Fast Swims!

I still need to post the "whole story" from Henry's experience fencing in the Junior Olympics last month in Charlotte (as all I posted about that so far were 2 treadmill workouts in different hotels as we were on the road). We we got back rom that trip about 4 weeks ago, our schedule was thrown off for a day or 2 as we got back to normal. So I hit the pool at a much different time than I'm used to.

There were more college students around (collegiate swimmers), and I think that pushed me to swim harder. Usually, I'm in a lane next to a 65-year-old going half my speed. I did one of my very normal workouts: a pyramid swim where the main set is 100, 200, 300, 400, 300, 200, and 100 yards. Lately, here have been my times:

- My 200s have been averaging around 3:08 (3:06 or better is good, 3:11 or slower is bad).
- My 300s have been averaging around 4:46 (4:43 or better is good, 5:52 or slower is bad).
- My 400s have averaging around 6:30 (6:23 or better is good, 6:40 or slower is bad).

I was PIUSHED in this swim! Here were my splits for the pyramid (along with my notes from my log):

1:26
3:04 (1:33, 1:29) - faster than normal
4:42 (1:35, 1:37, 1:30) - "normal/fast" but not exceptional
6:13 (1:35, 1:34, 1:33, 1:31) - FAST!
4:39 (1:35, 1:34, 1:30) - Fast! First time under 4:40 in LONG time (maybe pre-pandemic?)
3:00 (1:33, 1:27) - FAST!
1:25

Those spilts were GREAT! Especially "coming down" in the back half: the 400, 300, and 200 were killer!!

Then a week later I wondered if I could keep it up. It was my (current) favorite workout of broken 3x400 and 3x200. Again, this one started with a super fast 400! And then my 200s were all decent. This one wasn't as amazing as the week before, but these are still better-than-average splits:

400: 6:15 (1:33, 1:36, 1:38, 1:28)
200s: 3:06 (1:35, 1:31) and 3:06 (1:35, 1:31)
100s: 1:31, 1:29, 1:28, 1:27

60 sec rest

200: 3:04 (1:35, 1:29)
100s: 1:26, 1:29 (my first 1:31 100 above and my last 100 [the 1:29] were mentally weak)
50s: 0:39, 39, 39, 40

Spurred by these workouts, I'm still pushing the effort a BIT more than usual. Yesterday's swim was decent but not amazing. Just getting in some consistent yards!

Getting out of the pool when it had quieted down.


Post-swim selfie.