RAM Swim Meet

The Rochester Area Masters hosted a well run meet at the RIT pool Sunday.   The drive over was snowy and dark, because I had to leave at 5:15am.  The first event was the 500 at 9:00am.  I was happy to improve my 500 time from January by about 6 seconds.  Maybe by next year I'll improve another 6 seconds. :-)

I must have been feeling the 500 still during the 200 free, because I was a sec. slower. My legs turned to brick at the 125 mark, so that was not good. I will have to learn how to kick through that.

I won't even mention the 50 BR., since that is not an event I can swim any more with a hip prosthesis.  Next was the 100 FR, and I felt good. I dropped one second.  The time is about 7 seconds slower when I swam in my 30's, but I'll take it. 1:08:16.   Not coming from a collegiate background in swimming,  and spending 5 years with no formal training, getting fat and lazy, I was happy.

And finally the 200 BA, love this event, but I have a long way to go to meet the Nat'l qual time in  my age group.  Took 2 seconds off the previous Jan. meet. with a 2.55:XX.

I think one of the main reasons for the improvement in times was primarily due to the fact that I watched a USA Swimming Webinar last week on starts and turns with Russell Mark, sports performance consultant for USA Swimming.   I have seen Russell present before at the US Olympic Training center, when the Colgate team was there for Winter Training camp. That was a great experience, and the team, including myself learned a great deal about how to be a more efficient swimmer.  Russell is an excellent speaker, and really provides us good information and videos on what to think about when improving swimming technique on all levels.  I was able to employ the things I learned about turns from watching the webinar. I realized this morning, that the one thing I completely forgot about was the point he made about "Throw water over your head" during the turn.   I hope to spend more time practicing starts.

RIT pool is nice. 4 ft. at the opposite end of blocks. Diving well, and boards are gorgeous!

Really tired today, ate like a pig yesterday - so this morning's swim will be some standard stuff:

Warm: 1200
300 swim
300 kick
300 pull
300 swim
300 back
Main:
2 x 200 @  3:15
100 - paddle grab drill (hold top of paddle with hand) @ 1: 45
2 x 200 @ 3
2 x 100 - paddle grab drill @ 1:40 or 45
2 x 200 @ 2:55
3 x 100 - normal paddles (no buoy)@ 1:20
200 cool
3K

Happy Laps!