I used the same weights for the exercises and think I will again on Saturday. However, I think that I will test increasing the weight on some of the exercises next Wednesday.

I did not weigh in yesterday. Today I weighed in at 130lbs.

The weather was pleasant this morning, but it's supposed to be COLD tomorrow!

[I forgot to post an entry for this workout; I'm manually setting the posting date.]

I thought that I had gotten out of the house sooner this morning. As it turns out, I got to the workout a little later than normal. I got to do my warmup with a 300m pull.

I think I swam about 900 meters.

The kicking on my side drill went somewhat better than on Friday. I maintained a much better line and didn't feel the same sense of strain in my neck.

I didn't write down the stats for the bike. Overall, I aimed for a bit lower cadence. I think I averaged 87 for the workout. I rode in gear 5. Total distance was something under 4 miles and I believe the average pace was around 14.6mph. I think that my heart rate averaged somewhere in the 120's.

The first time I went to the fitness center today it wasn't open, yet. I arrived sometime after 6AM and the center doesn't open on Saturdays until 7AM. So, I rode back home and came up with a new plan.

I decided that I would head back later in the morning with Eli after breakfast. Since childcare is available from 7:30AM - 12:00PM, I needed to get back before Eli's nap. So, after eating breakfast and watching Elmo's World, I took Eli in the stroller and ended up getting back to the center around 10:45AM.

The good news is that I can see that I have lots of room for improvement in my technique. I think it will be a great investment for me to swim four days a week from now until the 30-week training plan starts in January. The other two days I'll be doing strength training, which I also feel is a good investment.

I currently take about 22 strokes to swim 25 yards. Ouch! I did the count during my 100 yard cooldown. I'm not sure how much I had swum before that. But, my best guess is that it was in the range of 600 - 750 yards.

Scott was the coach today. He put together a 2400 meter workout. I was able to complete just shy of 1400 meters.

I liked the workout he created.

He gave me a pointer that I'm dropping my elbow when my arm enters the water / starts the stroke. I think that I was basically feeling what he was describing and can see how getting better elbow position will give me a much more effective pull.

I'm glad that I did the strength training before the swim. As it turns out, the strength training took up almost my entire alloted time. I didn't end up doing the swim at all. I don't know how much time was adding waiting behind other people to use the equipment. But, I don't think it was more than about five minutes total. I'll have to see how the time works out (no pun intended) on average.

I kept all the weights at the same as they were from my first time.

I completed my first Masters Swim workout this morning! I don't have much noteworthy to report. I got to the workout on time (5:30AM) and swam for the full hour following the workout the coach prescribed. In the last 10 minutes of the workout I was supposed to practice dolphin kicking, but the coach had me swim 200 meters crawl so he could check out my form. He said that my form was pretty good overall. The only issue he pointed out was that my hand entry was too close to the center line; he wants me to keep my hand more at shoulder width.

In preparation for resuming my workout routine, I stopped by the Carmody fitness center to see if I could have my membership reset. I explained to them that just as I had purchased the annual membership with masters swim, I got sick and was unable to use it for all these weeks. They extended my expiration date to November 8, 2014 without an issue.

Thank you Lakewood Rec Centers!

I give thanks to the Universe for the abundance it provides me. I surrender and am open and ready to receive.

I've had to be away a long time because I was brought down by a bothersome cold. It didn't make sense for me to blog every day or even every week that I was still sick.

I think that the cold had a resurgence just when I was about to recover. Now, I think I'm finally ready to start getting back at things again. For these past many weeks I've been doing my best to still get to bed around 9:00PM. But, instead of getting up at 5AM, I've been getting up at 7AM to give my body that bit of extra rest and recovery.