Total Immersion Level 3
Deciding whether to take Level 3 was as much about seeing my classmates each week as improving my swimming—though dinner would only satisfy the first goal.
Week 1
Pursuit of Mastery
As I decided whether to continue and take level 3, I admit that signing up was as much about continuing to see my classmates weekly as it was about improving my swimming. One might argue that arranging a dinner out would be just as effective to hit the first goal, but alas it will not help the 2nd. As I entered this class, I was excited. Eager to continue. Disappointed by my practice session the prior week but not defeated; just disappointed that I have trouble keeping everything strong when I practice on my own.
Shane reminded us that there is no finish line in the pursuit of mastery, and I was grateful to be back.
Salmon
We have a joke in my house that I am the salmon. I resist most any change in routine and insist on digging my heels in against even the smallest of changes. I’m working on it, but I still spend too much time swimming against the current of life.
I started class with a warm-up session in the sauna with 3 of my classmates. One woman had taken level 2 last year and was back for level 3, and the others were part of my group of Level 1 and 2. We wandered into the pool area and then we were 10; 7 from the fall/winter over the two nights of sessions and 3 people who had taken some time off and were back to continue the pursuit of mastery.
Session 2 had 4-6 of us in every class. There were two nights offered, each with 4-5 in the class, and we could go to what worked with our schedule. The classes mixed and mingled and we often had 2 lanes with 2-3 people in each lane. This was down from 10 people in each class of level 1 where we were 4-5 per lane. I spent much of session 1 freezing and whining about freezing. Oddly, in session 2, I decided that I had become a much warmer person. I wasn’t freezing and I didn’t whine. Tonight as we hopped into 2 lanes of 5 each, I realized I hadn’t changed; we were back at 5 per lane and I was freezing and either whining or thinking about it. I also noticed that the 3 people joining our class were better swimmers than most of us - well much better than I am. I was thrown off kilter by being cold again and having a big class again after getting used to a little class.
Time to Swim
Thankfully there wasn’t too much time to stay stuck in my head. Pretty soon we were swimming. We continued to work on our poise points and Shane further explained the delineation between the entry phase (toned and aligned forearm, wrist and hand) and the recovery phase with a relaxed almost dangling forearm. For the Recovery, the shoulder articulation is the most important factor and the initial source for Entry and Extension comes from the hip/torso. Shane reminded us that our goal was effortless power.
An interesting thing about being back in a large class was the opportunity to see different swimming styles and speeds. While I admit I wasn’t feeling that Zen; spending way too much time worrying about whether I was too slow for the person behind me, frustrated the the people in the lane next to me were moving effortlessly way faster than I was, and feeling cold, I was also learning. It happened that I often swam next to one of the women who had taken a break. We’d start together and then she’d zoom by, and in doing so I watched her core. She was really snapping. She had completely effortless power. I was not snapping. As Shane gave us tips to help make sure that the stroke wasn’t all focused on our arms, I realized again that my core wasn’t really fully part of this equation. Visually seeing it in the next lane was helpful; something that I could bring into my weekly practice.
Yin Yang
After we worked through all of our House of Cards focal points, we moved into the Yin Yang drill. During the last class of Session 2, my stroke count averaged 18. When I practiced during the week, I was back up to 23. I was a little nervous when we started the Yang part of this drill (working on minimal strokes per length) that I wouldn’t be anywhere near 18. I was pleasantly surprised to hit 18, and then shocked to hear another classmate had 12 SPL. Body length not withstanding that’s still amazing. We played with this a little; wide tracks, closed fists, open palms. I enjoyed all of the variations and found them useful. I wasn’t struggling and was able to focus on what he asked us to do until he had us do a 50 of the Yin (fast cadence). I still find myself out of breath and dragging badly on the last 10 or so. I love that he has us do this though because it used to be a real challenge to do a 25 with a fast cadence, so improvement is evident.
Goggle Trouble
My goggles leaked water all evening. This wasn’t especially awful as I had plenty of time to empty them and re-position when we stopped to check in, but I nearly lost my right contact on the last 50 because I didn’t stop to adjust. It was nearing 8:20 and I saw Shane getting the tempo trainers out and knew were were going to close class with a continuous swim. Generally speaking I’m not someone who would leave a class early for no overtly obvious reason. However, as I stood there freezing, thinking about Scott leaving for a business trip at 5:30 the next morning, and knowing that I would have to adjust my goggles after each 25 to avoid an eye catastrophe I decided I had to leave early. As a result, I missed the final set where I could have put all the practice into play. I am including what we were asked to do here so that I can go back and check. As I was leaving, I did hear Shane say that we were to keep our tempo trainers below 1.35. The fastest I’ve successfully set mine on is 136 SO I know that next week will be a challenge for sure!!
Tempo Trainer Set
200 yards at “tempo x”
100 yards at “tempo x - 0.05”
50 yards at “tempo x - 0.10”
(For example: 1.30, 1.25, 1.20)
As we swim this final set, he asked that we work on a sustainable breathing pattern and maintain a 3 stroke per length range (ex 17-19 SPL). He reminded us that when we get to flip turns this breathing pattern will be very important; we won’t be able to catch our breath at the wall each time.
Final Thoughts
This will be good for me. Really. It is out of my comfort zone ... again! I am going to have to work hard to stay Zen in Level 3. More people means more time to think and thinking while trying to just relax and work though the swim progression is not good (for me). This was the first time since level 1 that I did rather actively watch the clock. A combination of being cold, goggles leaking, and feeling like I was really not swimming well was a perfect storm for staring at a seemingly unmoving clock. I plan to demand an open attitude from myself for class 2 and I know that will be just a bit easier for this salmon now that I know exactly what to expect.
Week 2
We’re Not in Kansas Anymore
A year ago, I was in the pool when Shane was teaching a Total Immersion group. I looked at them and thought, “I could never swim that much” and “I would be so embarrassed to mess up in front of other people.”
Tonight after our dry land warm-up, Shane asked us to start with a 4-6 lap relaxed warm-up. The 10 of us took two lanes and off we went. After we went through the warm-up, he asked us to swim using a Pause Drill. We would pause at the poise point. This drill encourages many things;
Patient Lead Arm - both degree of patience, and accuracy of placement
Optimal Poise Point - shoulder/scapular articulation and elbow flex
Long aligned spine
Calm legs
Optimal timing of all elements that constitute your weight shift
After we did several 50s he asked us to return to regular swimming without pausing.
Sometime during this swim cycle, a 3rd lane opened up, so my lane dropped to 4 swimmers. There was not much rest time, so not too much time to get cold or to think. I tried to stay focused on doing what Shane asked me to do and was a little more (well actually a lot more) successful with this than last week. I still spent too much time thinking about how slow I am and wondering why I am not getting more streamlined, but for much of the time I was able to shelve these thoughts, especially during the pause drill.
As Shane had us swim 50s and later 100s, there wasn’t much pause time. We were swimming a lot! I suddenly realized WE are that group I saw last year. The group that is swimming, swimming, swimming. I was not cold. I was not counting the minutes, and while my head is still getting in my way with negative talk, I am doing all that he asks me to do.
Arms Only
After this first part, we swam 2x50 with NO KICKING. We were supposed to keep our legs together and just use our arms. This meant that we had to stay in balance because our legs couldn’t help us compensate. I did well with this drill. In the natural swimming portion right before this I started to get back into my head wondering why I was so slow, and when I started this drill I was worried I’d sink. However, I found the challenge of no legs fun. Shane told me my legs looked better positioned relative to the water with this than when I was kicking.
After our no kick swimming, we moved to a dolphin kick followed by 2 beat kicking and back to dolphin etc. This was to help us work on minimal hip/knee flexion. When we finished our two 50s of this, Shane told me I was still firing only with my right leg. I so want to use that left leg, but it isn’t happening unless I put the fin on the “leg of opportunity” as Shane likes to say. He asked us how we felt and pointed out those of us who were seeing improvement in kicking. After this, we decided to mix up our order in our lane so that we could see different kicks as we swam.
Tempo Trainers
Now it was time to put our tempo trainers to work. We picked a tempo and swam 50 with an easy kick, followed by a 50 with a medium kick and concluding with a strong kick all at that tempo. We counted our strokes with the different style kicks. I liked this. It was fun to compare BUT I did really struggle to define for myself what an easy, medium and hard kick felt like. I knew I was only using my right leg for kicking, so I had to decide whether to try again to use the left leg or continue to kick as I have been and do what Shane was asking. I chose to try the drill vs continuing to stress over which foot I was using.
When we first started counting strokes, I could barely swim and count. Now, it feels calming. In my counting I learned that the 50 using a medium kick gave me the lowest stroke count. The strong kick made me feel so tired in just a 50 that it felt unsustainable. The stroke count was only one up from the medium, but I don’t think I could have comfortably finished 100 this way.
And the Final Swim
Our final swim was ... interesting. We still had 3 lanes available to use for circle swimming for the 10 of us, and Shane decided to group us by speed. He noticed that 4 of the 10 of us are a little faster and they gathered in one lane. Thankfully he’s a master teacher and he didn’t subdivide the remaining 6 “not as fast people”. I remained in my lane with 2 of the women I’d been with and one of them hopped into the middle lane. Again, we chose a tempo and swam at this tempo working on a sustained breathing pattern and a calm hidden kick.
At the start of this I had a flashback to my my swim in the lake with Jenny this summer. A week before the CLT we decided it was time to get into the lake for the first time of the season. In the one minute 15 seconds that we were in the water (before I had a panic attack) Jenny had seemingly swam a mile while I was mere feet from the shore. Of course I exaggerate, but as we started our final swim of the evening, I imagined the 10 of us lining up on shore and me losing the bubbles from their kicking in less than a minute. I quickly let that negative thought leave my head and started to swim. I got into a groove, relaxed and mostly enjoyed the 10 minutes. .
Shane noted in our weekly summary that most of us maintained longer legs which translated to a longer body line. I don’t know if I was in the “most” category, but I felt ok about my final swim. I finished it, my goggles didn’t leak and I felt hopeful. The pursuit of mastery will be a long road, but it is a road worth traveling.
Week 3
Practice in a pool with a DEEP end!
Before I talk about week 3, I must tell about my practice this week! I only managed to get into the pool once, and it wasn’t in my home gym at Island Health and Fitness. Elizabeth had dance workshops in Syracuse from 5-10:30 p.m. on a Friday night. I had to pick up my packet for the Syracuse Half Marathon at Fleet Feet Sports between 5 and 7, but after that my options were limited to shopping, eating, or hanging out in the hotel lobby with the other parents. In the middle of the afternoon, I had the brilliant idea to look for gyms. I found Pacific Health Club in Liverpool. For a $10 day pass, I could use the entire facility which included an indoor track and a lap pool.
Upon arrival, I received a tour of the two ladies locker rooms, indoor track, tons of weights, all the pools and more. The pool was open until 9 and it was just shy of half past 7 when I arrived. I grabbed a 2 mile shake out run on the track and then headed to the pool. The pool had a deep end (my first struggle with lake swimming is the depth, so this was good practice for me). I went through Shane’s standard progression, starting with a 400 and working through poise point drills and later finishing with a 400. It felt really great, and I wasn’t scared of the depth of the water. I actually wished it had been crowded so that I would have had to share a lane (reality for the Tri for the Y practice) but it was more pleasant to have my own.
The trouble started AFTER my swim. The woman who gave me my tour told me the pool closed at 9, and I hadn’t checked the facility hours. The ENTIRE place closed at 9. So when I hopped out of the pool at 8:55 I wandered into the sauna and enjoyed 10 lovely minutes of heat followed by a shower. At Island the pool closes 1/2 hour before the locker rooms, so I planned to be ready to leave right at 9:30 and then dawdle my way back to pick up Elizabeth downtown at 10:30. At 9:15 a woman peeked into the locker room to ask me if I was almost done. Yikes! Here I was with my $10 day pass causing her to have to work late. I quickly finished up and headed out!
If I Drowned in a Former Life, I’m doing GREAT
Recently NBC news aired a story about a young boy who remembers amazing details about his former life as a Hollywood Star. As we listened to this story in the car on the way home from skiing, I said “I truly must have drowned in a former life.” This prompted an entire conversation about reincarnation, God, and more.
But seriously speaking, the time has come to solely measure myself against myself. My classmates are faster than me, and they are getting things more quickly than I am. This was becoming clear midway through level 2, but our class was small so it wasn’t quite as “in your face” obvious.
I am proud that I have practiced weekly, come to class every week, and despite some occasional lapses into really negative self talk I stay pretty optimistic.
Body Matters
After class, I was chatting with Shane about my progress. He is super sweet and was saying that he sees improvement. I think it must be really hard for the coach to look at a group of 10-12 and find positive things to point out for each person. I laughed and said I had a pretty steep learning curve. He commented that I really don’t have an ideal swimmer’s body. SO TRUE! I have really tiny shoulders and odd shoulder mobility issues, and I’m bottom heavy. He also said that my breathing is derailing the process for me. I wasn’t aware of that, so here emerges another value of having a coach!
Swapping Goggles
Shortly before class I received an email from a classmate. She had purchased new goggles and they weren’t going to work for her face. She would love to give them to me if they work for me. I have been struggling with leaking goggles. I don’t think my goggles are flawed, just that they aren’t fitting my face perfectly. This wasn’t much of a problem in earlier sessions when most of our swimming was 25s or 50s. Now that we are swimming longer distances, if my goggles leak it is more challenging. I’ve almost lost a contact a few times this session! I was excited to try hers, and since she’s also been struggling with leaking goggles I had her try mine out.
What a difference! I noticed right away that I could swim without much worry of leaking. Even with taking them on and off every time we checked in after swimming they sealed right back up. After class, I took hers and gave her my goggles. Mine worked pretty well for her and her Aqua Sphere Vista Lady Goggles were amazing for me.
Weekly Practice
This week when I went for my first weekly practice, I started with a 400. It went well, with no panic or worry, but my stroke count is way high which is moderately to highly frustrating. Then, I moved into working with focal points and went back to finishing with a 400. The thing that stood out for this session was the breathing. After Shane pointed out that my breathing was stalling things, I was able to see it. EVERY time I breathe I can see the ceiling. He talks to us about getting just a “nip” of air and rotating our head so we can see underwater with one eye and just above the water with the other eye. I am looking at the ceiling with BOTH eyes. I worked on the nip of air thing, splitting vision, and just trying not to look at the ceiling. This is when and where depth starts to play a role with me. I choked several times, or got enough water down my throat to be a little freaked. Because the pool is only 4 feet deep, I could just pop my feet down and re-group, but in a lake or pool with a deep end this option is not something I can avail myself of.
Final Thoughts
Almost halfway through Session 3 I feel happy that I did sign up to continue this Total Immersion swim journey. Even though my progress next to my peers is slower, a moment in late September pops to mind. I was “swimming” in the warm pool when the life guard told me that you aren’t allowed to actually swim there. I was merely working on 2-4 stroke lengths at a time. I couldn’t fathom the idea of having to move to the cold pool to do that. I remember telling her, “but it is SO cold over there.” and “what if I just do 2 strokes?” It is March and I now comfortably swim continuously for quite some time and can easily fill an hour in the pool with practice. It is a journey of continual baby steps.
Week 4
Numbers Matter
Our class met over spring break. It was a freezing cold week in Ithaca, NY and I was rather happy that Shane still held class. During break, there were no kid activities on the calendar so no busses, help from others, or rushing around required! For this simple reason, I arrived at class much less frazzled. Because of the break, many in our class were on vacation, so there were 6 of us. This meant 3 per lane, and a more casual feel to the class.
A Small Tweak
Over the week, during my practice I was again stalled out at 23 strokes for length. This was upsetting and confusing, and nothing I did in my own practice changed this number. Shane asked us to swim 150 lazily, and midway into this he told me to focus on not driving my hand so deep. Another classmate in my lane needed to work to drive deeper. I made this correction and sure enough I was back to 18 strokes. Again, the power of a coach! I was so happy he noticed this EARLY in the class, as it helped me imprint this proper technique for the entire class.
Gears
Shane has been telling us we’re going to learn to control our stroke count and speed and talking about “gears” for a few classes now. Tonight was the night to give it a try. He asked us to swim three 50s. First, we had established a baseline SPL (strokes per length). Mine was 18.
He shared the two ways to go faster; increase stroke length and # strokes per length or increase tempo. To increase our tempo, you just need to make your weight shifts happen more quickly, thus gaining time, BUT you have to work to keep your efficiency stable. To increase the stroke length you can increase the amount of time gliding, improve your balance or play with the pressure applied to the water. These are all really neat nuances, but since I keep falling out of balance on a weekly basis, I wasn’t so sure how I’d do with the gear thing.
Pretty soon we were swimming. For our first 50 we would swim at our baseline SPL. I was really jazzed that I managed to hit 18 both down and back! Then, we were asked to add one stroke per length. This felt pretty easy too. I nailed it. Then, for our last 50 we added one more stroke. Success again! I hit 20 SPL with ease. He asked us our strategy. Mine “I got tired.” It was true. I was rather winded by the end of the drill.
Then he asked us to reverse it! Three 50s starting at our highest SPL and dropping one stroke each time. I was sad to say that while I was able to start at 20, I held constant at 20. I think that my very last length may have been 19, but it wasn’t successful. I was tired and also felt more pressure for this.
Final Swim
We closed class with a sustained 300 followed by a 200 and then a 100. The class had done this before on the evening that I left early with goggle troubles. The pool was empty by the end of class, so we were able to spread out to two people per lane. I shared a lane with my friend Anne (she gave me my marvelous goggles) and we were off. I set my tempo trainer at 1.36. After my first length I choked on water and had to stop to catch my breath at the end, but pretty soon I was back in the swim. After the 300, Shane asked that we speed up our tempo by .04. I dropped my trainer to 1.32 and headed out again. When I finished my 200 and started to set my next one .04 faster, I realized that everyone else was done with everything. A couple people had lost count, and I hope I wasn’t really 100 behind everyone BUT there are some pretty fast swimmers in my class, so it is quite feasible.
Overall I felt really positive about this. I enjoyed the sustained swim, and felt successful. Shane would like me to work to get my tempos much faster, to 1.20, so I plan to work on that this week in practice sessions.
My Video
Random Thoughts
This was an excellent class for me. Shane’s small tweak to my form helped me for the entire class. The small group made it easier for me to feel part of the class and answer Shane’s questions when he asked about how a drill went. And, the goggles worked really well (after the first length. I hadn’t gotten them wet and they didn’t stick to my eyes for the first 50). One thing that I noticed is that with my stroke improves when I’m swimming right next to a very strong swimmer. I lined up with a woman in the next lane every so often and while she is much faster than I am so she zoomed right by me, I could feel my core snap improve and my gliding improve as she swam near me. I was able to see her in my peripheral vision very well. The few times that I swam near her were the same times that Shane noted positive improvements in my stroke. It ties into Shane’s suggestion to watch good swimming on video. There is something in you brain that makes it feel to your body like YOU are doing that.
Week 5
Sadly, I had to miss this week!
Week 6
Feeling Swimming
We’ve spent a lot of time with our House of Cards, doing great drills and plenty of time with work on form for swimming. This week, after our dry land work where we focused on the subtle details of our shoulder articulation and forearm placement during recovery, Shane had us start to work more on refining our body tipping point.
To have a really well refined “tipping point” for a most efficient weight shift we need to have a lot of factors align including;
Optimal Poise Point
Leverage for our grip
Muscles must be relaxed
Proper head, neck and spine alignment
Patient Lead Arm
Whew! He helped us do this by having us work on dropping to a deeper target. This shortened our stroke, but helped us to feel what a proper tipping point would be. We also worked with lunging our lat muscle as we extend. His main point here was to remind us that our goal is to use gravity first and then add our body’s force.
I did enjoy the deeper target and could feel myself tipping more. It was nice to just work on feeling swimming happening, thus spending a little less time thinking about every piece.
Flip Turns
One of the things we had talked about learning in Level 3 was how to properly do a flip turn. About halfway through class, Shane inquired, “so who wants to learn how to do a flip turn?” We all looked at him and DiDi and I looked panicked. He smiled and said, “yes?” I blurted out, “Anne is sick and she really wants to learn flip turns.” DiDi echoed with, “it is really important to her.” We decided to have flip turns wait until week 7.
Eyes CLOSED
Shane wanted us to focus on really feeling swimming. To this end, he asked us to close our eyes in the water while we focused on delicately slipping one arm forward in the water. He wanted us to feel the water moving along our entire arm and keep our forearm “hidden” as it extends through the sleeve.
This was fun. It changed the focus and made things feel a little easier. My forearm is not in the correct form, and I don’t think that this improved anything about that, but I did find that with my eyes shut I was less worried about things and more zen in the water. I tried hard to feel that water moving along my arm like Shane wanted us to.
Double Fin Swim
We’ve been doing Yin/Yang drills for many weeks now. When they first started, I didn’t even know if I could do it! Now, they’ve become something that I look forward to. Tonight Shane asked us to try this drill with a fin on each foot. Immediately, I could feel my kick settle out. I was still breaking the surface for the first few times, but each time the kick felt a little longer with less leg flection. The fins greatest asset? Helping me feel the pressure on my foot that is sometimes just too subtle for me to recognize in normal swimming.
The Video
Week 7
The Best Swim Class Ever
I greeted Scott after class saying, “I know I’ve said this before, but that was the best swim class ever!” In truth, I have. I can think of at least 3 times that I’ve posted on Daily Mile or Strava that it was the most wonderful class ever. Many evenings have also been called “worst night ever.”
Tonight a few things happened. First, several of us were talking about the upcoming Tri for the Y, DiDi shared that she came in 2nd in the swim in her recent ocean triathlon (she couldn’t do the other two events due to her stress fracture), and it was a nice sunny evening. It is class 7 and by class 7, the group has always reached bonding/chatty phase which helps make everything feel relaxed and fun. Then, after Dry Land, we split into our 3 lanes. There were 8 of us and we self selected by speed. Our two fastest swimmers shared a lane, there was a middle lane for the other speedier swimmers and the 3 slower swimmers hopped in the 3rd lane.
Differentiating Swimming
Shortly into our warm-up set of drills, Shane mentioned to me that my forearms were still bending out and that I should focus on keeping them straight and relaxed. Then, he began explaining the “fist drill” we’d be doing next. We’ve done this before but this time I was thinking, “I probably shouldn’t do that. I need to work on keeping my arms forward and relaxed.” As he set us loose, Shane said, “you should keep your hands open.”
During the first 50 my head was saying, “Wow you are so behind that you have to do something different than the class.” But, by the 2nd 50, I was out of my head , realizing that I really had to get this. This was an opportunity to practice something I needed to work on while my classmates worked on something appropriate for them. A gift.
The Workout
Shane asked us to use our tempo trainers and start with a 1.20 tempo. We’d swim a 50 without stopping at the wall, and then drop the tempo by .3 when we returned. We did this until we hit a tempo of just under a second, .99.
Normally there is a bit of panic that happens when we are tempo dropping, but tonight this was really AWESOME! It helped me with so many things; keeping a straighter kick, keeping my arms forward, snapping, efficient recovery etc. I managed to stay out of my head for the entire 400 because there wasn’t time to think. I was focused on the task at hand, and it was really a positive experience.
We followed this up with a 200 at a sustainable tempo. For me that was 1.20. I enjoyed this swim. It was a challenging tempo and I felt winded at the end, but it was sustainable. At the end, I asked Shane about proper tempo for a 400 if this felt like it was getting challenging by the end. He first suggested that I change my breathing from alternate side to every stroke, just alternating sides for 50s and if that didn’t help then to drop the tempo by .4 seconds. I will work on that this week.
Learning to Flip
It was finally time. We’d been working on our pushing off from the wall all evening as we swam, but it was time to try the flip. First we swam about 1/3 of the distance of the pool and then did a full flip without using our hands for rotation. This was FUN! I love flipping in the pool and I really enjoyed this. Next, Shane asked us to do a half flip and emerge out the other side upside down. I looked at Anne and she said, “This is where it gets hard. I didn’t learn past this part.” One of my classmates was a synchronized swimmer in school so she executed this beautifully on her first attempt. Others soon followed her lead trying out the half flip. This was hard but also fun. A game to practice in a really safe environment. As we neared the end of class, he had us try doing this as we approached the wall.
I was surprised how fun it was to begin learning flip turns. I thought we’d just begin by swimming at the wall and trying to flip over. I should have known that Shane would have a wonderful step by step method to help us gradually approach this skill. It felt totally pressure free; a fun way to end the session.
Final Thoughts
As with level 2, I have mixed feelings that last week is our last class! It is so hard to believe that our Tuesday sessions are almost over. Our last class is right before the Tri for the Y so we’re going to need to have a reunion to talk about how the event goes!! I think 4 or 5 of us are participating this year. But, it is getting warmer and closer to the Cayuga Lake Tri. The next step of my plan is of course continue to work on my form and being more comfortable with the swim itself but also getting into the lake. I am excited to wear my wetsuit that I got from a fellow Finger Lakes Running and Triathlon Company ambassador and know that the lake swim will be a big journey itself! Perhaps I should try to form a group to hire Shane as our lake coach for summer!!
Week 8
It has been 2 weeks since our last class. Typically I try to write within a week so that I can really remember things. This is an opportunity to remember, and think back fondly on that last class.
The Start
We talked about bikes and bike fitting this week as we were waiting for class to start. We also talked about the year wrapping up and looking forward to summer. One of my classmates is a senior at Cornell this year and will be graduating very soon. She’s coming back for the Cayuga Lake Tri this summer! Several of us are signed up for it, so we talked about lake swimming for a little while as well.
Pretty soon it was time to get into the water. It was bittersweet knowing it truly is my last class at least for now. My next step is to take the Ithaca Tri Club boating class so that I can participate in the lake swims. I do have my wetsuit from my friend Allie that I’m ready to use as I begin to move to swimming freestyle in the lake!
Introduction
Shane started with our now familiar Dry Land Drill sequence. He talked about the shoulder/scapula and also about our pelvic core rotation. I’m sad to admit that I’m so spatially challenged that I still struggle with the Front Quadrant walk if someone isn’t in front of me. I can do the proper elbow movements if I’m watching someone very carefully, but I don’t have it imprinted yet.
When we got into the pool we worked on swimming relaxed as we started the evening off with a 300. I think it was a 300, but it could have been 150. Whatever it was, I felt relaxed but aware of how far behind the others I was falling. I think that this is my biggest hang up; worry about being the slowest. I am certain that if I can manage to drop this thought from my mind that my swimming will improve. It is almost as though the thought manifests and then that is exactly what happens - last to finish.
He asked us to observe our rotation and pointed out that too little will result in inadequate shoulder clearance and trouble breathing, while too much will cause drag and also challenge our breathing stroke. One thing that was key here was that he pointed out (probably for the 100th time, but it was the first time I processed it) that if you don’t rotate enough it is challenging to skim the fingertips because the entire arm is too low above the water surface. This is definitely something I’m dealing with. However, tonight, every other stroke or so I found the “a ha” moment of doing it properly and then it vanished.
Then a Brilliant thing happened
Three of us planned to participate in the 27th Annual Tri for the Y coming up the Sunday after our last class. When Shane asked us to swim a 2x200, Anne (one of the Tri for the Y folks) decided to swim faster. She wanted to see how it she’d do in a race situation. Shane called her out on it and asked what was going on. She shared and then Shane made a brilliant move.
Now you see, every time I try to prepare for the Tri for the Y (it is only 400 yards so you’d think I could relax about this) I lose all ability to swim in any semblance of proper fashion. I try to race and ultimately revert to my very poor swimming self. This is what happened to me this summer when I made the unfortunate choice to attend a swim clinic the morning before the CLT. The coach recommended that we swim very fast for the first 100. He advised “staying in the fray” and “seeing the bubbles” to get a good spot in the race. Then, we should settle into a comfortable pace. Well, I had been practicing swimming and felt reasonably confident so I tried it. I completely panicked at the first buoy and the rest is history: backstroke for the entire swim. I did seriously consider dropping too, but had too much determination.
Shane got the pace clock and asked us to swim a 2 x 100. We’d swim the first one at a fast pace and note our time. Then, we’d rest a bit and do the 2nd 100 with good technique and composure. Most of my classmates were about 10 seconds slower on the 2nd one (so 40 seconds over the Tri for the Y distance). I didn’t really process the clock but estimate that I was about 30 seconds slower.
In this short 100 of fast pace in a 4.5 foot deep pool, my mind flashed back to last summer when I felt like I was going to drown in Cayuga Lake. I panicked, knew I couldn’t sustain it past 100 and felt scared. For the 2nd 100, I settled into a happy pace, calmed down and enjoyed the swim.
I say that Shane was brilliant because if he hadn’t done this, I very likely would have raced out of the start in the Tri for the Y. I wouldn’t have gone crazy fast because I know it doesn’t work for me, but I would have started too fast. Because of this last drill, I went into the Tri for the Y knowing that I’d pick a pace and stick with it. I was really grateful for Shane’s ability to read Anne and adjust our class accordingly.
The Video
The video does tell all. I’m still working hard at getting basic technique. My shoulders aren’t articulating properly and I’m not gliding through the water like my classmates. But, as with all learning, every person has a pace and everything does have a learning curve. I like to think that I am on the bell curve, just sitting at the very far left right now. I hope to move myself more to center over time and practice.