So last night marked my 10th workout since January 7th. I am not bragging or boasting but I find it fascinating how quickly the body can adapt to adding distance in such a short time. For years I wanted to get back into swimming but felt too out of shape and scared. My son who is Autistic started swimming for the swim club 6 months ago and after watching all his hard work and how much he enjoys it I realized I needed to suck up my pride and just get back into the pool. After watching his time trial 2 weeks ago I decided I would take it one step further and enter a meet on March 3rd at my Alma mater. All of this was after a 26+ year lay off from any sort of competitive swimming. I am currently 36 and 6'1 250. Here is where I started and I where I am now.
1st workout I went for a total of 400yd in the entire workout.
last night I went 2000+ yards and started with an 800y br warm up w no rest.
I have gone from barely making 25y to being able to 50y fr sets at :40 w less than 1 min rest.
My br has gone from barely being able to do a 50 br in 1:10 to doing sets of 50's in the low 50's.
My fr and br 25y wall push off times have gone from maybe 20 sec(max effort) and 30 sec, to under 15 consistently and 19-20, respectively.
My goals for my first meet in 4 weeks are to go sub 40 in the 50 br, and sub 30 in the 50 fr. I have yet to try any starts yet (frankly that is what scares me the most). I may try the 100 fr as well but that will depend on how much yd I can get done in the next month. My ultimate goal would be to be able to qualify for the meet in Indianapolis in May. I honestly believe I could do it if I can get my times down.
I post this not because I am impressed with how far I have come in a short amount of time but for any of those people out there who are like me and wondering if they can get back into swimming. For me I've gotten the competitive urge back. I look at the guys in lanes next to me, usually HS swimmers who are shredded, and i find myself timing them and then comparing what they do to how I do. I find myself wanting to ask them to race... just to appease an old man and humble me.
Sorry for rambling.
I went through a similar thing back in September. Started swimming regular for the first time since high school back in 1985. (However I did do a small amount of swimming during the past few summers, but nothing more than a few laps here and there.) Since September I trained for a meet that was being held less than 5 miles from my house. It was only 2 months that I had to prepare, but I couldn't pass it up since it was so close to home. Did better than I expected probably due to all the adrenaline\nerves. I didn't have any seed times and the entry form would not accept "NT". All I had to go off of was times I did in practice during the middle of a workout. Also my local "Y" doesn't allow you to go off the blocks. My ballpark guesstimate placed me in the slowest heats, and I'm sure people thought that I was sandbagging. Nope, just clueless. Also I was very relieved to find out that practice starts from the blocks were allowed during warm-ups. Of course I didn't know that until I got there.
I still have a ways to go before I get back to my high school times, but it is a goal that I feel is attainable. I only wish that I jumped back into swimming sooner, hopefully some reluctant ex-swimmer reading this will be encouraged to make the same leap.
I went through a similar thing back in September. Started swimming regular for the first time since high school back in 1985. (However I did do a small amount of swimming during the past few summers, but nothing more than a few laps here and there.) Since September I trained for a meet that was being held less than 5 miles from my house. It was only 2 months that I had to prepare, but I couldn't pass it up since it was so close to home. Did better than I expected probably due to all the adrenaline\nerves. I didn't have any seed times and the entry form would not accept "NT". All I had to go off of was times I did in practice during the middle of a workout. Also my local "Y" doesn't allow you to go off the blocks. My ballpark guesstimate placed me in the slowest heats, and I'm sure people thought that I was sandbagging. Nope, just clueless. Also I was very relieved to find out that practice starts from the blocks were allowed during warm-ups. Of course I didn't know that until I got there.
I still have a ways to go before I get back to my high school times, but it is a goal that I feel is attainable. I only wish that I jumped back into swimming sooner, hopefully some reluctant ex-swimmer reading this will be encouraged to make the same leap.
