January Update

Pre-Masters is awesome! I am doing drills that will help me with my stroke, but more importantly, I'm spending more time in the water and getting more comfortable every week. Just in January, I will have swum over 5,000m after tomorrow's practice. This is a very high number for someone who couldn't swim at all 18 months ago. :-)

I registered for my first Sprint Tri in May, which includes a 500m pool swim, a 20K bike ride and a 5K run. I am a bit worried about the swim, because I would like to do it all front crawl, and i'm not sure I will improve enough to go from 50m front crawl straight (right now) to 500m front crawl in May. We'll see. I'm ready to lower my standards a bit and go with some front crawl and some breast stroke... but I would really love to do all front crawl.

Right now, I can "swim" 280m straight. I put "swim" in brackets because that 280m consists of some front crawl, some breast stroke and a lot of Sweet Spot drills. Oh well, I'm still covering the distance and building some endurance, I guess...

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I've started increasing my running distances in preparation for 10K training. I will run 7K on Saturday, as a LSD, and I'm running a bit faster on my week runs (but doing intervals between 3:1s to 5:1s). I don't consider my week runs speed work, but I do run a little bit faster than on Saturday.

I ran just a little over 40K in January, which is below what I am expecting to run during my 10K training. These 40K are a good start, and I didn't get injured even though I've been doing longer long runs and running more consistently. And this, my friends, feels very good.

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I will be getting laser eye surgery again soon. My vision has started regressing this Summer, and it has now stabilized which means I can get a second surgery. I can't say I'm looking forward to it, because I'm remembering every little detail of the first one, but I can't wait to see clearly. Also, one week off work and spent sleeping sounds very interesting to me right now.

Pre-Masters Swimming

I have completed 3 adult swimming lessons courses, and I found myself lately at a point where I was fine with the basics of swimming, but I wasn't quite yet ready for Masters swimming or to join a triathlon club. Last week, I saw an advertisment for Pre-Masters swimming, where the requirement was to be able to swim for 50m straight, and have some basic knowledge of front crawl, back crawl and breast stroke. I decided to sign up for it and my first lesson was tonight. It was awesome! :-)

There are 2 other girls taking the lessons with me. These girls are about at the same level as I am, which is so good for my ego. I was scared that they'd be much better than I am, but we're about the same.

The instructor is very nice too, and he takes the time to explain to us how we should be feeling in the water and why we need to do things a certain way. He made us do some basic drills, which were challenging, but doable. I was good at some things, not as good at other things. One thing I noticed while doing one of the drills is that I stop kicking while I am breathing. I think I do the same when I swim laps, and this would explain why I feel like I'm sinking when I breathe...

Anyway, it was great and I think these lessons will help me progress in my swimming. Yay!

Running-wise, I'm getting back at running consistently (3 times a week) and I will start increasing the lenght of my Saturday long runs next weekend. My ultimate running goals for the Spring are a 35 minutes 5K in April and a 1:10 10K in May. To achieve them, I am planning on running consistently and swimming/cycling to strenghten my quads. I think those goals are within reach if I train smartly and avoid injury.

On a personal note, I was confirmed into my position at work. Yay! I don't need to worry about it anymore, and I can now concentrate on the next part of my carreer.