Expressing Gratitude

How do you thank So many people?

I am currently sitting at home after a nice 4km wallow in the pool this evening, mind going at 100mph. Then there are thoughts as to how I am where I am today? 

I had a pretty traumatic day. As I am such an expert at procrastination, I had to head to the high street and endure the hustle and bustle of Kingston upon Thames. One of my pet hates in this world! I am shortly off to my homeland, to catch up with family, and left it too late to use Mr internet for all my shopping needs, so the high street was beckoning.

Anyway, I digress. It is virtually impossible to thank each and everyone of you individually - my sponsorship does not extend to global flights to thank you all in person, although it would be nice. I just want you to know that each and everyone of you that reads my blog adds another string to my enthusiasm and desire to go on with this little adventure. _There has now been an audience of just under 600 people, that is in just two months. I thought that you might like to know that.

For some who watch from afar, and others who have been a total rock for me recently - you know who you are, you all make this little adventure much more bearable and fun. I may be the nutter that you see at the pool, and soon in the lakes, ploughing out the laps, but I would never be here if it was not for people who take the time to believe in me, when I have problems believing in myself. They often realise things that I do not about myself, and very often point them out to me, whether I like their opinions or not. Sometimes these realisations are hurtful but they are for a reason. That is the one reason I love my friends, they say it like it is.

The only thanks I can offer is to keep writing this blog, watching your comments and learning from my friends - can anyone teach me to swim faster? Although I cannot predict the future outcome of my swims - or the British weather, which, if it is anything like last year, will play a big part as to if some of them actually happen. All I can do to thank you is PREPARE! PREPARE! PREPARE!  You all have so much to offer and you all offer me belief in myself. To me, there is nothing worth more than that.

So where are we at now?

Training is going well, although my sets are not up to where they should be, I am now excercising most days, walking, swimming or pilates. I am not too worried about the distances anymore - seriously, swimming in excess of 250 lengths in a heated pool SUCKS! not just the laps, the heat nearly does me in. The distances will come, when I can get into cold water, and I look forward to them.

Now most my shopping for my trip to Africa is done, that is a weight off my mind and I hope not to have to go to the high street anytime soon. I now have just over 10 days to go before I am on holiday.

I have been told that I am toning up again, not that I will ever admit to it. I am getting my classic "Daniel Craig coming out of the ocean look, from Casino Royal," look back. This photo was of me 4 years ago when I had just finished a 6 hour swim.

The one thing that is missing for me right now is the tan, thanks Britain for the wonderful spring that you are giving us. Sorry People of Zimbabwe, this Zimhippo is going to be walking around nearly naked for three weeks to get my Vitamin D intake - even if it is your winter, it is still about 25 degrees warmer than Blighty

All in all, things are going well for me, and that is thanks to YOU - my supporters. I only hope that some, or all of you might be able to be able to support me on one, or all of my swims.

Happy reading and I hope you get as much joy out of these blogs as I do writing them

A man's friendships are one of the best measures of his worth.

Charles Darwin

Planning the Summer

Planned swims this summer.

TIME STANDS STILL FOR NO MAN, No matter what you are feeling or how life is
going, so it is time for me to put dates in the diary for the swims that I plan to do this year and I figure what better time than now, sitting at home after a short week. Tonight is a night off from training, so instead of driving myself insane THINKING about things, which seems to
be happening with for too much regularity, I thought I would DO something constructive.

Hmmmmm, this is going to be a bit more difficult than I thought. I was planning on doing the 24 mile challenge in 24 hours. That is not going to happen, I will be on holiday in deepest darkest Africa.
So lets look for a decent size swim in May.
Bugger!! The 10km that I was hoping to do in May at Dorney lake is on the 27th of May.  Guess what, I will be in Scotland that weekend, so bang goes that Idea.

Listening to the weather forecast over the last couple of days, meteorologists out there are comparing the lovely weather in Blighty akin to a "mini ice age."  We had our three hours of spring earlier today. You may ask why I point this out? Well ...... as some of you, who know me know..... I DO NOT, and
WILL NOT swim in a wetsuit.  A hippo in a wetsuit is NOT a pretty sight. Mind you, neither is a hippo in orange budgy smugglers!!  Well tough, you will just have to deal with it. Anyway I have lost 10 kg (1.5 stone) this year so my smugglers aren't so snug anymore! I'll just have to get tighter ones.

So the search continues for a decent distance swim in May.

After a fair amount of googling, it seems that there are not many middle to long distance swims in May.  I have however found one  that is not a million miles from me, it is called the Jubilee River Swim. This takes place on the 2nd of June and starts at Taplow and takes in the 10km stretch of the Jubilee river, ending in Eton.

It is ideal for spectators, as they can either walk, run or cycle the whole distance along the edge of the river. I would love the support. For details of the map please go to Jubilee River Swim

My next swim will be 15th June, Champion of Champions. A total distance of  9 miles (14.5km)
          This will take place in Dover Harbour, a place that became very familiar to me in 2008.
          The format is 5 miles, then you get out for a rest. Then get in and do 3 miles, get out for a rest,
          culminating in a 1 mile swim.
You get to choose either 1,2 or all 3 swims. To gain the title of "Champion of Champions" I will have to complete all three of them.
This is an ideal event for supporters to come down and watch. There is an awesome fish restaurant right on the beach that overlooks the swimmming area. For those that do not want to sit and get sozzled in the sun, there is always the amazing Dover cliffs to go for a walk on, then join up with me and the other supporters at the end of the day.

My next anticipated swim will be back to an old wallowing patch, The River Thames Swim between Hampton CourtBridge and Kingston bridge. This will take place on the 21st July. Start times are on a wave basis so will start any time between 8.30am and 10.10am. Another Lovely swim for spectators, who can follow the whole event along the towpath. I will try to beat my time of 36 minutes, unless there is a pretty mean current, I think that will be most unlikely.

The ultimate goal of my "Journey to 21" comes around on the 10th/11th of August at lake Windermere. As I have discovered from chatting to my friends, this needs a bit of clarification, as some of their geography is so bad they could not find a beer at a beer festival, let alone the biggest
lake in England. So there is a place in Britain called Cumbria. Just below Scotland, that is the country that is NORTH of England. In this area of outstanding beauty is Lake Windermere.

The swim is 2 lengths of the lake - I don't think I will have to practice my tumble turns as I will only be doing one of them. 10.5 miles each way.
Sadly, this is not a very spectator friendly swim for a few reasons. It is at night. Most of you will be in the pub. There is no real walk way up the lake.  This does not mean that I would not want to have you support me. You are all most welcome to come up to this part of the world for the weekend. There is loads to do there and the area is stunning.

So there you have my schedule for the summer. There will be other swims along the way that I will use as training but above are the events that I will try to book onto.
  
           So what else is going on with me?

My training is getting better. I have still not broken the 6km barrier this year but I have give up beating myself up about it, it was only dragging me down. I am loving my swimming again.
Whether it is the fact that I can escape life for a while, or just enjoy pushing myself, I do not know. I am in a far better place with my swimming than I was about 3 weeks ago.

My weight loss is good, considering I did not even think about it and it was never a goal of mine.
I have now lost 10Kg (1.5stone) this year and am still losing. As I am losing it, I figure I would like to lose about 5kg  more before I go on holiday in 12 days time. that way, if I put some weight back on, I will not be too bothered.

My holiday will be in Zimbabwe and I will try to put in some training inwhilst I am out there. One thing I will be working on is getting a tan. Lilly white hippos are not common.

This week, for no apparent reason, I have started receiving posts from one
of my swimming idols. Lewis Pugh. I do not know why, but they have just started appearing on facebook. I Really love this guys attitude to life, If I could get just a fraction of his enthusiasm, I would be a happy man. Some of the quotes and thoughts that he has really strike a chord
within me. To Focus, Keep Going and Never give up on your Dreams .

Well that is about all for now and I would like to leave you with a quote that I got of Lewis's facebook.

 

"if someone tells you that you can't achieve your dream, don't waste good time arguing.Walk away and do it."

or in my case swim it.

I do hope that you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy sharing my journey with you.

Till the next time stay well and keep on Keeping on.  

Finding Focus

 

Hi there all. Hope this finds you all well and enjoying the Spring that we are having in Blighty - well the one day we had of it in the last week?

 

I am a bit late on this blog - but it is worth it. Recently my life took a bit of a seismic shift. This shift has given me new found vitality, and a reason to go and push myself to where I should be. So, how did this shift take place?

 

About two or three months ago I was conversing with a friend of mine over the internet.  He's an old friend,  who went to the same school as me in Zimbabwe. He follows me on Facebook and I follow him. He is a bit of a fitness freak- more so than me, the worst kind - a budding ironman. He is also the managing Director of Colins-IT, an IT company based in Rugby, Warwickshire.

 

As a thought, I proposed the idea of sponsoring me this year with my adventures.  I had done my work, the ball was in his court. Time went by and I did not hear anything back from him. I did not really feel like pushing him, he knew the details and the decision was his.  Whilst out with friends last weekend,  I get a Facebook  post back from him - short and to the point - Can I get hold of one of his colleagues?

 

Monday arrived and I sent the email, I was dumbfounded by the response that I got back. Not going into too much detail, I can now go and do the swims that I want to do this year - and a few more -without having to delve into my personal funds. The sponsorship runs for 6 months.

 

 As people who know me and what I do, these sporting events are not cheap. When you take into account all the training, accommodation, entrance fees, membership fees, travel and keeping my fat backside in costumes – chlorine really hammers them – it all adds up to a fair amount of money.

All these swims are done for charity, and I very seldom take any money back from them to cover my costs.

 

So, all of the above have taken me from a TRY-athlete to a PRO-athlete – depending on your interpretation of the word “PRO”!

 

What it has done for me personally, is amazing-  I have found my focus again!  Last week I would just go to the pool and grind out the lengths, often getting bored after about 4 km. Now I have a purpose, a goal, a helping hand.  Knowing someone believes in you is a very powerful motivator. I am not solely answerable to just myself any more. To be honest, I was beginning to get to the point where I was not enjoying what I love –my swimming – somewhere I never want to be.  My sport, and particularly my swimming have a lot to answer for, particularly in the person I have become.

 

So a new chapter in my sporting life begins – thank you Colins-IT. You have no idea how much this means to me. To top it all off, guess what their colours are – ORANGE!  It must be Fate!

 

On the training front, things have picked up and last week I managed to train for 5 days and this will carry on until I head to Africa to find some sunshine. Whilst I am there I will hope to be training at my old college. I have put in a couple of very good 5km sets and a couple of speed sessions, which are not as long, but a lot more intense. My times are starting to fall again.  I now train with two Masters classes. One, at David Lloyd Brooklands, one at David Lloyd Cheam. The Brooklands group has a lot more marathon swimmers. Half my Saturday session is done with a water-polo player who really keeps me on my toes – very short, very intense. I do normally carry on after my training partner leaves for the steam room.

 

My core strength is improving all the time thanks to the delightful Claire who is my Pilates instructor.

 

Since Middle of January I have lost 8kg, sliding further down the BMI scale on the way to being just fat!

 

Things that I need to improve on

 

My mental  well-being. I need to put time into my life to sit down and reflect on my challenges, and visualise how I am doing and the final outcome of them all. This was very easy in the past as I used to travel to work by train so used that time to its maximum in positive reflection – which sometimes ended up in sleep, and me missing my stop.

My physical well-being, I need to focus a bit on my nutrition during these training setss rather than go and do an big early morning session on just a banana. I do not really want to lose too much more weight – Have you ever seen a slim hippo??? In cold water it is preferable to be on the slightly rotund side of the scale.

 

 

I would like to end this post with a Quote that I find very pertinent to what you have just read:

 

Coming together is a beginning;

Keeping together is progress;

Working together is

SUCCESS.

Henry  Ford

Slow Start to March

The Start of March has come and gone and we are now 1 week into it. Well it has not been a stunning start to the Month. My aim was to start pushing my trainig up to 6km sets. You Guessed it, Have not managed to do one. No matter how hard I try to justify it, and my justifications are perfectly valid. I think it is just plain old Laziness and negativity.

The main reason I have not been swimming that much is I picked up a horrible cough and cold that has had me up most nights and coughing a spluttering most of the day. There is a lot of it around at the moment so it is not an odd thing. I did a small set on Saturday last week of about 4km. This was followed in the afternoon by a lovely walk in Epsom Downs  with Rish Robbie and Marlene. I felt crap most the rest of the week so did not do any training apart from Wednesday.

I had planned to go and find some other Masters classes to train with and gauge their abilities to push me and hopefully, focus my mind again. Armed with a blocked nose, stuffy head, that was about to explode and not so great Cough, I ventured down to Brooklands David lloyd gym, dosed myself up on a few drugs and headed for the pool to do a couple of Km's of the masters class.

The outcome - I found some swimmers that can push me, they are not just faster than me, they validate the one belief in myself that I have always had - I am not such a good swimmer afterall!! Well in my state, I manged to hammer out the whole set and ended up doing about 4km of swimming, at a pace harder than I have done this year. If I felt Crap before I started, I now felt absolutely terrible except, this time, it was physical I can deal with that kind of ailment. The mental side of me was very pleased. I had left my comfort zone of my masters class - which I really love swimming with, and found a group which challenges me to get better and push harder.

If I learnt nothing else, I have taken away from that evening that I need to Leave my comfort zone more often. If I train on my own then I really need to mix up my training a lot more.Whenever I train on my own I generally do what I know I am capable of and build my sets on that basis. It all comes back to the T.B.C (Total Body Confusion) method of training which I adhere too, seems like I need to change the way I do that as well. Not drastically, but input a lot more diversity.

A couple of them even knew of, and had been following the escapades of the Zimhippo. I have subsequently swapped details with some of them and will aim to meet them once a week to keep me focused. There are a lot more marathon swimmers at their club than I have at my club. I will probably meet up with for training more often.

Another thing that I took possession of this week is my new traiing Aid. A Lovely ORANGE (Marlene, see what you have done to me!!) Timex Ironman watch. I purchased this about 2 weeks ago on the interweb from America for the poultry sum of £55. Cheapest one I found in the UK was £70. The Numbers are BIG. most people whose site starts to fail them go and get glasses or contacts, I like my solution better, Buy  Bigger things with bigger numbers. On that note, I think I need a bigger TV as well. Anyone know of a bright Orange 60" smart TV going Cheap?

Another plus this week is that I have been weighing myself since middle of December last year and, as of yesterday, I have lost 5KG (0.8 stone or 11 pounds) in three months. On the wonderful BMI index, That just puts me into the top end of the Obese category, narrowly escaping the Severely Obese category.

So what Lies in the week Ahead?

I think first and foremost,

   - Book my 9 mile swim and get paid up for that. I do not think the 21 mile swim is open yet for bookings.

    - Get into my longer sets and train with other people who push me.
    - Look at maybe getting a coach. I have found it difficult this year to coach myself. Something I have never really struggled with. This year I need to face the facts that it might have to be an option.

    - Put what is behind me BEHIND ME and let it go. I can't change how crap I have been in the past but I can change how crap I will be in the future ----SORRY, that was meant to be AMAZING!!

    - Most important thing is to BELEIVE in ME, if the responses I have had to my facebook postings are anything to go by, it seems that I am the only one who does not.

On that note, I would like to express my thanks to my Amazing friends and family that are getting me through this

"Journey to 21"

I would like to end this blog with a quote that has come very much into my focus this week

THERE IS NO "I" IN TEAM

With the "team" I have 

behind me, success 

is the ultimate

conclusion to

this Journey.