Wednesday 2 January 2013

New Year, Same Old Challenge, Renewed Enthusiasm? (not to mention introducing Son of Toosmartwatch)

Inspired by Jean Luc Picard no less (courtesy of Mel Lutton's Facebook news feed) and determined to get back in the groove I left Teenage Triathlete up to her neck in GCSE Biology revision and escaped to Dunston.

I'd almost forgotten the way there as the last time I swam at the Dunston International Leisure Centre (or Dunston Baths) was early June last year.

I arrived early (shock horror completely out of character) and thought I was going to be swimming on my own; where were you all guys? (obviously making training sessions wasn't high on Gateshead Masters list of New Year Resolutions) anyway "quiet Claire" turned up for company and we worked our way through this little sesh. I'm sure she was secretly enjoying seriously kicking my butt during the workout (even on breaststroke)

I was resolving not to moan and whinge about how excruciatingly horrible it all felt, but as you can no doubt imagine after a 6 month swimming hiatus it was truly excruciatingly horrible. It was such a relief to slip the paddles on for the 8 x 100's I went almost miraculously from wallowing to gliding through the water.

The session was a good opportunity to properly test swim my new toy, a replacement heart rate monitor who has been christened "Son of Toosmartwatch" see here for further explanation. It is pretty swanky and the toosmart bit comes in because after I'd downloaded the session it told me  "This training increased your anaerobic tolerance, and improved your maximal oxygen uptake (VO2max) and efficiency. It also raised the speed you can maintain without building up lactic acid. The training duration was long enough to increase fatigue resistance at the used speed. Carbohydrates are the main energy source that your body uses at this training intensity."

Whereas perhaps "notsosmart" Binge Swimmers might just say "it bloody well hurt!"



800 warm up change stroke each 25
5 x 200 odd ones free @ 4 mins, even back and breast on 4.30
8 x 100 pull with paddles @ 2.10
12 x 50's medley changeover @ 70 secs  *
16 x 25's drill @ 35s swim down
50 swim down
3650 metres

* only managed half a length fly (5strokes to be precise) and also wimped out of back-breast turns (I'm such a wuss)

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