First Week Swimming

New job has started (as evidenced by the slowdown in posts), which means membership at the Y has started, which means I have access to a pool in the mornings now. I am choosing to make use of it.

Monday: got downtown, spent half an hour getting a locker rented (they really could develop a better process for this!), then went for my first swim. I picked the only lane with just one guy in it. His name is Jack, and he was waaaaaaay nice to me. Thank goodness.

500+ yards (I lost count) in 30 minutes.

Tuesday: decided to swim for half an hour, then bike for whatever time I had left. Remembered my locker combo (yay me!). There was an open lane in the pool when I got down there, so I went to it and got in. Then a weird thing happened. This lady walked up and said hi to the guy one lane over. He said something about not being able to save her lane. There were 2 in his lane so I asked her if she wanted to split. She said yes, I started swimming, but she never got in. I swam my half hour and got out. As I was toweling off before going into the locker room everyone in the pool stopped swimming and offered that lady my lane, which she got in. WTF?? She could have had it by herself in the beginning if someone else wanted me in their lane. I don't give a crap which lane I'm in - I just want to avoid the cowing feeling of akwardness that plagues me whenever I have to ask someone to get into their lane. Anyways, this really pissed me off and made me feel like an outsider who is an ass for breaking unwritten social rules. Even though there was no other way I'd have acted in retrospect - they just didn't give me enough information.

Anyways - 1000 yards in 30 minutes.

Wednesday: hopped into a lane with a really good swimmer, unfortunately. Even though we were splitting, so I didn't have to worry about slowing him down, I worried anyways. I finally figured it out that if I started swimming off the wall right after he did, then he'd be only about 40 feet behind me when I got back to that wall - basically he was swimming 4 lengths of the pool to my 2. I would wait for him to hit the wall, then follow him out again. This wasn't ideal, but it was the most comfortable I got.

1100 yards in 30 minutes.

Thursday: my last day swimming for the week since I won't work Fridays in this job either. I wanted to go "long". Again, glory of glories, there was an open lane. My buddy Jack from Monday warned me that the lane on the end was tough because the water feeds in there, creating a current. He offered me to split his lane, but I told him I actually wanted to try staying in the hard lane for a good workout. Around the middle I got to talking to him and asked him about the paddles he was using, so he let me try them - said they're a better upper body workout. I felt it, but not too badly - does this mean I'm doing something wrong with my regular stroke? Only swam 100 yards in them, because I felt akward with them more than anything. The current was tough, especially for the last 500 yards or so. (Of course, I'm rocketing through the water like a real swimmer on the laps with it!!)

1600 yards in 45 minutes.

I'm exhausted. I ran before the swimming on Monday and Wednesday, 4 miles each day. Stationary biked on Tuesday before the swim. Core every evening. Going to bike again tonight, then maybe Tae Bo for fun tomorrow, long run on Saturday and then well-deserved off day on Sunday - I can't wait!!!