What a strange week it has been. This week has seen COVID-19 come front and center in American life. A week ago we were listening cautiously to the news of the virus, wondering what might come. Now, daily life is impacted by the closures of schools, gatherings, events, and gyms.
Even still, the desire to train and stay healthy is high.
Workouts for the Week of March 9 - 15, 2020
Monday, March 9
COVID-19 Impact: Very Low
Focus: Longer Sets
1000 Free, Timed
100 Kick
4 x 50 Pull
4 x {500 Free; 50 Recovery}
Total 3,500
The training must be paying off. My 1,000 timed freestyle was 8 seconds faster than my previous best 1,000 (in the last ~5 years or so). I came in at 15:06. I know that I can shave a good 20+ seconds off of that time still. All in good time...
Tuesday, March 10
COVID-19 Impact: Very Low
No swimming today.
54 minutes on the bike trainer.
Wednesday, March 11
COVID-19 Impact: Heightened Awareness of Impending Impact
Focus: Intensity
600 Warm Up
6 x {100 IM; 1000 Free}
12 x 50 Free
500 Free
100 Cool Down
Total 3,000
I was really looking to get my heart rate up on the 100 IMs with the 100 Free being medium recovery. My 100 IM times were in the 1:40 - 1:43 range, which is pretty decent for my current physical condition.
I did the 500 Free for time (off the wall) and blew my 5 year PR away by seven seconds. While I'm excited about shaving the time, I know I'm capable of much more. I want to get that down to sub-seven minutes.
Thursday, March 12
COVID-19 Impact: Impending closures of places like gyms, but no closures locally yet
Focus: Recovery & Technique
10 x 100 Free
100 Recovery
5 x {100 IM; 100 Free}
100 Recovery
100 Kick
700 Various Drills
Total 3,000
I have been dissatisfied with my stroke for a while now. I feel uneven in my pull and recovery and my right arm just isn't behaving as I want it to. I spent quite a bit of my drill time focused on that and trying to feel for my right arm entry and recovery.
Also, after my workout I learned that the gym will be closed Friday for a massive cleaning as a preventative response to COVID-19.
Friday, March 13
COVID-19 has the gym closed. My workplace is moving to work-from-home-if-you-can. All local events are cancelled. Gatherings over 250 people are prohibited. There has been a run on the grocery stores.
Total rest day. I spent the day working and preparing for my son and his girlfriend (whose home is in France) to temporarily move home from college. Their campus is being closed and they will probably be home for around a month. From a fitness standpoint, I will be taking advantage of my son's Division 1 water polo skills and asking him for stroke advice. He can swim a 0:47 100 Free (SCY) off the wall. I'm so proud. And jealous. Did I mention that my husband and I met at the pool?
Saturday, March 14
COVID-19 Impact: the gym opened back up! So, back to the pool.
Focus: Long and even
1650 Free Timed
100 Recovery
3 x 1000 Free
100 Recovery between each
500 Free
Cool Down
Total: 5550
Fasted 1650 in 5 years! Yay! The 1000 sets were quite consistent. I kept them slow and steady. The first 1000 was 16:06 with numbers two and three being 16:20 and 16:24. Happy enough with that.
Even more exciting was that I recorded my entire swim session and watched my stroke. Gasp! Hideous!
I also posted my video to Slowtwitch for the good people there to chime in on what I can do to fix this mess. I had no idea I was entering with my thumb. And this is me actually consciously trying to get my right arm out in front with a high recovery. Clearly, I have work to do.
Sunday, March 15
COVID-19 Impact: This feels like the calm before the storm.
There will be no more swimming this week. You can see from my swim summary that I have had quite the ramp up for the last three weeks. So far, my shoulders feel good and I have no niggles or pains. I have one more big week ahead of me before I schedule in a recovery week.
I still have a lot of swimming to get built into my base before I'm 10k ready. I have about 10-12 weeks left before summer so I think I can get there. My current long swim is just around 5k and my current long week is 13.5k. I suppose I could probably get by in a 10k at present, but it would be really rough and ugly, not to mention risky.
Totals for the Week
15,050 Yards
4 hours and 5 minutes of swimming
54 minutes on the bike trainer
It is interesting to see the ramp up. You can see my dabbling from last fall and when I started to be committed to the training.
I am excited for what fitness is yet to come.