Training Journal #21

Holy Moly what a day!


Ability to move my neck comfortably in all directions -- CHECK
Final Trial Swim -- CHECK!

Up at 6am today to get to the canal for a 7:30am start. Dad and Christine came with me and paddled a double kayak. I've been feeling kind of off the last few days, like cold symptoms. We were in KW all yesterday for Ingrid and Paul's 25th anniversary, and I could tell by the end of the evening that I was gonna be feeling it the next day. So this morning I had the aches and the sniffles and all that good stuff. But the canal doesn't care how I feel, it was sitting at 65 degrees and my health is irrelevant, I already made it wait a week for me. I couldn't push it another week because you're not supposed to do anything big when you're within a month of your swim date. So I had to do some major psyching up this morning. I think my most effective piece of motivation to myself was, "If you can do 10km when you feel like shit, then you can totally do 20km on a good day!"

Well, I managed to do 11.2km, so we'll see if the second part comes true in a month from now.

We started from the South Niagara Canoe club dock and went right in the direction of downtown Welland. I had never swam in that direction before so that was a good way to start. At least I was looking at new trees and new slabs of concrete. Then it got way more interesting because I was swimming under cool bridges and seeing actual buildings and parks and people. The plan was to go further in that direction to another bridge in our sights, but then we realized that it was the weekend of the Welland Triathlon. There was a swimming course set up right in front of us, and luck would have it that it was starting right as we approached it. I couldn't see the swimmers, but Dad and Christine could from their kayak vantage point. So I quickly swam up and touch a big green inflatable buoy that marked their course, and then turned around and swam away. I swam all the way back to the place where we started and then Christine told me that I'll now have to swim out to the 406 bridge and back. Quick pee break for the kayak crew.

Side note: Christine wants me to be able to pee as I swim so I don't waste time by stopping. EASIER SAID THAN DONE. Try relaxing enough to pee while still moving all your limbs. This will not happen. She's convinced I'll figure it out in the next month. I will not. I have no intentions of doing that.

On that second leg of the swim I was really glad for the kayak beside me. Its just a nice distraction. Its not like I can talk to them while I swim or hear what they're saying, but its something to focus on other than my stroke, and I haven't had much luck with singing to myself or doing much else on the long swims so far. Every so often Dad or Christine would smile at me and give me the thumbs up. Sometimes Christine would have this really concerned look on her face which would give me a heart attack and I would launch into self-assessment mode: "Am I kicking? Is my hand entering the water straight? Am I doing a full recovery? I'll do a few obnoxiously full strokes and splash some water up behind me just so she knows I'm not tired yet. Is my elbow high enough? Am I rotating my body enough?" I asked her about it afterwards and 99% of the time she wasn't thinking any of that, I think it was just her resting face lol. When I turned around at the 406 I was starting to get tired and I was starting to feel the cold. At some point on the way back my hands went completely numb. The last 2km was tough mentally. I'm glad Christine didn't make me do the trial swim in Lake Erie. I think if I swam out into the middle I would just want to get it done once I'd come that far.

The important thing is I did it. I'm not even sure what my time was, but its done, and Christine is happy, which means I'm allowed to be happy. I felt the after-drop on the way home, I'm glad Dad was driving. I went immediately into our hot tub and it took me a good 30 minutes in the tub before I got even close to the point of feeling too warm. For the first 10 minutes I couldn't even feel the heat, I still had goosebumps on my skin!! Then I went to Julie's bridal shower right after that. Can't stop, won't stop.

Last week's mileage: 21.5km (that doesn't include today :)