Thursday 01/07/10

Another foggy day this am. It has been a bit eerie lately in San Ramon at the butt crack of dawn.
I got to the gym at 5:00 to prepare for another 2350 yd swim. The warm-up (300 yds) and drills (450 yds) again were on the sluggish side.
The meat of the workout was a selection of 300 yds drills. 5 sets of different strokes.
The first set was DPS (distance per stroke). The goal is to take as few strokes as possible for a lap. It is relaxing in that you are not moving alot because you are trying to coast.
The second set was breathing every 3 strokes. NOT my comfort zone. The drill is done to improve breathing on both sides, just in case you have to. My issue is that I can't relax if I breath every 3 strokes, I tense up. So I spoke with Coach Mike and he said work on breathing on your left on the way down and on your right on the way back. Problem solved!!!!!
The third set was increasing speed every 100 yds from level 3 to level 5. Level 5 is race day speed (a speed I can maintain over 2.4 miles).
The fourth set was breathing every 3 again and I changed that up like I did before.
The fifth set was increasing speed every 100 yds from level 4 to level 6. This part was comical as I tried to swim at level 6 after swimming 2000+ yds. That did NOT happen!!I was back to being a tugboat.
I finished the 100 yd cool down and felt pretty good about the workout.
The distances are steadily increasing, but I am feeling OK with them so far....