Out front

I had a bit of a quiet milestone today. This morning at swimming I led my lane for the entire set. 5000m of swimming out the front, I have never done that before. It wasn't an easy session either, containing quite a few bits of solid work.

I wouldn't say I smashed through every part of the session, but I did manage to hold on the whole way, not imploding on any one part. It is not a particularly impressive sounding achievement, not like a FTP PB or something, but believe me, it is a very big deal for me. It indicates that I am swimming at least as well as I ever have, potentially better.

So what I hear you ask, you led the lane, what is the big deal. Well firstly I train with some pretty awesome swimmers, so leading the lane means I am swimming well enough to hold my own against them. But more importantly than that, when you lead the lane, there is no draft. Swimming in a squad, even when you leave a big gap between swimmers and you are trying not to draft there is still some drafting benefit there, it is almost impossible to eliminate. Swimming at the front, you are working harder, simple as that. Being able to stay at the front means I was able to work harder for the whole session. That in itself isn't an amazing achievement, our squad is full of people who do that every session, but it is definitely a first for me. Hence my excitement.

The swim was my only session for the day, but that is okay because it was a fairly hard one. Tomorrow I have another solid day with another session on the Kickr in the morning and a run in the afternoon. If my Kickr session goes half as well as the one went yesterday I will be very happy. The session yesterday was probably the best feeling 2 hours I have ever spent on an indoor trainer. I just felt good the whole way. The run in the afternoon didn't go quite so smoothly. The plan was to do it on the AlterG treadmill, but unfortunately it gave up the ghost part way through the session leaving me stranded. Shouldn't be any problem tomorrow, as far as I am aware the road shouldn't breakdown.