Time for Smooth Swimming

Well the gamble paid off this morning. A nice 15km of running done and not a drop of rain to be had.

Last night I was fairly sure I had made the wrong call, with around 30mm of rain falling on our house. I had basically resigned myself to a wet, cold run, but when I woke up this morning, to my surprise, the rain had stopped. By the time I finished my run some of the roads were even starting to dry out. It wasn't to last of course, with more rain rolling through in the morning, so I was particularly happy that I managed to slot the session in between the fronts.

With the run complete and a gym session finished, that is training done for the day. All that is left for the day is some relaxing and spending time with the family. Nice to have what will hopefully be a relaxing night to look forward to.

The morning is probably going to be a little bit less relaxing. Tomorrow I am heading down to Claremont Pool for my return to the Swim Smooth squad.

This is my third week of swimming since my injury and so I figure it is about time to brave the squad session again. I am not too anxious though since the plan at the moment is to take the morning fairly easy. I will be dropping myself down a lane from where I usually swim and I will go into the session only planning on swimming for an hour. If I can get through 3km of the session then I will be happy anything more will be a bonus. I have illusions of making it through the full 5km session. Really tomorrow is all about adaption and assessing where I am at. Depending on how I go tomorrow will give me an idea of where to situation myself for other upcoming squad sessions.

Even though I have only just returned to swimming, I feel it is in a really nice niche at the moment. A mix between squad sessions and guided solo training will hopefully start to see me regaining my swimming form. The squad is great for motivation and to help push just that little bit more, while the solo sessions are good for solid, honest work. No drafting here. Combine the two will also provide that other critical ingredient, miles. For me my swimming speed almost directly correlates to how much I swim. The swimming has to be good quality training obviously, no point just getting to the pool and splashing about. But if I manage to get in a decent amount of quality training, consistently then my swimming always improves. Common sense really now that I have reread it, but it is not a point that everybody gets. Particularly with regard to swimming lots of people are looking for a 'silver bullet' or a trick to get them quicker. It is true, swimming is very technique based and so a lot can be gained through technique improvements. But too many people focus purely on the technique and forget to simply get in the pool and work.

I swam as a child and so my technique is reasonable. It isn't pretty, but for open water it is effective. For me the improvements come through doing. More swimming equals speed for me. That is what I am working towards now. As with everything, the build has to be within reason, not trying to do too much too quickly. But more swimming is the goal. Tomorrow is the first real step towards that goal.