The ups and downs of February

 February - an interesting month

Sad to admit, it has been a bit of a pants month with regards to training. I set out with the plan of doing about 15 - 20km swimming a week,interspersed with Walks and pilates.

Well we are at the end now and I have not not got anywhere near where I was hoping to get with my training and I am really beating myself up about it, to the extent that it is affecting most my life. It  seems that something is wrong as I have been called up on my highly negative attitude, reflected in my facebook posts, by many of my great friends.It is very comforting to know I have so many AMAZING friends, without you slapping me into shape, I would not be who I am.

My Mind is just not in it right now and I have been told that I should just give it a rest for a while. The reason I am trying to push myself really hard is that I have a 3 week holiday coming up in April where, although I might do a bit of training, it will not nearly be enough. I am trying to get my fitness up as quickly as possible and maybe that is not the right thing for me right now.
On this note, to ad to my frustration, I have purchased my wife and I tickets to Africa only to see them go on bloody sale a week later, losing out on about £400. I then bought myself a new watch online, only for that to go on sale 3 days later.

Moral

I need to work on my procrastination skills

I am usually brilliant at this

 

It has also been suggested that I should find someone to train with. If anyone knows of anyone who swims at about 4km an hour and is keen to do about 5 - 8km sets and lives in the Sutton area then please make yourself known. Most my masters class are not up to that sort of speed or distance right now although they are a great bunch and enjoy haveing me push them,and I love swimming with them,I need someone to push me. I will look around and see what I can find

Another suggestion is to find a coach. I am not to keen on this idea as I have never had a coach and, as I have learned over my life, I am not a good listener. This is the reason I have steered clear of them in the past. Also, I have, probably stupidly, believed that if someone wants to coach me they need to have done the distance I am planning on doing.

This week however has not been all bad. I had a great 3.5km swim on saturday morning with my waterpolo Friend who pushes me way past my ability. But he can only swim on Saturdays and after about 1.5km he done. All very understandable as he does not have to worry about endurance, only speed, so his sets reflect that.

This was followed by 6km walk around Wimbledon Common which was great to be outside.

Monday was a very good 5.2km swim set and my times are improving, doing 500m in 7 min 6 seconds. A whole 24 seconds faster than I was expecting to do. I can only attribute this Increase in speed to my pilates and better core strenght because, it cannot be due to my swimming training.

Tuesday was a good pilates session

Wednesday was a good 5.1 km set and my times are still surprisingly faster than they should be.

Tonight I am taking a bit of time out but When I am not training I am thinking. This is a bad thing.

Tomorrow I will try to head to the pool and also Saturday I will be swimming and then walking,with some work thrown in so it is not all bad, just not where I was hoping to be. One thing that I am surprised at is my speed at the moment. Lets just hope that the endurance will come

Well, As March approaches I aim to try to do things a bit differently. I will Go to another masters class for one evening a week, see what they have to offer in the way of professional Swimmers or triathletes to push me a bit. I have not really considered myself to be a fast swimmer and I do know Many other people who would push me hard, sadly they are nowhere near where I live so I would not be able to meet up with them regularly.

I am also longing for the time when the Lakes open for swimming, hammering out 200 lengths for me is becoming a bit tedious and when I am not having fun I am a very Grumpy person as some of my friends have discovered, to their detriment.

I hope you enjoy reading this and some of you might even be able to understand where I am coming from, because I don't.

Happy reading