September 2011

Today was difficult for me.  It's been a long week.  I didn't have much left to give today.  I had a pathetic practice, I actually got beat by a breaststroker in a 100 yard specialty IM today (Fly, Back, Free, Specialty).  I wasn't proud of my performances today at all.  The coaches gave me zero praise and that's because I didn't deserve any.

Our final set of the morning was a series of relays.  They were all 2 x [200 Medley Relay].  It was a relay were we would all swim 50 yards twice.  The first one I swam buttefly.  The relays were uneven regarding speed so I didn't really race anybody.  The second relay was an entirely backstroke relay.  I was lined up against Wu Peng, the Chinese Olympian who beat Michael Phelps at Michigan and Charlotte Grand Prix.  He is primarily a butterflier but also a fantastic backstroker.  As we started I could see him pull ahead on the underwater kicking.  He is a fantastic kicker.  We flipped at about the same time meaning I momentarily caught up.  However the second underwater he pulled away again and held the lead to touch me out by over half a second.  The second 50 back, about a minute later was ugly, Wu Peng is a 200 meter swimmer and was prepared to swim again.  I'm nowhere near as good at doubling out of a race into another race.  He killed me on the next 50 back, probably by over 1 second.  Olympians 1, Doak 0

The next relay was preceeded by a few minutes of easy swimming.  It was much appreciated.  The relay was a 200 Medley Relay, twice in a row.  Naturally I was chosen to do backstroke.  My relay was yelling before the race to pump me up, I heard a lot of "LETS GO DOAK, BEAT THIS GUY".  It put a smile on my face.  Relays are always a blast.  I was lined up against a 2008 Olympian Freestyler from Norway.  He was the best shot the other team had since they didn't have a backstroker.  I knew I had a pretty good shot at beating him at a stroke he wasn't good at!  We started and he actually had better underwaters than I did, we both surfaced and I was slightly behind but I flipped sooner than he did.  He seemed to catch up a little during the underwaters again but naturally since it wasn't his stroke, I powered home with my #1 stroke to beat him by a second.  Since the other team had Wu Peng and another Olympian, they took the lead at the end of the first 200 Medley.  I started at a slight deficit against my backstroke competition.  We started from the blocks like a relay start and I gave it my all.  We flipped at the same time at the wall and I actually got the lead back for our team with a great 50 back.  However the rest of the other teams relay was stacked with Olympians or almost Olympians.  We lost the lead on the breastroke since we had to make a butterflier swim breast and our other butterflier had to swim against one of the fastest butterfliers on the planet.  Our freestyler ALMOST caught up to theirs but we ended up getting beat by a second in the end.

It was a fun morning even though I sort of swam poorly.  I'm still 1 for 2 against Olympians.  Not bad.

This will be a quick post but here are my stats:

• College best 100 yard kick: 1:04.2
• Post College best 100 yard kick: 1:01.4
• Today's 100 yard kick: 57.5

I typically do an "all out" 100 yard kick with minutes of rest.  Today I was in the middle of a 1600 yard kick set and with only 45 seconds rest I blasted off to my best 100 kick EVER!  I dropped almost 4 seconds off my best! 

Tonight we swam a 2.5 hour pool workout.  The main set was:

3 x [1x50y@:50 + 2x25y@:35 + 2x25y@:40 + 5x25y@:25 + 1x25 easy]

The "tween" set (as in: inbeTWEEN) was swum between the rounds of swimming, was another 500 yards of moderate 50y swimming on short rest.  All of the main set was to be swum at "100 pace".  This meant it wasn't ALL OUT, but darn close to it.  I was averaging 25 seconds on the 50's and between 12.8-14.0 seconds on the 25's.  It was a rough set, but I've seen worse.

By the time I changed and got home, I received an email notifying us that new videos were posted to the shared network drive on the CW server.  It turns out that the assistant coaches were taking video of the main set.  Once the practice was done, it was transferred from the camera and placed on the server.  I clicked on the link of "Doak Freestyle 9-21-11" and proceeded to watch part of my practice in the comfort of my own home than 30 minutes after I actually swam.  That's impressive.

Today, like many days, we'll start off stretching for 15 minutes, doing weights and then boxing each other.  The process will take an hour and a half.  Then we'll hit the pool for some power work against either bands (surgical tubing with a belt) or the buckets (large buckets with a pully system you tow across the pool).  The pool workout will last another 1.5 hours.

This afternoon we will stretch for 45 minutes, then have a two hour pool workout which focuses on speed work.  It will be burst speed with some easy swimming inbetween.  Total workout time today will be 5.75 hours, unless of course they want us to go longer.... I've learned it's never shorter than planned.

I still love it.

Club Wolverine is throwing a big meet for post graduate swimmers in November.  I recently learned I would be welcome to compete.  I'll be swimming at least the 100 Back, perhaps the 100 Fly as well but most importantly, they offer the 200 Medley Relay!  I have always loved that event since it gives me a chance to tag an official time for a 50 backstroke.  To those who don't know, since the lead swimmer is doing backstroke, it is a legal in-water start and finish.  The rest of the relay is forced to do a relay exchange which negates their swim from being counted as an individual 50y/50m time.  This has always given me a great chance to achieve many more 50 backstroke times since it's rarely offered as an individual event.  

Anwyay, I'll have the chance to lead off a 200 Medley Relay at this meet!  As me and another team member were talking about it in the locker room, I mentioned that I wanted a shot at that 50 backstroke.  After some joking, he replied "I don't know, (insert name) is pretty fast at the 50 back".  It was an understandable reply to my confidence charged aspiration of wanting the spot on the relay team.  I didn't reply at all, just smiled and thought to myself "I'm faster than that guy".

Understand that it's no disrespect to this other backstroker.  He's significantly faster than me in the 100m and 200m distances.  However, there is only one event I pride myself in, and it's the 50 backstroke.  I would never say I have some sort of superhuman speed by any means, but I don't think many people would disagree I'm moderately quick in the event.  With a summer of training and barely any coaching, I broke the 25-29 USMS World Record with a 26.64 in the event.  I can honestly say that I'm noticeably faster and better trained now.  I don't think a 25 second swim is outside the realm of possibilities.  The exciting part is that I'll have a chance to swim it in a pool I'm comfortable in very soon!

I think I have what it takes to lead off the best 200m Medley Relay Club Wolverine can put together.  I look forward to proving it.

After so many "doubles", it was refreshing to be done after the morning workout today.  We had a single 4600 meter workout this morning with some dryland mixed into the workout.  The main set was:

4 x 200m :20 rest pull
4:00 Stretch
6 x 150m :15 rest swim
4:00 Hip flexer stretch in the hot tub
8 x 100m :10 rest swim
10 x 50 @ :40 swim 
4 x [2:00 step ups and :30 rest]

Those step ups at the end was pretty tough, it involved simply stepping up on a single beacher for 2:00 straight.  The fact that we were barefoot made it tougher.  We were on concrete and after 3 sets of fast stepping up and down, your feet really start to hurt.  The last set we basically were jumping up and down off the bleacher.  The bottoms of my feet were burning with pain.  My pain had nothing to do with the workout itself, the fact that I was straining the structure of my foot was the issue.  I felt like the set had good intentions but it would have benefitted everybody much more to have proper footware.

I got some good feedback from the coaches today regarding my backstroke form.  It's been improving consistently and I seem to be catching the water better and better in practice.  Their complement was followed with yet another reminder that for me to improve, I need to become stronger.  It seems as though their thinking is that I am near my potential from a technique standpoint, now I need to gain muscle to further improve my times.  I would have to agree.

One thing I find interesting is that I've been training with CW for 4 months and unfortunately, I don't look any different physically. I'm feeling my progress in the water and on the clock but I don't look like I've been working out 5-7 hours a day for 3-4 months.  I look forward to some visible results. 

Today was challenging.  The morning workout was 2.5 hours of aerobic swimming and sprint kicking.  This afternoon was a 1 hour lifting session, followed by a burst speed set of only 1800 yards.  It was mostly bucket work.  "Buckets" refer to a large aluminum structure which has an intricate pully system and a 20 gallon drums filled up with water.  You strap a belt on your waist and because of the pully system, you are able to pull the cord a full 25 yards/meters with significant resistance.  It was a tough practice, but at the same time, not really that difficult.  This can mean only one of two things:

1. The Coaching staff just feels like: Hey, lets lay off these guys for ONCE in their lives, no need for EVERY day to be difficult.
2. The Coaching staff is giving us one moderately easy day, and they will DEMOLISH us tomorrow.

I'm going with the FAR more probable scenario, which is option #2.  Team: Brace for impact.

There are two groups in the pool when I'm with the team.  The Joe's, and the Pro's

Understand that it's almost entirely joking when it's even mentioned.  The Post Grads at some point determined that due to the fact that we have a handful of Olympians in the group, we can consider the group "Pro's".  Everybody else in the pool, specifically the college guys are "Joe's" as in "Regular Joe's".  Anytime it's mentioned, it's guaranteed to squeak a smile from either group since we all know it's said in a joking manner.

On Friday afternoon, the college team had cleared a lane for the Post Grads to use, yet one person remained.  All I saw was that he had a white CW cap.  I turn to the coach and a few guys and with a smile on my face blurted out "Can we get this Joe out of of my lane or what?".  The guys laughed as usual and the coach snickered, only to follow up with, "Sure, let me get Peter Vanderkay, Olympic Gold Medalist out of your lane Doak".  It was among the most epic "open mouth, insert foot" moment of my life, good thing I was joking. 

It was worth a laugh from the group and yes, he got out of my lane.

I'm run down.  It's been yet another long week.  I didn't do anything today I would consider impressive in the pool.  This morning we ended our workout with another 50m all out swim with full equipment (fins/paddles).  In the last few days I swam a 23.7 and a 23.0, both great times.  Today I had on smaller paddles, and admittedly, my effort level was lower, I just wasn't motivated to go fast.  I touched in a 23.9 but I promise you that was a generous split.  I can't imagine it was a 23 second swim.

This morning was an IN/OUT workout.  Meaning we swam for 30 minutes, then went upstairs to do dryland for 30 minutes and repeated that process twice.  We boxed and did an ab workout while we weren't swimming.  It was a challenging morning.

This evening wasn't much different.  I was just in slow motion.  Luckly Coach Mark Hill worked with me on my backstroke body position for a while and I actually got something out of an otherwise difficult/boring workout.  Tonight we tried the "AvidaSport" performance monitoring system again.  It consists of 5 modules you strap to your body, one on each wrist, one on each ankle and one on the top of your head (under a cap).  The head mounted one has an earpiece to give you feedback on your rates.  It will tell you verbally how fast you are moving your arms and legs.  The information is relayed wirelessly to a tablet PC the coach is holding which tells him how everybody is swimming.  The MD group uses them much more than sprinters do.  We've tried these 3 times now. Last two times around I couldn't get mine to work correctly.  The system as a whole has been an annoying part of practice.  It takes 20 minutes to get it all strapped together, only for there to be a technical problem which reduces the experience to us simply wearing a bunch of stuff on our bodies with no benefit.  Today was no different at all.  50 guys all put them on and not a single one got any feedback from the system.  I'm not sure I'll ever try the system out again, it just seems like wasted time.  The swimmers agree, it's a FANTASTIC system in theory but we cannot get the darn thing to work, even with two AvidaSport employees on site.  AvidaSport, PLEASE fix this, it's a truly revolutionary concept!

And of course I had to make a crack at the end of practice which raised the concern that perhaps the system wasn't waterproof :)

Yea, a disturbing image huh...

At one point during our dryland workout, I happend to look down in the competition pool to see a bunch of floating, motionless bodies.  The womens team was learning how to float :)  They had snorkles on so they didn't even need to pick up their head to breathe.  It was sort of an unsettling image to anybody who's seen a scary-ish movie.  About 40 motionless bodies face down in a pool.  Quite the sight!

Today was our longest practice day since starting back up 3 weeks ago.  A 2.5 Hour Morning Session and a 3.0 Hour evening session must equal somewhere around 13 hours.  That's how it feels anyway.  It's tough to lift my arms and my lower abs are pretty much useless, still torn up from last week.  The workload in only two days has been very strenuous.  We get Wednesday morning off, not that I'll sleep in, but at least I can rebuild a bit of what has been destroyed this week alone.  We had another ab session today.  I considered sitting out of it entirely since I'm already pretty torn up.  I decided to give it a try and it wasn't too bad except for the leg lifts.  The work in the pool has been mainly annoying me, lots of long swimming, which I wouldn't mind if there were more backstrokers.  Since everybody else does freestyle, it just feels like I'm getting run over after beginning last in my lane (40 seconds after the first guy goes) and then getting passed 200 meters later by the first guy burning up the lane doing freestyle.  I actually look forward to the few sprint sets we've done.  I'm still excelling a little at the kick sets.  I'm 2nd or 3rd out of all the sprinters (10+).  I seem to have good speed but can't hold it for more than about 40 meters STILL.  I've swam a few :32 second 50 meter timed kicks lately.  That's a good place to start.  There is one guy on the team who can kick with a board in :28 seconds. I attempt to race him each time we kick, I'm zero for plenty-of-tries so far.  My backstroke feels great.  One thing I can credit Club Wolverine and Coach Mark Hill is an understanding of how my backstroke works.  I comprehend the timing, placement of my hands in the water and how to pull.  It's amazing what I've learned from him thus far.  Each day I'm in the pool I think about when I'll be able to try it all out in a meet.  I'm looking forward to some masters meets and Nationals in December.

Today the coaching staff asked for my college transcripts.  It's the first step in gaining an excemption to a NCAA rule preventing post-graduate swimmers from training with current NCAA swimmers.  I will provide my transcripts, then a letter will be requested from USA Swimming.  For now, we have to swim a separate workout from the college team, not an entirely bad thing (at times).

I'm feeling run down but very healthy.  I'm eating so much food it's ridiculous.  Somebody today dared to ask me... "why are you so hungry?"... to which I responded, "I just worked out for five and a half hours".  

The coaches have been asking for a list of meets we want to attend before Olympic Trials so they can optimize the training around these events.  Most guys are going to Pan-Ams, Nationals or World Cup meets.  I've qualified for Nationals in Atlanta this December, but prior to that, I don't have anything on my schedule.  I'm hoping to tag at least a few Masters meets before December.  This will be a little tricky since the meets are on Sundays.  Since we typically do "Race Pace" on Saturdays, I'll most likely ask the coaching staff if I can either go easy on Saturday and then swim the meet on Sunday, or train normally on Saturday, race a meet on Sunday and request Monday off to recover.  I'm confident they will accomodate at least a few of those requests.  I'm excited to swim some masters meets again and catch up with some friends!