Clock Watching

This morning was the final Old Skool session down at Swim Smooth. Paul had mentioned this morning that the session would include a mixture of strokes this morning, as well as a few other Old Skool touches. It didn't disappoint.

The mixture of strokes came in the form of 8 x 50m medley, which was short on distance, but probably about as much as it needed. Watching some of the quicker swimmers in the squad reminded me that a lot of these folks come from a swimming background. Some very nice butterfly, breaststroke and backstroke on display. To their credit a lot of the less experience swimmers gave the medley a go too. That may have been partly due to a desire to try and partly because the alternatives were choices of 8 x 50 with T-shirts and band or 8 x 50m kick. All of a sudden medley doesn't seem to bad.

The rest of the set was equally old school. 3 x 200m, 10 x 100 and 8 x 50m. All this was done without the use of Tempo Timers and instead using just the clock. You could see that it was like a trip down memory lane for a lot of the more experience swimmers. Even for me it was a nice throwback looking up at the clock to keep an eye on everyone's times.

The session was a nice reminder that while the Tempo Timers are great bits of technology, they are not essential for going swimming. The squad certainly worked very hard without them. However, the session also was a reminder of why the Tempo Timers are so useful. Being able to cater a session exactly to a person's capability and speed, rather than making them swim in the group that is the closest fit to their ability, is an immensely powerful tool.

The session was also a reminder why the Tempo Timers are a good thing from the perspective of the pool deck. With the Tempo Timers the squads are largely self sufficient, they don't need much guidance during the session because the Timer is giving that to them. That frees Paul up to do more actual coaching, rather than just being a glorified stop watch holder. Similarly, this session was one of the harder that I have done on the pool deck. It was great to be so involved, taking times, keeping track etc, however, I can see that it would wear thin very quickly. The Tempo Timers are a more efficient and effective way to train, simple as that.

With the Friday swim taken care of my attention is now turning to this weekend, which will hopefully include a bit of exercise of my own. Tomorrow the plan is to head out with the BYL Juniors again and make the most of this great weather that we are having. There might also be some Standup paddling as well as a bit of jogging if the mood takes me.

I love being out and about exercising at this time of year. As I have said before the weather at this time of year is awesome, but more than that there is a real buzz out on the road. This weekend marks the 'one month to go' point for Busselton 70.3. That means that nearly every long course triathlete in Perth is in the process of losing their mind. They are full of nervous energy as they are putting the final few weeks of work into their race preparation. For the first timers the race is suddenly becoming very real. When you are out riding, or running, or down the pool, you can almost feel this nervous energy. It creates a great feel.

I am looking forward to heading out and being part of it tomorrow.