The Difference Between Slow, Medium & Fast

This morning I met Laura for our last swim at the other 14th Street Y. Neither of us really like this pool that much. The past two times that we had been there it was really cold, which didn't make it any better. The pool is also generally fairly crowded and today was no exception. It's a seven lane pool and four of the lanes were open for lap swimming. Two of the other lanes were taken up by a master's group and the last lane was for water walking (whatever that is). The lanes that were open for lap swimming included one for slow swimmers, two for medium swimmers and one for fast swimmers.

I decided to start in one of the medium lanes. I wasn't quite sure I wanted to hang with the big boys this morning in the fast lane and there were also quite a lot of people in that lane already, so I decided to go with a less crowded medium lane. It didn't take long before I got really frustrated with the lane that I was in. There was a girl alternating between doing drills and swimming breast stroke, which I don't think is anyone's fastest stroke.

I must have passed this girl about 10 times (without exaggeration). On the tenth time, I really wanted to ask her if she thought that she was in the right lane since everyone else was passing her as well. Instead, I decided that I'd just suck it up and move over to the fast lane. Now, I had already realized that my arms were still exhausted from Sunday's lifting workout. And I'm just tired in general these days. I think I'm in need of a day off (or at least a day to get another hour or so of sleep in the morning), but Drew's sister will be visiting this weekend and I'm not 100% sure I'll get in long workouts over the weekend, so I need to stick with it this week.

When I moved over to the fast lane, I thought my arms were going to fall off my body. I don't really think I was swimming that much faster, but I always feel more pressure to go at a good speed. I think it's all more mental for me. After doing about 400 yards in the fast lane, I decided to slow down and give my arms a rest and move to the other medium lane.

That medium lane was only slightly better than the first one. I'm not sure if people just have no idea how to seed themselves or what the deal is, but if you're doing drills or something else very slowly, there is no need to make the rest of us suffer. I actually still had a pretty good swim despite all the obstacles. It was rather boring as the pool situation wasn't really conducive to doing a lot of drills or short sets. But, this is what I did:

1000 yards freestyle
600 yards alternating breast & free
150 yards kicking

Swimming
Time: 40:40
Distance: 0.99 miles
Pace: 41:04/mile
Calories: 435
Maximum HR: 174
Average HR: 155