A Humbling Swim

After about 18 months off from swimming because of the start of the pandemic, I swam a few months in the fall of 2021 and then a few months in the fall of 2022 (both times because I was teaching at a university and I could use their pool). This past fall, I swam a lot of 200s, pyramids, and broken 400s/200s. But 2 days ago, I finally felt comfortable to try 3x500 in the pool.

This 3x500 workout was sort of my first "real" swim workout that I started doing over 10 years ago once I graduated from just going for 2000 straight yards. Apparently, I did 3x500 a few times just over a year ago, but I didn't know that when I hit the pool 2 days ago. I didn't have any real goals, and I was OK with my first one being 8:00 flat.

But then I didn't get any faster. I actually slowed down. And felt pretty crappy the entire time. In the end, I was just happy I actually got through all 3 sets:

8:00.4 = 1:36, 1:36, 1:36, 1:40, 1:32
8:05.4 = 1:40, 1:34, 1:39, 1:40, 1:32
8:04.7 = 1:41, 1:39, 1:39, 1:36, 1:29

Average: 8:03.5/500 (1:36.7/100)

(I've noticed when wearing my Garmin that it tends to record the first 100 a bit slower, and then the last 100 is recorded a bit faster. It must just be based off the timing of when it starts a new 100.)

This was rough. I'm used to speeding up, but I had no juice in this workout. The 500s that I did over a year ago in Sept, Oct, and Nov averaged 7:58, then 7:55, and finally 7:48. I have some work to do!

Nothing surprising here, but I still don't know if I can fully trust my heart rate chart
for my swims - sometimes it seems to go oddly high when my heart is acting fine.