The Pass Book

Yesterday was a big mix-up and I ended up not having pilates in the morning like I thought I would, so that meant no workout for me and my stomach has now been saved until after the Christmas holiday!  Truthfully, I think the rest was best for my cold anyway, so it all worked out.  Plus I got to have a nice egg and potato breakfast at my desk yesterday morning.

This morning Laura and I had made plans to meet at the JCC for a swim.  Last year, we both deemed it to be in the top two pools in the city.  Even though it doesn't even have a hot tub!  This year, we had saved up our passes from our fitness book for the JCC until the end of the year.  This was partly on purpose, I think, and also partly due to the fact that Laura and I both broke bones this year. 

I got there first this morning and the guy at the desk told me that the JCC no longer accepts these passes.  Oh, and they haven't accepted them all year long.  Which was bad news for me & Laura.  But, he was really nice and let both of us go in on a guest pass today.  Disaster averted! 

We got out to the pool deck and there was no one swimming in the Fast lane, so we both grabbed that before anyone else could.  We started by just splitting the lane, but the lifeguard came and yelled at me by the time I had finished my first 25, so circle swimming we went.  It wasn't a big deal or anything, it just most likely would have prevented anyone else from coming into our lane.  Which is exactly what happened near the end.

While I was swimming today, I was thinking that swimming in an Olympic distance triathlon is a long ways.  And even when you're swimming in a pool where the sun is shining directly in your eyes, it's still a lot easier to swim in a pool than open water.  That being said, however, I feel like I should get a triathlon on the books for 2011.  I'll have to do some research on that. 

As preparation for this unknown triathlon(s) in 2011, Laura and I decided today to buy the passbook again for next year.  We didn't get as much use out of it this year as we did in 2009, but we have a plan to change that next year!  

Tomorrow I'm off to Wisconsin to have Christmas Cookie Extravaganza, Take II.  I'll be back with a full recap after the weekend.  If last year was any indication, it should be a lot of baking and candy-making and a whole lot more fun! 

Swimming
1000 Free
100 kick
100 free/breath control (zero breaths x 2)/breast stroke

Time: 26:31
Distance: 1200 meters = 0.75 miles
Pace: 35:21/mile

See You Next Year!

I was completely unable to drag myself out of bed yesterday to go running with Terrier. Drew got up and went to the gym and I just stayed in bed sleeping. When he got home from the gym, I told him that I pretty much hate myself right now. I don't know what my problem is with getting up in the mornings. I'm wondering if I went to bed earlier if I'd have an easier go of it. I've always needed a lot of sleep compared to the average person and I'm wondering if I'm simply staying up too late.

This morning I had a really good reason to get up and out of bed! I was meeting Laura to go swimming at the JCC. The last time we went there was in May and we've been saving our last trip there for something special. I'm not sure that today qualified as special, but we're definitely running out of places to go and we have to use up these passes prior to the end of the year, so it was mostly now or never. They have really nice facilities and we lucked out last time in that it was a sunny day and the sun just shines into the pool and it's really beautiful. This would be the most perfect pool if they only had a hot tub.

This morning we got to the pool, took stock of how fast people were swimming in the lanes, and finally motivated ourselves to get in and start swimming. I didn't go with any sort of plan today. I had asked Drew how far I should swim and he said 1.1 miles, so I sort-of had that in my head as a goal for today.

I swam in the fast lane and when I got in there was one girl that was faster than me and one that was slower, so we all made it work pretty well once we figured out the proper order to swim. It was nice to have someone that I knew was coming up behind me and it definitely made me push a little bit harder and swim faster than I would if I had been in the lane by myself.

Eventually, those two girls got out and I had the lane to myself for a few minutes. I definitely slowed down then. I could tell because I started humming. I know it's a little bit silly, but I really like to hum while I'm swimming. I can tell when I slow down and relax into a slower rhythm because I automatically start humming. When I'm working harder, I don't spend enough time under water (since I breathe more often) to hum.

Then two guys got in my lane and showed off with their hot shot equipment (kick boards, pull buoys, fins, etc.) and started swimming. I actually felt pretty good because even with all the fancy stuff they had, I still definitely held my own without any gear. I just kept swimming most of the time.

I swam in sets of 100s, sometimes 200s, depending on the lane traffic in the pool. Then I'd stop and take a quick break before starting again. Probably only 10 or 15 seconds, although I did have to stop for a longer period once in order to adjust my goggles. I had tightened them for the big swim meet, but they really don't need to be that tight if I'm not diving off the blocks, so I had to put them back to normal as they were giving me a bit of a headache.

After we had been swimming for a while, the sun finally started to come out and started streaming through the water. It really is beautiful to see while you're swimming. Of course, it made it hard to breathe on the right because the sun was blinding me in my eye, but I probably needed a little extra practice of breathing on the left anyway.

So, goodbye JCC pool! At least until 2010. Thankfully, that's not so far away. I told Laura when we got out of the pool that I think that next year we'll have to have a bigger debate on which pool we're going to as it seems like since we know them now, we'll be able to really figure out if we should get the bad ones out of the way and save the good ones for later or do a mixture similar to what we did this year.

All in all, today was a fantastic swim. Much better than I was hoping for. And I even went further than Drew said I should. Seems like a win-win situation. And, of course, I also got up and got my workout done before work, so that was a big bonus as well.

Swimming
Time: 44:36
Distance: 1.24 miles (2000 meters)
Pace: 35:53/mile
Calories: 520
Maximum HR: 182
Average HR: 166