4th 12in12 Challenge :: Great Swim

Teacher and Pupil :: BIG Victory Smiles!!

For anyone wondering - a wetsuit, swimming hat and swimming goggles do NOT make a great disguise. My A Level Biology Teacher, a lady I've not seen in 10 years, recognised me in under 5 seconds despite the fact we were both up to our waists in the Thames. Clearly I look 100% identical in a wetsuit contemplating imminent death as I did in my old school uniform contemplating my report card - ?petrified/perplexed? - BUSTED! ;-)

Today was the 4th challenge of my 12 challenges for 12 in 2012.  I spent the morning feeling more than a little stomach churning A.N.X.I.O.U.S. This was definitely a massive leap out of my comfort zone but that's the point of this year I suppose - or that's what I kept telling myself. Spotting a message that Jess (of Tooting Bec Lido fame) completed the 1 mile course in 34 mins in an earlier wave - AMAZE! - reassured me that it was at least possible to finish.

I'd been contemplating my game plan for this event all week and had decided that the goal was simply a) just finish and b) come in under 1 hour 15 mins. Reminder :: I am a rubbish swimmer.... as you will discover.......

The water was an incredible 17 degrees - which compared to the 12 degrees I'd experienced at Tooting Bec Lido just a week previously was DIVINE. The very murky, low visibility, green water was to be expected BUT the never ending choppy waves literally knocked me sideways. I didn't expect to be fighting a) foot high waves at points and b) a really strong current throughout the entire swim.

As a comparison it was like spending an hour battling a wave machine head on. At points I was tossed sideways, thrown into the path of canoes, people, a battle ship albeit on a plinth (which I then spent a soul sapping 20 mins trying and failing to get away from) and turned every which way except the direction I needed to be going in. Trying to swim in a purposeful straight line was a laughable notion - it was all I could to stop myself going backwards at points.

Aside from the energy sapping waves, I thankfully only had two scary moments:

1. Finding my wetsuit zip strap twisted around my neck on three occasions and having to stop to untangle myself before I cut off my airway. (NOTE TO SELF - TUCK YOUR STRAP INTO YOUR WETSUIT NEXT TIME)   I say next time - hahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaa
2. At the 1200m mark, I had a heart-skip-a-beat 'is that a shark' moment and felt my BP quandruple instantly when I found myself tangled in a see-through plastic sheet about a meter square in size which was drifting at the rate of knots due to the current. Thankfully I realised it was an inanimate object with no teeth almost immediately but that didn't stop me thrashing about for a good 90 seconds trying to detangle my arms from the plastic sheet: I just kept thinking that I couldn't swim all that way ONLY to suffocate in a glorified plastic bag when I was practically at the finish line.

But what surprised me most was that in those conditions battling the waves - I was literally my own worst enemy: In the time it took to place my hand in the water to front crawl - just the sheer strength of the current tossing me around meant I bashed myself on the head, whacked myself in my own face (thank god I was wearing goggles cos I'd have a couple of black eyes right now) or nearly took my own goggles off my head. At these points I appeared to have no control of my own limbs - how ridiculous is that?!

All I can say is that I literally have no idea how people swim across oceans.

On a positive - my fellow swimmers were amazing - I had a chat under the bridge with one guy when we both realised we were going no-where for a moment due to a swell in waves. When I was choking on water - (mistimed breath - one of several!) - someone ahead of me heard me spluttering and stopped alongside to check I was ok - HOW SWEET! Plus EVERYONE who swam into me - there was no way to avoid it really - APOLOGISED!!!!

(That thing they say about not swallowing the water is hopefully just a water conservation precautionary measure and not a life and death thing cos I basically swallowed my body weight in Thames Water this afternoon - it was impossible not too - FOOT HIGH WAVES PEEPS).

Thankfully after probably the oddest swim of my life - I eventually made it to the finish line and was helped out onto the dock just in time to hear the announcer proclaim TWICE to all the spectators present that I had just completed an epic swim of 1 hour 12 minutes.

Thanks dude. What's wrong with a little mystery?! Cue my second walk of shame of the afternoon.

(My first walk of shame came about when unwittingly I had to walk halfway round the Victoria Docks  - i.e. past all the bars/ restaurants and ALLLLLLL the people enjoying the sunshine on a Saturday afternoon - to the start line 1.5km away in just a swimming costume - SO NOT COOL, BUT I do have a lovely set of tan lines from my walk of shame.)

But my tippy-top favourite moment of the afternoon was hearing my former Biology Teacher say that she was so happy to have completed the swim - part of her knee operation rehab - because she had inspired her three gorgeous kids. Her eldest is 9, 2/3rds my height (I'm guestimating) and can already swim 3km. Errrrr I have NEVER even tried to swim 3km and I'm triple his age and twice his size! In COMPLETE awe.

My former highschool teacher is still schooling me! WHAT a timely reminder about the bigger picture and what this swim, 12in12 and life is all about: Inspiring hearts and minds. Whether that's a 4, 6 & 9 year old kid watching their mum cross the 1 mile swim finish line, whether that's a mother who's recovering from knee surgery and wanting to achieve a personal rehab goal, whether that's someone who couldn't even front crawl 50m non-stop three weeks ago! OR whether that's an orphan of HIVAIDS in sub-Sarahan Africa who needs a little help to secure a future and that inspiration for themselves.

YOU can be that inspiration xx

p.s.  Off to nurse my Thames Water sore tummy and fall into a coma - SHATTERED but happy!!

A Numbers Game

Obviously the number of calories I consume FARRRRRR exceeds what any reasonable amount of exercise can burn off - I'm looking at you, jar of Nutella and your 8000 delicious kcals. Well that and my shameful lack of willpower, ma belly and the extra 28 lbs the scales are registering.

My battle with Paleo is just that - a battle - at the moment my sugar addled brain is all-powerful. No matter how much I tell myself that sugar is the no 1 hormone disrupter, cause of weight gain & cause of ageing. From my continual sugar abuse ;-) I'm stuck in a state of TOTAL denial.

However yesterday I might just have started to tip the balance in my favour again with:

• 1 x Bootcamp session - loathe burpees
• 1700m CONTINUOUS SWIM!!!! Finally I've swum a mile of front crawl ahead of Saturday's Open Water event. Thank goodness. Keeping count of the 70 lengths of the 25m pool was the hardest part. Happily I didn't touch/ kick off any walls and I only needed to tread water twice throughout - once because some numpty kicked me in the stomach. But 1 hour 5 mins of non-stop front crawl is seriously arm flailing hard work.
• 1 x Nike Training Club Session - still loathe burpees
• 12 miles cycled to and from sessions

That HAS to be 1000kcals minimum burnt off right there surely!

Plus yesterday, looksie what I had to eat: 2 x yummilious salads

Plus the numbers game doesn't stop here: Nike have just launched a FAB new contest: To generate as many points as you can via Nike Training Club Sessions and via the NTC app between now and 2nd July. Essentially a minute of training = 1 point. The top players who generate the most points between now and the 2nd July 2012 get invited to an exclusive training session/ celebration on 07.07.12. Plus there is talk that there are Nike+ Bands to win.

I reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally want a Nike+ Band but can't justify buying one as it doesn't recognise swimming as exercise/kcal burn. But my reptilian brain still really wants one.  So the challenge is on to win one aka rock the top of the leaderboard.

60 points and counting. Off to complete a 15 min ab session before lunch! xx

p.s. To join in with the Nike Training Club Live contest - sign up here

Channelling my inner Polar Bear

Today I did one of the hardest thing I've done in a realllllllllly long time: Climb into freezing cold water - well actually 12 degrees C - and stay immersed for 40 mins.

This is no joke. At best it's seriously sadistic - I can't even properly convey just how cold 12 degrees is BUT the cold is S.E.V.E.R.E even clothed in a wetsuit - think melted ice caps cold. Within seconds your feet go completely numb. The rest of your body has literally no idea what's going on. Putting your head in feels impossible but it's non-negotiable with front crawl - your ears scream with the biting cold.

FACT. Your body loses heat 32 times faster in water than it does in air.

FACT. After just swimming 90m - one length of Tooting Bec Lido - I was starting to feel really light headed, spaced out AND a little freaked out.

FACT. My hands were in extreme pain throughout - shockingly so - with every stroke. Can you get wetsuits with inbuilt mittens???

I managed just 8 lengths of Totting Bec Lido before I HAD to get out. Between acclimatising to the cold and swimming just 700m, including treading water on a couple of occasions when I started hyperventilating - I was in the water for 50 minutes tops. That level of cold makes swimming really tough :: my brain was struggling to think :: there were occasions when despite telling myself to turn my head to breath, the neurone pathway didn't link up in time and I ended up swallowing a face full of water. Plus the strokes shift the water inside your suit to different places - so you constantly get cold shocks. Lovely!

Out of the water:

FACT. It took 10 minutes to stop staggering about and regain control of my legs.

FACT. It took 30 minutes to manage to think/speak coherently.

FACT. It took 3 hours for the spaced out feeling to pass.

If that wasn't bad enough - check out this comforting nugget I discovered - arrrrrgh - I SERIOUSLY need to speed up the old front crawl - my life depends on it.

Big thanks to Jess who got me in FREEZING water in the first place - no easy feat! AND who agreed to model the wet suit look on le blog :-) xx

P.S. If you were waiting for an indescribably tough event to pop up before sponsoring me - THIS is it!!

Sponsor, Sponsor, Sponsor me here!!!

Never seen a pool sooooooooo crowded!!

The ESSENTIAL Guide to Open Water Swimming

If this scene makes you recall a certain 'Waving not Drowning' English Lit GCSE text and evokes similar feelings read on... The secrets to mastering this scene (the pic not the pom!) are all about to be revealed.

I SOOOOOO wanted to start this post with a quote from The J.M. Barrie Ladies' Swimming Society by Barbara J. Zitwer which I spotted in the local library last week. The title alone made this book a must read given the upcoming 1 mile Great Swim Open Water Challenge I'm committed to. Happily it's a really compelling read - but as for the quote - copyright laws are pretty stringent, the fair use policy is confusing, the author's American and as a collective Nation Americans are a bit sue-happy - so I'm not including a quote ;-( But if you buy or borrow the book - page 92, paragraph 5 is my quote of choice.

A final swimming lesson and a wetsuit fitting today taught me SO MUCH about open water swimming (even despite the fact that I've still to dip as much as a toe into actual lake water) that I feel compelled to pass on the wisdom I gratefully absorbed like a sponge! That way if you have the urge to go open water swimming or to sign up for a triathlon you can jump in fully clothed briefed and not feel quite as utterly clueless as me.

1. TRY SWIMMING A LENGTH WITH YOUR EYES CLOSED. This is exactly how much you'll be able to see swimming in open water - unless you're in the Caribbean lucky thing ;-) Not being able to see is incredibly mentally disorientating and scary so it's worth getting use to that feeling of swimming with limited/no visual clues.

Additionally swimming a length with your eyes closed is a great way to test how much you naturally drift. Start swimming on a marked line and with eyes closed see how long it takes you to bash into a wall or rope or unfortunate person! This will be a great guide of how much spotting you'll need to do during the open water event setting to ensure that you're heading in the right direction. Personally over a 25m distance I go about a meter to the left when I can't see - so I'm planning to spot every 12-20 strokes. If you go more adrift - you need to spot more - if you can maintain a straight line better than a ruler then you can skip tip number 2!

2. SPOTTING. Contrary to what you might think there's no point spotting for marker buoys plotting the open water route as once you're in the water you're unlikely to be able to see them until you're literally a few meters from them. Instead pre-event check out what landmarks you can use to spot for - eg a building, tree, pylon - something distinctive in the distance but on the same line as the corner/turning point marker. When you spot as you swim look for your pre-selected landmarks.

The best way to spot whilst minimising the disruption to your front crawl stroke is to use your breath stroke to lift your head - eyes forward pre-lift - think the breast stroke head raise/ dolphin action ;-)

3. THE SHARK MOMENT. Apparently EVERYONE, even World Record Holder & Open Water Swim Champion Lynne Cox, gets the 'What was that? Was it a shark?' feeling during open water swimming. Not going to lie - I freak out when I'm in the local pool and I see a clump of hair or a plaster heading my way underwater. My response: Spontaneous dolphin flip attempts to get out of the way and ensure it doesn't come into contact with me. That's me in a pool when I can see the good, bad and the ugly. In terms of open water swimming hazards I'd mentally got as far as thinking about inadvertently swallowing duck doo dah and water bugs - then my swimming instructor went and mentioned dead rats. DEAD! RATS! OMG. OMG. OMG.  The only thing you can do is focus on keeping swimming - FAST from the dead rat that you just swam into.  Hopefully I don't need to worry about actual sharks in the Victoria Docks!?

4. HOW NOT TO HYPERVENTILATE 3 SECONDS AFTER ENTERING THE WATER. My biggest issue (well it was til I heard about the dead rats situ) is dealing with the cold. My lung thing makes me really, really susceptible to hyperventilation (and pneumonia - but lets not go there right now). Really cold water in my nemesis - and is the number 1 reason my toe hasn't dipped into lake water yet. Fortunately le swimming instructor has a great fix to avoiding hyperventilation on entry to lake: Pre-race splash your goggle-less face with lake water, especially your nose and mouth area - and keep repeating until you acclimatise. Plus don't do your wet suit up til the last possible moment pre-race - out of the water you can really overheat in a wetsuit and you then have to endure a bigger temperature adjustment when you hit the water after the starting gun goes off.

If you start hyperventilating mid race:

1. Slow your stroke down and calm down mentally (to reduce the amount of adrenalin in your system) 
2. If that doesn't alleviate the hyperventilating - GET OUT OF THE WATER QUICK.

5. THE FIRST 10 MINUTES WILL BE THE TOUGHEST. It takes about c.10 mins to adjust to the temperature and get your body sufficiently warmed to work efficiently aerobically. If you can warm up pre-race (without your wetsuit on - don't want to risk of overheating in your wetsuit - people die this way - swim instructor was on good form this morning!) that's ideal - think similar to a pre-race/ workout training session warm up.

6. CORNERING. This is probably too technically advanced for me at this stage but I didn't even know this was a swimming possibility so I wanted to share this clever little manoeuvre. Essentially the name of the game in long distance swimming is conserve energy and so to reduce the number of strokes required to cover a distance. When you need to change direction, turn a corner in the marked route or if you just want to get away from someone swimming too close to you - here's what to do:

• One Front Crawl Stroke (arm a)
• Followed by one Back Crawl Stroke at 90 degrees (arm b) Left arm to go left. Right arm to go right
• Followed by one Front Crawl Stroke (arm a)
• Continue Front Crawl as normal

How much easier is that than c.6 -1,000,000 strokes to turn a corner?? Honestly it's one of those things that you need to see to totally understand or at least I did - I'm still on the hunt for a YouTube vid demo to illustrate the steps.

FYI: Corners are where swimmers can pile up so if you're a little or a lot apprehensive of being kicked and hit STAY WIDE.

7. PACE. How long should it take to swim 1 mile? Seriously I was so clueless. Answer: Really good swimmers swim 20 minute miles, slow swimmers are in the 40 minute mile category. Me. I don't even come close to the slow swimmer category. I'm prepared to be overtaken by everyone in my wave and the next 14 waves! We worked out it will take me 1000-1200 strokes to swim a mile. 1000 strokes feels manageable. hahahhahahhhhhhhaaaaaaaaa!

Honestly if you're new to open water swimming - be kind to yourself and go small - a 400m race is a great starting point. Don't do as I do and go 1 mile at it unless you are similarly cra-cra because even your swimming instructor starts praying for your sanity.

8. TWO HATS ARE BETTER THAN ONE. This is a tip I got from Shosh and well you don't argue with Shosh - she swam for England ;-) The point of two hats is a) warmth - you lose most of your body heat through your head and b) it's a security measure to stop you losing your goggles when you enter the water or when you get kiboshed over the head by stray arms. You wear your goggles over the first hat but under the second. And don't worry about feeling/ looking like a clown you are wearing a WETSUIT and resemble a beached whale after all - or is that just me?! My swimming instructor also recommended having a spare set of goggles around your leg - but I'm not convinced I really need to be a) the slowest swimmer they've ever seen, b) SUPERprone to hyperventilation, c) wearing two hats AND d) wearing two sets of goggles. That feels one step TOO cra-cra EVEN for me! But I'm thinking it over. ;-)

9. THE JETSTREAM EFFECT. Technically this is a no no in Triathlon competitions but when 100+ people are all swimming in the same body of water in the same direction it's pretty hard to avoid! Essentially just as pro-cyclists travel in a pack to minimise the headwind effect, it's possible to benefit from reduced energy expenditure by swimming in someone else's jetstream or 'draft' as it's technically known. To do this you need to pair up with someone who's slightly faster than you and swim alongside them positioned at their hips.

N.B. If you swim in someone's draft you need to be aware that the churn of the water created by their stroke will minimise the effectiveness of your own pull stroke and so it's not a total win-win. If the churn is really bad - get away from them - their draft is not benefitting you.

10. THE WETSUIT - I'm leaving this for a separate post - this one has already become an Epic - sorry. So check back soon for the full wetsuit ins and outs, hows and how not tos - I may even model mine!! Mwah-ha-ha.

On a happy note - apparently what I lack in sanity, (good) sense and speed I make up for with technique - with a few tweaks my front crawl is shaping up well - the things I need to be mindful of are:

Don't pull back until your other hand touches the water
Emphasis on stretch forward not pull back as this creates the desired shoulder rotation
The pull is the fast movement - the rest of stroke is slow and leisurely
Pull back to thigh 
Leg kick is just for stabilisation and minimal NOT for propulsion

Off to hunt down a copy of Lynne Cox's Swimming to Antarctica - I want to know what she encountered swimming in the Channel and in the Nile!!!!!! xx

p.s. HOW impressed are you with my ability to remember all this when I shamefully can't recall my friends' names for love nor money half the time?!

The 3 C's

Amen!

First things first. I've been a total misery guts recently - too much life chaos does that to me - so please accept my sincere apologies and thanks for bearing with me.

I made my choice. I'm taking a chance. I'm changing my life. What's a little uncertainty in the interim compared to knowing 1,000,000% I did the right thing.

Normal service and *happy dances* resume from here on out :-)

The scales are nudging in the right direction even despite a couple of non-paleo minor slip ups (of the flavoured popcorn variety).  WAHOOOOOOOOoooooooo

1200m swim is happening 8am tomorrow in my new neon pink swimming costume. Oh yeah 1 mile swim I'm coming at you. 12in12 challenge number 4 prepare to be obliterated on the 26th May :-)

3 alternative C's I can highly recommend as a daily sweetener - Chuckles, Charisma & Cocktails ;-) xx

Jaysus

I know it's only Monday but this week is not going to plan - do they ever?!

1. I woke up after 10.5 hours sleep. Noooooooooooo. Slept through alarm. Missed training. Plus who over the age of 18 months needs 10.5 hours sleep? 10.5 hours sleep hasn't even left me well rested: I am cranky.

2. Waking up - eventually - I thought I had crippled myself lying in an odd position - it turns out all that front crawl is engaging muscles in my back I've clearly never used before. Ouch.

3. I became the beneficiary of yet another *delightful* 'you're too experienced rejection email and we are affronted that you won't consider spending what remains of your crummy life in this delightful £18k role and that you dare to have an iota of ambition and may seek a role that might actually pay the bills in 18 months time'. Hard to decide whether those emails trump the 'I'm just calling you with feedback cos you're moronically inexperienced though we love your business sense' calls. *eye roll* Make up your fri***** mind people.

4. I really need to wash my hair. It's taking on a whole new fabulous level of volume that it sadly never achieves when it's clean however on the downside it also reeks of chlorine. But according to the training plan, I'm also due in the pool - a) back permitting, b) if I can trust myself not to drown myself in a wave of pitiful rejection and c) ignore the hunger pangs long enough to attempt another 1000+ meters of front crawl. Do I have a hot shower and give up on swimming today or do I drag my sorry butt off to the freezing pool for more torture?

5. Whatever I decide to do, I really *MUST* get another couple of job applications in today but really the prospect of all that work for a pitiful rejection (at best) is not rocking my motivation socks off.

6. Is the fizzing sensation in my feet a symptom that I'm getting type 2 diabetes and about to lose my feet even though I've eaten no sugar for over 24 hours?

Rather than doing anything constructive (or destructive) I'm just sitting here staring out at the rain and blogging (the poor man's therapy ;-) my 1st world problemos.

Told you. Majorly cranky.

Sunday Pictogram

Figuring out and executing the glitter effect on Photoshop only took me the entire duration of Twilight: Full Moon (aka 90 mins longer than I anticipated) so I no longer have the energy to write about my day except to say I am S.H.A.T.T.E.R.E.D. Forty five minutes of front crawl will do that it seems. I'm only now starting to realise just how far a mile is to swim. It's realllllllly far. The fear of drowning due to exhaustion in the middle of Victoria Docks is the one thing that keeps me going for another 4 lengths, then another 4 and so on until I can literally no longer propel myself forward. This evening in total I think I did somewhere between 30-40 lengths of the 33m long pool but I don't know definitively as I lost count after the 8 length :-) xx

3 swim sessions done, 900m managed, 700m more needed to hit the mile mark, 13 days left.