Back to tapering, and new gear!
Back to tapering, and new gear!
After plenty of rest Sunday, I was back to the taper schedule with the team. We did a short dryland session combined with a 30 minute pool workout. We are 19 days away from Nationals in Palo Alto, California. Club Wolverine is taking almost every swimmer on the team to the meet. Only a few guys have chosen to swim Sectionals or go to their home states or countries to swim an alternate meet. I feel the excitement building for the upcoming competitions!
We did just a few 15 meter blasts today, during the brief set, Assistant Coach Josh White, out of nowhere, saw me and blurted out, "Doak, you were SMOKIN' fast on Saturday" as he smiled. I was about to start so I just returned the smile and got ready to dive in. The comment meant a lot to me. It was the first complement I received from Josh since joining the team. Josh typically trains the distance swimmers so I rarely interact with him. It was an uplifting comment and it made me feel like the coaching staff took notice of my fast swims on Saturday. I've talked about my Saturday practice quite a bit since swimming a 50 back LCM in 25.3 seconds, my family and friends might be sick of me talking about it by now.
For kicks, I looked up the results for the 2008 Olympic Trials in the 100 backstroke. And just so we're clear, I realize this is a pathetic comment:
Not a single swimmer took out the 100 back in less than a 25.58... including world record holder Aaron Piersol. I think that's relatively awesome that I can swim as fast as the fastest backstrokers in the world, for half their race. Now if I could just figure out how to bring it home in a 27.xx we would be cookin' with gasoline!
Overall, I'm impressed that in 2008 with a tech suit, the fastest 50 back time I could swim was a 26.75, after 2 months with CW, I'm a 25.30. Even with a margin of error on the timers and other variables, it's undeniable that I'm swimming faster than I ever have before. I'm really optimistic about my future swimming career!
Today I got my warmups and bag for Nationals. Gearing up!
"Doak, you were SMOKIN' fast on Saturday!" - Coach Josh White