Fins to the Left, Fins to the Right: Training with...
The Philadelphia Fins are Philadelphia's gay and lesbian masters swim team. I am absolutely horrendous at estimating numbers, but I'd have to say that there are probably around 40 swimmers at every practice. I haven't met all of them yet, but I have met a good majority. They are all good people with wonderful attitudes. Take my word for it that I'm not just spitting the party line so I don't offend anyone; I doubt anyone from the team is reading this. I just wanted to praise the people there before getting a little bit into my training so far, and I promise to try not to do that too much (I know too much flowery language can make you want to vomit).
Before joining the team, I could barely swim a lap without running out of air. Swimming with a team full of great swimmers is strong motivation to train outside of practice. For me, this involves three days a week in the weight room and lots of analyzing great swimmers' techniques. The practices are held at a 25-yard pool with six lanes. The lanes increase in skill level and speed, land six being the beginner lane. I started out in lane six, and I barely made it through the warm-up in my first practice last week. Nonetheless, I felt great sitting on the edge of the pool huffing and puffing.
Tonight was my first practice in lane five. On Tuesday, a new friend of mine who swims in lane five suggested I meander over there at the end of practice. We were doing sets of 50, 25 underwater, 30 seconds of vertical kick, and 25 easy swim. I went over and pumped out the sets. So, I decided to stay in lane five for today's practice. I had never swum a 400 anything before, but that was the first part of our warmup. I managed to finish it while maintaining good technique and without getting too winded. We then did a 300 IM (without the fly, since none of us in lane five can actually swim it well enough to do an entire 100), which I also finished well. At this point, I figured I was probably suited more for distance swims than sprints, since whenever I try to sprint, I would barely finish a 25, but my time would be more like an appropriate time for a 100; on the other hand, I've discovered that I can hold a fairly decent pace with good technique over a pretty good distance.
Strangely enough, I'm also good at breaststroke. I had a swimming breakthrough today that involved the breaststroke, and I'm pretty proud of it. I've noticed that a lot of the olympic breaststrokers swim the stroke differently. I've also read that there are upwards of 50 ways to swim it. Over the last few weeks, I have been experimented with different forms of the wave style and flat style. I've been using the wave style mostly, coming pretty far out of the water and diving down and forward. Unfortunately, my times have not been where I was hoping they'd be. Apparently, I am more suited to swim like the great Leisel Jones. The articles I have read about her talked about her odd, water-plow style. Well, I was trying to get through a breaststroke drill tonight, and I wound up converting to a style very similar to hers (a fact of which I was not aware until after practice). I didn't time myself, but I noticed that I was catching up to the swimmers ahead of me that were halfway across the pool, and my distance per stroke was much greater.
I'm planning on attending Aquapalooza on October 11. Up until tonight, I couldn't decide which events to register for; however, I think I am going to do the 50 and 100 breast. Eventually, I will be able to do the distance freestyle events (800, 1500), but until then (and even then, really), I think I'm going to stick to the breaststroke events. I'm going to mail in my registration form tomorrow and hope it gets there by the 24th. Don't screw me USPS!