Back into the Pool, Treadmill Run
Oh, water. With your viscosity of 8.90 × 10−3 dyn·s/cm^2. Why you gotta hurt me like that?
Every time I have a lapse in my swimming I get a big viscous slap in the face upon continuing. This was probably my first swim in a month or so. I felt sluggish. My arms tired quickly and the water felt thick.
The good news is that after four years of this stuff I seem able to click back into my own personal form of a freestyle stroke almost immediately. A few years ago I remember a lot of struggle early in the season just to get the swim stroke feeling "normal" again.
The other good news is that not all is lost. After a nice warmup of about ten minutes I did a couple 100's. 1:24 and 1:29. Not bad for me. They hurt a lot more than 1:20's did at the end of last season. But three seasons ago 1:30 was a quick 100 for me. Some long term improvement.
It'll take a few weeks to get the muscular endurance back. Dylan pointed me to lat pulldowns. I did some today. Along with my first core gym workout in a while. I expect my torso to hurt a good bit tomorrow.
After that I hit the belt. The treadmill, that is. Thirty minutes of intervalish running. I did two minutes fast every five. No real plan. Usually the first minute at 9 or 10 mph. Second at 10 or 11 mph. Final bonus minute of the workout at 11.5... fo show. I believe I have better leg turnover than I did last year at this time. And, given last week's private marathon, I apparently still have the endurance too. This is the balance I'm looking for. We'll see if I can maintain it.
Only an hour of aerobic time. Felt like a lot more. Late last season I was doing two and three hours daily.
I'm starting to feel some pressure for the early season races. St. Anthony's where Josh Shields and his massive VO2Max seek to destroy me. And Gulf Coast where Kindzia and his science-forged man-fitness seek to disembowel me (while maintaining that Kindzia kindness and smile, of course).
But it's still early and any time I start to fret I quickly realize that these are very long seasons.