Just Keep Swimming

 

For the past few Fridays I’ve been going to the gym to do 30 minutes of lap swimming.  I have a feeling only about 15 of that is actual swimming but as of last week I was resting less and moving more.  I only go on Fridays because I get off work at 3:00 PM and I’ve discovered that there are almost always empty lanes by the time I get in the pool around 4:00.

Prior to today I’ve been coming home from work, jumping on my bike, and riding to the gym.  I realized this was silly, though, because the gym is on the way home from work.  So, today I decided I would take the bus from my office to the gym and then from the gym home.   It’s a total of 3 miles.  1.5 from my office to the gym and 1.5 from the gym to my apartment.

So, I left work, walked to the bus stop, and waited.  I saw the bus I wanted coming so I got out my bus pass and stood at the curb.  The bus stopped a little further down the street than I was standing and let its passengers off, and closed the bus door.  I walked down the street, up to the bus door, and the driver totally ignored me.  Okay, I thought.  Maybe (s)he’s going to pull up closer to the actual stop.  I walked back up to the stop and the bus drove right on past.

Um. Okay.  I guess I’ll walk?

The 1.5 miles to the gym weren’t bad even though the air temperature is near 100.  Stay in the shade downtown and it’s tolerable. 

I got an empty lane in the pool and started my workout.

10 minutes with the kickboard to work on my breathing.  Still haven’t figured out how to exhale underwater and not get water bubbles up my nose or feel like I’m gasping for air when I turn my head for a breath. 

10 minutes with the pull buoy.  Or, at least, that’s what I usually do.  Today I felt weak and flailing after about 5 so I switched to the backstroke.

10 minutes of freestyle swimming.  Except I felt exhausted, bored, and frustrated after about 5 minutes so I called it quits.  I just can’t find my groove with swimming.   I know I won’t be great out of the gate, but it just feels so much more difficult than running or biking. 

Anyway, I went back to the locker room, showered, changed, and decided to walk home.  I mean, I already walked there, I could certainly handle another 1.5 miles.

Except, since I have ZERO sense of direction, I walked the wrong way for who knows how long until I realized I was actually going east instead of west.  Dammit.

35 incredibly sunny and sweaty minutes later, I made it home. 

Some days just aren’t the day, you know?  But I’ll just keep swimming.  Both literally and metaphorically. 

Weekend Wildness

Ladies and Gentleman, let me introduce to you the Stupid Tan Lines: Summer 2012 Collection.

Item #1 :

Bike shorts tan line

 

Item #2:

Bike jersey tan line

 

Item #3:

 Bike glove tan line

 

And just how, exactly, did I end up with this lovely collection of tan lines?

By parking my car here:

 

And riding my bike to here:

 

And then 5 more miles to get lunch here:

 

And then turning around and doing it all again to get back to my car.  Plus a slight detour when I got a little lost.  Total mileage?

64.22 miles.  Today my legs feel sore in all sorts of new places.

I am not the world’s fastest cyclist so not counting stops for traffic or my stop for lunch I did those 64.22 miles in just shy of four and a half hours.  My Garmin died around mile 52 so, sadly, it didn’t catch the last four miles where I was pushing it really hard and probably averaging closer to 18 miles per hour (instead of the 14 for the rest of the trip). 

I really just wanted to be done and, thankfully, an older gentleman on a bike behind me gave me the motivation to push harder. 

But riding my bike my furthest distance ever (by a factor of 2) wasn’t the only wild and crazy thing I did this weekend.

Oh, no.  On Friday afternoon I biked over to the nearest gym to which I still have a membership (until the end of July, anyway) I decided to swim some laps. 

That went….let’s go with….well, at least I didn’t drown. 

I have forgotten everything I learned from my lesson back in January.  I think I’ll be taking my work bonus and getting myself some swim lessons.  I felt awkward and ungangly in the water and I think I swallowed half the pool.  I was in the water for 30 minutes and I hope that at least half of that was swimming.  For the first 10 minutes I just did laps, for the next 10 I used a kick board to try and work on my breathing.  For the last 10 I used a pull buoy so I could work on my arm movements. 

I slept really well on Friday night. 

Saturday I tried a new strength workout that left me feeling a bit sore.  Peace Love and Oats posted a workout she recently tried and I thought, hey, why not?  I swapped out the cardio parts, though, for some deadlifts, dumbbell rows, and stability ball work. 

And today?  Today I am taking a rest day.  I think I earned it.

Running Results

Well, I ran on Monday night. And I'm still alive. And my left leg hasn't fallen off. I suppose that's success!

I was honestly debating whether or not to go because mid-afternoon on Monday I started to get a headache and feel a little bit "off". But I've felt that way in the past and a run has made me feel better so off I went.

Actually, first I walked the 1.5 miles to where my running group meets. The sports medicine doctor told I was supposed to do a one mile warm-up walk and I figured this would be more than sufficient. I'm a pretty good power walker thanks to many a time spent power walking with my mom.

Walk to OPRC by snmnstrz21 at Garmin Connect - Details

I did some of my stretches once I arrived at the running store and then set out for an easy three miles. One of the guys from the club I don't usually run with and I did the three miles together and chatted about skiing, both downhill and cross-country. He made me want to try cross-country skiing!

I noticed my hip and leg were a little sore when we would stop for intersections but it was hard to tell if that was because I just hadn't used them this way in a while or if they really weren't ready for prime time. We weren't going fast but I could definitely tell I wasn't in the same shape as I was at the end of 2011. But, hey, I'm still able to run three miles!

After the run my left leg needed a lot of stretching and massaging. However, now, a few days later, it feels fine! Unfortunately, I've been hit with whatever illness is going around and have been alternating hacking up a lung, dealing with throbbing sinus pressure, and monitoring my temperature every 10 minutes. Hence, no more running since Monday night.

But, I pushed my luck and Wednesday night I attended the swim lesson I won from Maggie's giveaway!

Swimming makes you look kind of scary

Coach Judie was amazing! I learned more in the 30 minutes I had with her than I did in the six weeks I took swim lessons a few years ago. I feel much more comfortable in the pool now even though we didn't get through all the fundamentals of the freestyle stroke. I'm looking forward to making time to get the pool and try out the drills she gave me!

For now, though, I'm going to continue hacking up a lung, slamming Dayquil and resting. I think my body might need it.