Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Swim-run combo a dismal failure

OK, let's get the bad part out of the way first...

It almost worked--nutritionally, I think I would have been fine, I had a banana and half a pack of Clif blocks at 6 and then the other half of the Clif blocks after the swim. I still had energy. But there were two problems:

1. That little nylon backpack thingie is not appropriate for running in! Hmmm... and as the weather gets colder, the whole carry-or-wear problem becomes slightly more intractable (perhaps not a great idea to run in winter with wet hair from swimming pool)...

2. Time.

I even made it down into the park--but after a couple hundred yards with the evil little backpack sort of falling all over me, and some anxious looks at my watch, I had to call it a day. Will try and fit in that run this afternoon if I can, or else I'll have to skip it. ARGHHHH!!!

On a brighter note, the swim workout was good.

Warmup: 1000 yards

2 x 150 (100 free, 50 breast)
200 pull
2 x 150 (100 free, 50 back)
200 pull

Then I got slightly off track--I missed the explanation of the main workout, it wasn't on the board and the coach had vanished, and my nice and helpful lanemate wasn't there today either. So I started doing the warmup again (I need to practice my breaststroke and backstroke), I did the first two 150s again; but then I did manage to snag him once he reappeared and got the main set.

Five 200s, starting with 200 pull and then moving down through 150 pull 50 swim, 100 pull 100 swim, 50 pull 150 swim, 200 swim. Try for descending times (but since I was doing these by myself, it defeated me to also keep an eye on the clock--however I tried to do it on effort, and I do think the last couple were a bit faster than the first three).

Did a couple length of breaststroke again to fill in the wait, it seemed to go much better today... not nearly so frantically out of breath!

And then a very nice little final bit of work, 8 50s on 1:00. I really like doing these little sets, it's hard work but very enjoyable. The first few were probably :53 or so, then up to :54, but I did the last couple at :50...

I must not have excessive self-reproach about the failure to run also! But for future I will note that I do think that if I want a run immediately following, it probably needs to be just three miles on the treadmill at the gym--this is easier to handle, both logistically and psychologically.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Yes -- no self-reproach! You tried, it didn't work. So you rework the approach. And dreadmills have their uses. ;-)

Jenny Davidson said...

Yep, that's right...