celebration!
I know there is something unseemly about bragging about ones swimming times. I think for many masters swimmers, a sense of personal accomplishment is best savored inwardly. John Wayne, were he to have taken up masters swimming, certainly would never have jumped up and down in giddy pride over a personal record. Nor, I suspect, would Clint Eastwood.
Having said this, I would just like to take a moment to jump up and down in shameless giddly pride over a recent swim I had!!!
At Y nationals in Ft. Lauderdale a couple weeks ago, at the age of 49, I swam the best 200 yard freestyle of my life--a 1:55.11, which beat my high school and college time by nearly a full second. I realize this may actually say a lot more about my former mediocrity that it does about my current prowesss, but the fact remains that as I near semi-centenarian status, I was able to whoop my teenage self!!! (Sorry about that, youngster Jim; you just didn't know how to race smart back then.)
I went into the race hoping just to break two minutes; I had never before broken 1:56, and this didn't even enter my consciousness as a possibility. When I finished the race--splitting 57 and 58 respectively--I wasn't even all that exhausted. I looked over, saw my time on the big board, and I have been ludicrously, bumptiously proud of myself ever since.
Anyhow, I'm hoping that rather than annoying my fellow masters swimmers who may read this post, this exercise in self-congratulations/aggrandizment will encourage others to pen their own moments of personal satisfaction. Where better to celebrate than here, where your fellow swimmers actually know about swimming times and (unlike the world at large) conceivably even care?
Parents
Former Member
Congratulations Jim,
Your splits indicate one way that us old fogies can still do ATBs (All-Time Bests) - swim smarter with great pacing.
There are other strategies that I am trying:
1) While I don't expect to do any ATBs in the 100 or 200 fly (If I did, I would be a 'Smith-Class' vessel), every time I improve my 50 fly I consider it a ATB, since I have no memory of ever having swum that event.
2) The Backstroke turns are a lot faster now than they were (at least the way I did them), and that can make up for some slower swimming. The underwater kick is also a potentially big advantage for a butterflyer like me. I am only 0.4 off of my ATB 100 back time, and there is a chance . . .
3) Anything with Breaststroke in it is a candidate for an ATB, both because of strategy 1) and also because I have the time now to improve my off-off-stroke.
4) While my peak yardage then was *way* more than I am doing now, I never swam year-round before. That means that now I don't waste time gasping while I try to get back in shape. That should help, I think.
5) I don't think *all* of my increased weight is fat - - some weight training, which I don't do yet, will help alot, too.
6) I am one of my coaches, now, because I spend lots more time analyzing and working on my stroke, and taking charge of what and how I am swimming. That increased maturity has made me a better, if not faster, swimmer.
Now, if I only didn't have to work . . .
Congratulations Jim,
Your splits indicate one way that us old fogies can still do ATBs (All-Time Bests) - swim smarter with great pacing.
There are other strategies that I am trying:
1) While I don't expect to do any ATBs in the 100 or 200 fly (If I did, I would be a 'Smith-Class' vessel), every time I improve my 50 fly I consider it a ATB, since I have no memory of ever having swum that event.
2) The Backstroke turns are a lot faster now than they were (at least the way I did them), and that can make up for some slower swimming. The underwater kick is also a potentially big advantage for a butterflyer like me. I am only 0.4 off of my ATB 100 back time, and there is a chance . . .
3) Anything with Breaststroke in it is a candidate for an ATB, both because of strategy 1) and also because I have the time now to improve my off-off-stroke.
4) While my peak yardage then was *way* more than I am doing now, I never swam year-round before. That means that now I don't waste time gasping while I try to get back in shape. That should help, I think.
5) I don't think *all* of my increased weight is fat - - some weight training, which I don't do yet, will help alot, too.
6) I am one of my coaches, now, because I spend lots more time analyzing and working on my stroke, and taking charge of what and how I am swimming. That increased maturity has made me a better, if not faster, swimmer.
Now, if I only didn't have to work . . .
