Beat-Up Chest and Swim Meet Results

50 yard freestyle:

31.69
3 out of 4 in the 30-34 male age group
43 out of 48 men
54 out of 67 overall

With that crappy, crappy dive, it makes sense that I was a little slower this year than I was last year.


500 yard freestyle:

7:26.08 (a default PR - my first 500)
50 splits: 38.32, 42.73, 46.00, 47.09, 46.38, 45.62, 46.34, 45.62, 45.00, 42.98
100 splits: 1:21.05, 1:33.09, 1:31.72, 1:31.96, 1:27.98
3 out of 3 in the 30-34 male age group
17 out of 20 men
27 out of 32 overall

I mentioned in my race report that "I bet there will be a 0:15 spread between my 100s." Well, I wasn't far off: my first and 2nd 100s were over 12 seconds apart. I needed to hold stronger 200-300 yards into this race. Ideally, I'd say I should/could swim this: 1:22, 1:30, 1:29, 1:30, 1:27 = 7:18. And being I did a "pool start" for this 500, I could easily compare this race with an all-out effort at any time. I might do that in a month or 2.


100 yard freestyle:

1:09.88 (a PR by about 0.3 seconds)
50 splits: 33.03 and 36.85
2 out of 3 in the 30-34 male age group
26 out of 38 men
33 out of 50 overall

I swam the first 50 nearly 0.7 seconds faster this year, and then finished with a 50 that was 0.4 seconds slower. But that's not surprising because I had just swam a 500, so I was beat. (But I didn't really feel tired during this race, so that's not really an excuse.)


As a follow up to the red chest poor-dive photos in my race report, here are some more recent images to enjoy:

Bruising over 24 hours after the meet.


Above my left boob over 24 hours after the meet.


This was from late last night: 2.5 days after the meet.
The small spots are getting better, but this bruise seriously contains about every color.
Roy G. Biv is well-represented on my chest.

Talking with Katie (the speedy swimmer who I met and chatted with for most of the meet who swam a 1:01 100 and a 22:48 1650) after she saw me dive for all of my races, she had a little advice. She knew what I was TRYING to do: I was aiming for a good pool-start dive where I shoot across the pool and then pop my hips up to get a dive action started. But the problem is I can't do that last part. My hips are like Shakira's: they don't lie. (I don't know what that means.) She recommended just diving straight in at an angle without trying to shoot as far across the pool. That will be a less-proper dive start, but it will probably be a lot better for ME. She warned that I'd probably go too deep a few times, but I probably get the hang of that pretty easily, and it'd give my chest a rest. Maybe I'll try that next year.