Monday Swim..so so

Mondays seem to come quickly after a Saturday morning session. Alessio seems to be letting up a little...maybe its the summer, the Cubs or he is having good weekends. Here was for the most part our workout:

• 200 freestyle with pull buoy
• 100 back
• 5x25 freestyle (2x drill, 2x progression, 1 all out)
• 5x25 anything but free (2x drill, 2x progression, 1 all out)
• 50 easy
• 10x50 freestyle in .50
• 2x200 freestyle (150 with pull buoy, 50 backstroke)

We are schedule to swim against the University of Chicago Masters Swim. I have signed up for a half marathon the next day so I don't know what I will be swimming, if any. Alessio suggested a 500...500...what? I have to think about it.

Monday morning butt kicking...and swim

I need more sleep. I cannot go to bed at 11pm and expect to wake at 4:30 and be rested. These are my thoughts at 7:30am and I definitely will believe it this afternoon.

Alessio is relentless in his Monday morning beating/sets:

• 100 warmup
• 300 freestyle
• 200 freestyle with pull buoy
• 100 Individual Medley
• 4x50 (25 kick, 25 catch-up)
• 4x50 in 2:05
• 100 freestyle easy
• 4x75 freestyle
• 4x50 freestyle
• 100 easy
• 300 freestyle
• 100 easy

....yeah...Monday morning....

Monday Swim...late to report

As I mentioned before, life gets in the way of life so this is the only free time I have to write about my training.

Yesterday morning, Alessio was suprisingly easy on us. Whether or not it had to do with it being St. Patrick's Day weekend or a weekend of our team party...who knows...we are just grateful.

• 200 freestyle easy
• 6x (75-freestyle, 75 (25-butterfly, 25-back, 25-breastroke)
• 100 freestyle easy
• 6x50 (50-catch up w/pull buoy, 50-catch up hard kick, 50 - any stroke, hard kick)
• 6x50 w/kickboard
• 100 free, easy

My stroke needs work, especially in my pull and when I enter the water. Coach Alessio has suggested that I do the fingertip drag in order to improve entering the water. Also, during my pull, I would normally, bend ath teh wrist and elbow, but I have since changed it to just pull straight down. I have seen my times improve as well as my power. I was losing power bending at the wrist and and elbows, so their instruction has been very helpful.

Monday morning session with Alessio

Most of us dislike Monday mornings and so at work, I try to ease into the week by not dealing with depressing or difficult tasks until the afternoon. Even in my training, Mondays were a rest day. For some reason, Alessio, our morning coach doesn't think so. I don't know much about Alessio except that he is Italian, raised in Rome, college swimmer and has great hair.

Here was our morning sets:

• 200 warm-up
• 4x75
• 6x75
• 4x75
• 200 with a pull buoy
• 100 easy
• 8x50 at 1min
• 100 easy
• 6x50 at 55
• 100 easy
• 4x50 at 50
• 100 easy

I think that was the workout give or take another 100 or 200 in there. Regardless, it was a tough monday.

We use 3 three lanes in the pool. The first lane is for the more novice swimmers, while the other two lanes are for more experienced swimmers. I started out in lane 1 but have since moved to the other lanes. Today, I was in lane three which at least today had 3 of the fastest swimmers in the program - Kira, Mike and Les and two others who were not as fast but fast nonetheless. I started last in the group and was almost lapped...embarrasing.