Sunday, January 11, 2009

Scales: fish-kind and "uh oh" kind

Today was a big day for me.

I got on the scale.

Uh oh!

While the number was not a big surprise, it is a bigger number than I want.

I certainly lived it up between my birthday and January 1st -- so now the Piper must be paid...with less calories in and more calories burned.

All in all, the number wasn't as scary as I thought and I should be able to get back to a more reasonable training weight within six to eight weeks, if I do this nice and steady.

I also went to a 3-hour swim clinic (hence, the loose association to "fish" referenced above).

Dave Cameron taught the clinic. I've worked with Dave a lot over the last few years and he has helped me become a more efficient swimmer. (Then again, when we first started working together, he was working with a guppy-student that was probably a "1" on the scale (yet another fish refrence)of 1 - 10 for efficiency).

I finally got to sign up for an advanced class -- YIPPEE. He had a clinic for beginners before the advanced clinic started. There were maybe 20 people in it. It was fun for me to watch them and to actually see some of the "newbie" things they did that I no longer do.

For example, I no longer swim like a barge (flat in the water). I swim more like a sailboat (up on my sides), which helps me cut through the water better.

Our workshop only had four swimmers; I was the only girl.

We did a warm up working on focal points: 3 sets of 200 free counting swim stroke; 100 skate; 100 build. First set focused on head position; second on extension; third on hip rotations.

Then we played 9 rounds of "golf", where you add your strokes and your time while working on drills.

I did okay on the first two rounds, but slowed down considerably in the other 7...Fortnately, the boys weren't too much further ahead of me, so I didn't feel too wimpy.

Then we did a 50 (25 strong/ 25 sprint). Dave filmed us during the golf game and the sprint and we all watched the videos for pointers, etc.

We did some more drill work (kicking; extensions, etc.). It was all wonderful.

I learned a lot and have some great things to work on.

Dave is supposed to email us our tapes, so I'm hoping to post one here.

I'm getting excited for tri season!

6 comments:

IronWaddler said...

Sounds like a great workout and clinic. I don't think I will ever make it to advanced.

TRI TO BE FUNNY said...

Awesome!! I swear the more I swim, the more I find something I need to CHANGE!!! I'll keep at it :-)

Christopher, Amanda, and Babies said...

I am dreading getting into the pooooool. Great job!

Vickie said...

A clinic sounds like a very good alternative to multi night masters classes. I do not feel the need to spend 3 hours a week at 3 nights a week, swimming. But a 3 or 4 hour clinic sounds like it can accomplish just as much. I'm still going to swim on my own but this way I can get my running and biking in too. I'm going to look here for something. Great idea.

Sunshine said...

Hey, cool, no longer swimming like a barge: I love that.
Swimming sounds like a great diversion from the alternating snow, sub-zero, snow, sub-zero, snow ... and tomorrow back to sub-zero.
Good job.

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