"Just keep swimming, just keep swimming."

Monday 8^th October 2012

Swimming

1300M

Back to the Tri club swimming sessions coached by Oliver Harkin.

These really are good sessions as they are structured and focus on improving technique – hence the relatively low distance covered during the session – but this is not about endurance, or even necessarily speed at this stage.  It is about good technique and the speed will hopefully come from that.

There is a big focus on kick drills and it has confirmed to me what I already knew, which is that I literally have no kick.  I make virtually no forward movement with just my kick and am totally reliant on my upper body and arms for forward momentum.

I look around me and people are going a LOT faster than me just kicking and I wonder how the hell I can’t do it, given all the years of running I thought I would have had strong legs.  Maybe this is part of the problem.  I don’t know, but I will trust in the training and keep working on it.

Wednesday 10^th October 2012

Swimming

1300M

Before the training, Arran and I went to meet Powerhouse Sports to talk about kit for the Tri Club.  It was a great meeting and hopefully between Powerhouse and SLS Tri, the other Company I am getting kit samples from, we should be able to start organising kit relatively soon for the club.  I think this will be a big step as the Kit helps people to feel part of something.

Slightly different training tonight as the coach was late to training because of traffic, so Arran “Ironman” McKee took the reins and gave us a few sets to do.  And Yes, he tried to beast us with 6X50 Leg Drills.  Monster!

I used my new Fins for a couple of the sets and the difference is amazing.

I had real forward momentum – not particularly fast but I had momentum at least.

It did feel a bit like cheating having the fins on, but I could also feel a better kick technique coming from it as I didn’t have to worry about my legs feeling like they were falling off and I could just concentrate on getting a good kick from the hips.

I am still surprised at my arm pull being quite strong as I would consider myself as not being a particularly strong upper body type person – but I must be OK as I would say at the moment about 90% of my forward momentum is arm pull and the small remainder is legs.  I need to really improve this.

Finally – the foot injury is feeling a bit better and I am hopeful of a run and bike this weekend. HOPEFULLY!

“Hi, my name is Jeff and it has been 2 weeks since my last run . . . .” 

Runners Anonymous