More swimming

Since the pool will be closed starting tomorrow for about 12 days, I decided to get another swim in. I swam 3,200 yrds or slightly more than 1.75 miles. The first 1.2 miles I swam freestyle without a break. Then I did half a mile using my flotation buoy to work my upper body muscle. I finished off with some more freestyle.

There was one other guy in the pool and he swam quite a bit faster than me. I could keep up with him when he did breaststroke, but his freestyle was just way better than mine. Ironically enough, he was a pretty big guy with a distinctly protruding belly. He was also not lying flat or near the surface like Alistair does. His legs were hanging down a bit although they appeared streamlined. I also noticed he kicked very little and certainly not continuously but rather in bursts. So I have to infer than his arm stroke exerted a lot more power than mine. Or maybe those bursts propel him along?

Right now I do believe I swim faster than say a year ago, but I have trouble keeping the pace for more than 1,000 yrds. Two things happen: one, my arms get tired as time goes on and they start feeling "empty." The second, perhaps more troubling, is that I get leg cramps, either in my calf or in my foot. I am not quite sure why that happens as I kick very little and I am also a lot more relaxed now. Could this be due to blood circulation issues?

Swim

Went swimming twice today. In the morning I swam 1.5 miles, the first mile continuous and all freestyle. Then some kicking and some alternate breaststroke-freestyle laps. In the afternoon, after I picked up the kids I swam another 1.25 miles, alternating freestyle with breaststroke.

I think that finally -after all those years- my swim is getting (a bit) faster. I am not sure if it will hold for the entire 2.4 miles of the ironman, but I am cautiously optimistic. I do swim easier and faster at least over shorter distances. The big tossup in all this is my right shoulder with its AC separation. I am not sure how that hold out in the race. I have swum 2.4 miles in the pool since the incident but never all freestyle.

The other big unknown this year is that I have done zero open water swimming. I did not do a single triathlon all year and I did not swim the Del Valle or the Catfish competitions either. In short, I never even put on my wetsuit this year.

You may also wonder why I mention freestyle, but up until five years ago the only stroke I knew how to swim was breaststroke. It is not ideal for triathlons, although it is not all bad. The key advantage of breaststroke is that you can see where you are going, but that turns out to be a big win (at least among the slowpokes). I see triathletes zig-zagging all over the course and adding useless distance.

Freestyle does not come naturally to me. I really struggled with it. For some odd reason I always get cramps in my legs when I freestyle for a long time. That never happens when I breaststroke. 

Up until very recently my breaststroke was faster than my freestyle and I was a lot less tired on top of it. I have swum breaststroke in all my races, except for a few Olympic distances, and in some races I swam more than 3/4 of the distance that way. Needless to say, I am one of the last ones to exit the water. Swimming has kept me from qualifying for Hawaii more than once. 

While one can lose five minutes anywhere, my swim is just too slow to qualify. It is not on par with my other events. Not by a longshot.