Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Pop the floaties . . .

Last night was my first swim with Coach Karen and, I have to admit, I was a little nervous. I had heard she was an "ass kicker" and that the TRIgirls were going to get a rude awakening from her vicious swim training. But, more than getting a tough workout, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to keep up with the length of the whole workout since my New Year's resolution to actually get in the water went out the window about 2 months ago.

Let me tell you: I have no excuse for not swimming. I have EVERYTHING I need to make swim training easier for me: a pool at a gym less than 3 miles from my house, an awesome SwiMP3, a cool little finger gadget that counts my laps, time during the day to get it done. I'm just missing one teeny-tiny little thing: the will to actually do it. So, given my lack of swimming dedication, I had no choice but to simply hold fast to the hope that splashing around in the pool a couple times in January & early February was enough to keep me from drowning. To add to the pressure, Kelsey came with me to training to watch me -- or, I suspect, laugh at me!!

But, you know what? It wasn't bad at all. Actually, it was fine. Dare I say, fun? I forgot that I'm really bouyant. I mean, I just don't sink. I think you could tie weights to my legs and I would still float. Sure, it doesn't make me feel great about the percentage of body fat I must have to make me just sit on the water like a flippin' buoy but at least it makes it easier for me to swim! And, Kelsey even said she thought I did a good job -- even if I did look "kinda slow".

So, what did I learn from swimming last night? Well, I guess it's that the 10 pounds I picked up in the off-season really isn't so detrimental after all. So, now I'm happily off to get in another training session for the swim: which means I'm going to go eat a Nutter Butter. Got to keep that buoyancy up!

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Dammit . . .

Well, the 10 mile run on Sunday felt pretty good. Monday: leg hurts. Hmmm. Maybe it's just that I ran too hard. Tuesday: my run kills the leg. Dammit. But, whatever. I'm SO done with injuries.

One of my favorite quotes has always been:

"Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well preserved body, but rather to slide in sideways, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, screaming "HOLY CRAP what a ride!"
~unknown~

Looks like I'm living the dream, huh? :)

Also, it's 3 months, 24 days til Placid. I may want to think about getting in the pool sometime soon!! I have a feeling I'm going to get a complete and total butt whooping when I go to my first swim next week!!!! I'm totally going to bring my floatie, some flippers and a snorkel.