...meh, I can't sprint, period. That being said, it was a good race! Like I mentioned earlier, I've had issues the past few years with getting a good body rhythm going on sprint fly. Well, I had that here, and it felt like I stayed completely flat in the water. Oh well, I still went a 12.89, which is a Masters best by .02. :-)

25 back

Much better start on this one than on the 50 back. Came up when I wanted to and went a 14.25, which is a Masters best by .36.

25 breast

I had a much better start on this one than on the 100 breast, going a 15.12 and setting a Masters best by .30 in the process.

25 free

I was a 12.09 on this one, completely botched the finish--thought I was a stroke further out from the wall than I actually was and pulled with my right arm, and as it was coming out of the water on the recovery, right before I started to pull with my left arm, my left hand hit the wall. Oops. Turns out this one wasn't a Masters best, missed it by .06. Should have been under 12 if I'd actually finished appropriately!

********************

I am beyond pleased with how this meet went! It's the best in-season meet I've had in 2.5 years, and since I've got another 6 months of training to go in this season, I now have high hopes for what April will bring in Greensboro!

Woohoo, Nationals, baby!

The 2015 USMS Spring National Championship was this past weekend in San Antonio. It was a great meet! Phenomenal pool (new outdoor, state of the art Myrtha 50m pool) and mostly good weather. I swam a total of 8 events: 100 fly, 50 breast, 100 back, and 50 free leading off our 200 free relay on Friday; 200 back, 100 breast, 200 fly on Saturday; 50 back leading off our 200 medley relay on Sunday. Here's how it went.

100 fly

Oops. All in all, this wasn't a terrible race, but I botched it pretty badly. I'd been psyching myself up so much for the 200 fly last week that from the time behind the blocks to about the 40-45 yard point, I was thinking I was doing the 200 fly. I was happy with how stretched out and relaxed I felt, and it wasn't till going into the 50 that I remembered I was doing the 100. Tried to kick up the pace accordingly on the second 50, but was only moderately successful. My splits were 28.93 and 33.73, for a 1:02.66. I should have been out at least 1.5 seconds faster, and would have liked the second 50 to have been closer to a 31-32 pace. Oh well. 1:02.66 isn't a terrible time for me, and is the fastest I've been since Nationals in 2013. On a side note...it helps to make sure your suit is tied *before* the ref blows the whistle to get up on the block...

50 breast

Argh, so close! After swimming a great 50 breast at Zones two weeks prior, I was hoping to break a 32 on this race. I had a good start (not a great one, though--I was still getting used to having the kick pad on the block and it was a bit rough) and great first 25. My turn was a bit sloppy, having been slightly off on my timing of the last stroke into the wall. Started to fade a bit on the last 10 yards and ended up with a 32.07. That was a Masters best by .65, but I still wanted to break 32! For next season, I'm going to try to add in some breaststroke to my training mix, since I did more breast while at meets (warming up and in the races) this season than I did in practice. While I'm thinking I may have to give up on any hope of being able to transfer standalone breaststroke speed to being able to split a good breast leg in an IM, I would really like to be able to throw down some good times in the 50/100/200 breast next year and maybe add them to my event lineup.

100 back

This wasn't a very good race. I had a terrible start--I've never learned how to properly do a backstroke start while holding onto the handles, so I've always held on to the gutter; this pool didn't have a lip, so I was holding on to the maybe .25 inch thick top of the pad, which provides nothing in the way of grip. I lost a lot of ground off the initial wall, and then upon coming up, I just couldn't get my arms moving fast. I hadn't done any speed training in backstroke this season (and only a little bit of backstroke training at all), but I didn't think it would have affected me as much. The rest of the race, while slow, was solid, even with an abysmal turn at the 75 (I hit the top of the pad and pushed it up, which resulted in me going straight down). I went 30.38 and 33.24, for a 1:03.62. That's the fastest I've been since 2013 Nationals.

(Alaina had some camera issues at the beginning of the race, but you can watch my race from the 25 on...)

200 free relay

This was disappointing! I had what I thought was a great start, and felt really good the whole time. Had what was probably one of my best sprint free turns (usually I royally botch the timing of the turn when I'm doing the 50) and felt good coming down the stretch. I took one breath down, one breath back. It felt like a really good race, but I only went a 25.81 (coincidentally, that's the exact time I went the last time I swam the 50 free, at the Sprint Classic meet in the fall of 2013). Dan said it looked like I ran out of steam on the last 12.5 yards, but I totally didn't feel like it!

200 back

This was a much better race overall than the 100 back! I had a good start, but my right goggle filled up when I hit the water. I couldn't see very well, so I decided to err on the side of caution and took my first three turns pretty long. Felt pretty good during the race and split it quite well. I went 31.55, 34.88, 36.07, 36.53, for a 2:19.03. That's the fastest I've been since 2013 Nationals, and right at my in season times during that season. Given my aforementioned lack of backstroke training this season, I'll take it! On a side note, this was a very wide spread heat--fastest time was a 1:48, slowest was a 2:21. Not really any competition there... :-)

100 breast

I went another Masters best in this event, after going a MB at Zones two weeks prior, but faded pretty hard down the stretch on the last 25. I split 32.67 and 38.74, for a 1:11.41, a MB by .28. I was hoping for a 1:10, but I guess I'll have to settle for a 1:11. :-)

200 fly

I went a Masters best in this event and finally broke 2:30! I just focused on staying relaxed and had a comparatively great swim. As always, I died towards the end, but it was a much more evenly paced showing than every other time I've swum it in Masters. My splits were 31:48, 36.52, 39.46, and 41.25, for a 2:28.71. As an aside, my best swim in the past couple of years had been at Zones two weeks previously, and I had been a 2:34, with my last 50 being a 46. I still have a ton to work on, but after 3 years of working on this event, I finally broke the glass ceiling that is the 2:30 mark! My goal is to break 2:20 for 2016 sprint Nationals in Greensboro. Ideally I'll be able to take it out in a 1:05-1:06 and bring it back in a 1:13-1:14. Lots of work to be done, but I'm finally happy with this race!

200 medley relay

This was my and Alaina's last event of the meet, and we left for the airport right after it. I did back, Lindsey did breast, Dan did fly, and Alaina did free. I had a surprisingly good (well, relatively good) 50 back, and went a 28.94. That was only the third time I've broken a 29, and my second fastest Masters time, after the 28.21 I went after a season of backstroke training at 2013 spring Nats. I'll take it! Of course, Matt Grevers led off his team's relay in the heat after us with a paltry 21.51. I was less than 7.5 seconds slower than him!!!! :-)

*****************************

All in all, it was a great meet! I did better in some races than in others, with my highlights being the 200 fly, 50 breast, and 50 back on the 200 medley relay.

Looking forward to the 2016 Spring Nationals in Greensboro, NC, I'm going to continue to focus on the 200 fly and add in some actual breast training. Tentatively, I'll swim the 100/200 fly and two of the 50/100/200 breast, and the 100/200 back. Except for the 200 fly, that's all up in the air. 

Last competitions before championship season, baby!

This past weekend was filled with the last non-championship meets of the 2014-2015 season for me. The kids I coach had their last short course meet of the season Friday-Sunday, and I had a Masters meet on Sunday. I mostly had my Nationals lineup already set, I just wanted to see where I was in my training a month out.

On Friday, I swam the 400 IM with the kids, then swam the 100 breast and 100 back with them on Saturday. I then swam the 200 fly, 50 breast, 200 back, and 50 back (on the medley relay) on Sunday. On top of all that, I spent an additional 9 hours at the pool on Saturday coaching the kids, most of it on my feet. I was definitely feeling it on Sunday! Anyways, with all that said, here's how everything went down.

400 IM

Hahahahaha! I hadn't raced this in two years, and the last time I'd swum it, I'd taken it out to fast and horribly crashed and burned on the back half. Behind the blocks on Friday, I kept telling myself to take it out easier and not kill myself on the front half...and proceeded to psyche myself out. I took it out criminally slow on the front half and was a 1:13 or 1:14 on the fly, then felt like I was barely inching along on the back. The breast didn't feel too bad, and the free wasn't a complete trainwreck like the 2013 swim, but the whole thing was slow. I went a 5:24 compared to that meet from two years ago's 5:11. My fly split alone was 6 seconds slower, so I can only imagine that the back was probably a similar amount slower. The results from the meet haven't been posted yet, so I don't know what my splits looked like except for the fly.

Oh well.

I plan to cut my kids coaching schedule back by two nights a week next season, so that should hopefully give me a solid 4-5 opportunities to practice each week, up from my current 2-3. Maybe then I'll finally be able to actually train for the 400 IM!

100 back

I wasn't feeling all that great going into this swim. I hadn't left the pool the previous night till around 8:00, and then was up at 5:15 to head back to the pool. Hadn't slept all that well, either, so it was just a bundle of fun. On top of all that, since I was actively coaching kids in the morning session, I'd had time for a whopping 300 warmup going into the race. Not my best preparation, I'll admit.

Anyhoo, onto the race itself.

I had a very lethargic start, but then kicked it (ha, pun intended!) into high gear once I was underwater. Totally killed the rest of my heat underwater, especially the kid next to me, but they were all better on the surface. I came up with about a half bodylength lead on the field, but they'd all caught up to me by the turn. I proceeded to pull ahead again off the 25 turn, but then lost the lead going into the 50 turn...then messed up my stroke count and turned about a foot away from the wall. Lost most of my momentum and had a resulting weak push off the wall, but made up enough ground underwater to pull even at my breakout. From there on I was behind the pack, ran out of steam on the last 25, and ended up 6th out of 7 in my heat with a 1:04.7.

Given my complete lack of backstroke training since the holidays, and everything else going on, I'm quite happy with that swim! It's the fastest I've been since last January, too. I'm hoping that with the more optimal conditions of Nationals (rest, taper, shave, better suit, an actual warmup, etc), I'll be around a 1:01.

100 breast

This was the first time swimming it since spring of 2013. Given my utter lack of breaststroke training since I busted my left knee last February (I've done maybe a total of 500 yards of breast since then), I had very low expectations. In addition, like with the 100 back, I had only a 300 warmup going into the event and was still a bit tight from the earlier race.

And yet I did much better than I thought!

I had a good dive and excellent underwaters throughout (seeing a theme here?), but got crushed on the surface. Going off the kid next to me, I'd routinely pull out a bodylength lead underwater, then he'd catch up to me by the next wall. Rinse and repeat. I really started to feel the 100 back around the 75, when my lats and shoulders started to burn, but pushed through it and ended up 4th in my heat of 7 with a 1:13.7, my 2nd fastest Masters time! My Masters best is a 1:11.74 from Zones in 2013, so I'm hoping I can get close to that at Zones or Nationals in April. I actually really liked this race and might add it to my repertoire next season, rather than having it be a pretty much one-off event.

200 fly

Oof. Again, not a great setup for the race. Although I had gotten a full night of sleep and was more rested than I was for the 100 back or 100 breast on Saturday, I was feeling rundown from the 11.5 hours at the pool the previous day. Energy level was at maybe 75%, and to put a cherry on that sundae, I had forgotten to seed our relays before the meet and spent most of the warmup time period putting them together, resulting in only about a 400 warmup. Definitely a pattern this weekend!

All that said...it was a good swim!

I made the switch to breathing every stroke (except the first stroke off the wall) in training a few weeks ago and this was my first meet putting that into play. I think it helped! I started to run out of steam at about the 160 yard mark, but it wasn't like at Tropical Splash in January, which felt more like this guy's 200 fly. Rather, it was a tightening up of the lats and shoulders, followed by a deep seated burning in my traps at the 175. Still managed to keep it legal...unlike my two DQ swim in January...and the pacing wasn't as abysmal as it could have been. My splits were 32.04, 38.80, 42.53, and 45.27, for a 2:38.64. Given my low energy level going into the event, I think I could have taken off a handful of seconds under better circumstances. Even though that swim was 2 seconds slower than January's swim, it was a much better race.

My Masters best is a 2:32.90 from 2012, so I'm right in the ballpark. Of course, my lifetime best is a 2:11, so I'm not gonna go there... ;-)

If all goes well at Nationals, I'd like to think I have a shot at going sub-2:30. I've got a month to work out the kinks on pacing and the little things in the race.

50 free (200 free relay)

This was a pretty cruddy swim. I felt terribly uncoordinated in the water and everything felt out of sync. While I think I had a decent start, my underwater off the start felt lethargic, and I turned a bit too early, then started my breakout about 6 inches too deep. Blegh. I went a 26.36, which is pretty darn slow time.

50 breast

After my surprisingly good 100 breast on Saturday, I was actually looking forward to this race. I only had a couple of minutes to warm down between the 200 free relay and this event, so I was kinda nervous about how well I'd do.

I had a great start and pullout, great first 25...and then botched the turn. Sloppy body movements during the actual turn itself, didn't seat my feet properly and pushed off slightly twisted, resulting in me pushing off at an angle and swerving from the middle of the lane to almost under the lane rope on one side. Tried to recover back to the middle on the pullout, but my, uh, lateral movement shenanigans cost me a noticeable bit of speed. Still managed to get more speed and distance underwater than the woman in the lane next to me, but much less so than off the start. Still, I went a 33.64, which is only .3 off my Masters best! I think I would have crushed my Masters best if I hadn't screwed up the turn!

I'm hoping to go around a 33.0 at Zones or Nationals.

200 back

I was really running low on energy by this point, so I figured that instead of killing myself and trying to go a great time, I'd step it back a notch and just aim for a respectable time. I had a decent start and good underwater, then just tried to keep it controlled during the race. I had some breathing difficulties around the 125 and was having trouble getting enough air in through my mouth, and spent that whole 25 debating how much of a time penalty it would be if I ripped my nose clip off, and if I could do it without getting DQd. Decided to keep it on, though, and finished the race out pretty well. Coming off the last wall, I wasn't anywhere close to oxygen deprivation, which is usually where I'm at in that portion of the race, so I probably could have attacked the middle 100 of the race harder and shaved off a few seconds. Oh well. My splits were respectable, at 33.04, 36.44, 37.31, and 36.77 for a 2:23.56. While that time is nothing to write home about, it's right on my best time from last year.

I'm hoping for a sub-2:18 for Nationals.

50 back (200 medley relay)

Ooh boy, this one hurt! It was just a few minutes after my 200 back, and my quads were completely locked up and felt like they were on fire while I was standing on the deck getting ready to jump in. It felt like I did the 50 backstroke pull, but I managed to put up a 30.36, which is honestly way faster than I expected, and is only about a second off my in shape, in-season time. Given how wiped out I was by that point in the meet, I expected to be much slower than that. Huh, maybe there's some hope for putting up a good split on our medley relay at Nationals!