Today, I swam the 200 yards free in 2:09.11.
This beats my previous best of 2:09.54 from April 1994.
I challenged the 2:09.54 in the past 11 years, over 20 times, many times under what I learned the hard way to be the wrong preparation, and never came close.
My result will be posted officially in the USMS databse.
I won't be able to make the 2005 Short Course Nationals, but hopefully I will make the 2005 Long Course Nationals.
The reason that I bring this success here is that there are some lessons to learn from it:
1.) to pursue virtue and excellence by meeting the intrinsic requirements that come to having a worthwhile goal (in my case, the goal is to stay in my prime intellectually and physically, for longtime), that's intelligence and tenacious work;
I immigrated to U.S. and relocated within U.S. on job skills in science to live my lifestyle;
this lifestyle comprises now, over 39 weeks of the 2004-2005 season so far, of 1,093 kilometers of training (an average of 28.025 kilometers per week, or 30,828 yards per week, no matter the holidays, tapering or illness, that includes kicking, strokes, and technique quotas), the most mileage I slowly built my late starter physiology up to in life, mostly under a Masters club with primarly college and age group swimming expertise, which I searched for and choosed;
I also cross train consistently in weights and running;
2.) I scrutinize self-indulgence and greed (to an employer who was asking me to work overtime like his Japanese employees do, even though I was ahead in schedule in a project, and who thought that I am a slave to him giving me a work visa, I stated "You know, my life doesn't depend on you." and I walked away from a near six-figures salary because it was jeopardizing my swim training; I looked for and found another) and I scrutinize good intentions backed up by feelings without hard data.
2:09.11 and staying in my prime, that's a tribute to 1.) and 2.).
Former Member
How about this ... you did a lifetime best, congrats ... now let's let this thread die.
Originally posted by SwiminONandON
How about this ... you did a lifetime best, congrats ... now let's let this thread die.
How about what I wrote, that this thread is not about congratulations, but about the process?
Now let's let this thread live.
Originally posted by Ion Beza
How about what I wrote, that this thread is not about congratulations, but about the process?
Now let's let this thread live.
OK, this was what I was looking for. Trying to figure out why you posted if you did not want to be congratulated(which is what people usually want to do when someone achieves a good time).
You want to discuss your process that achieved this.
Fine, but please realize, many people cannot stop all else, or limit all else in their lives to dedicate to swimming.
So I won't congratulate you, because you don't want that and whatever you hope to achieve by posting, good luck, I hope you get it.
HEy I did think of a question. I saw you swim at Spring Nationals in 2004, and one thing I noticed was that you could cut time by improving your turns. In your process to get faster, did you focus on things like your turns, and what technique tips helped you the most?
I sure picked the wrong thread to subscribe to...spent the day on the airplane, and arrived in Ft. Lauderdale to see over 100 e-mail messages, primarily from this thread.
OY!
~SB (now unsubscribed)
Heather,
I gracefully bow out of this thread. Ion is on my ignore list so I don't really know all of what he is saying, nor do I care. I sense it's just more of the same old "stuff". He doesn't communicate clearly and I'm not going to bite, and let the fun of these boards in the last few months take on an unpleasant taste.
I'll see you on the fun threads :)
Originally posted by gull80
You're confusing talent, which represents undeveloped potential, with actual achievement. Starting a sport late in life is a disadvantage regardless of the amount of talent an individual may possess. Hard work can achieve (and overcome) only so much.
It seems to me that this (the part in bold) is basically all Ion is trying to say with reference to "late blooming". I should note that the post that started the thread doesn't make any reference to late starts, he just says what it took for him to meet his goal and what his motivation was.
For people who started swim training when they were young the issue of just how large a disadvantage starting late is isn't very interesting. For people who did start later the topic is interesting because it explains some of the difference in performance they experience relative to others and can be used in setting attainable goals for the level of time and effort they are able/willing to invest. It's easy to say that you can achieve anything you want to if you set your mind to it and train hard, but it simply isn't true, we can all construct circumstances under which it just isn't possible to win an Olympic gold medal. It's interesting and useful to have some idea of just what it will take to achieve a goal. Clearly Ion is willing to pay a much higher cost to achieve his swimming goals than most of us here. If you want to swim in the Olympics it is useful to know just how much work the people who are getting there have had to put in. If it takes the level of effort Ion describes to beat lifetime bests set a decade earlier many of us will choose another goal.
It would be interesting if someone could point out one or more people with top ten times who didn't start swimming until in their thirties.
Another interesting tangent would be to determine just what level of training is sufficient to attain all the health benefits of swimming and at what point further effort is useful only as a way of maintaining interest and motivation.
It seems to me that this (the part in bold) is basically all Ion is trying to say with reference to "late blooming".
This is not "all" Ion is trying to say, if it were there would be no trouble. What Ion is also saying is that the combination of his talent and his hard work and his dedication make it extremely unlikely that *anyone* else in an equivalent "late-bloomer" situation could ever swim faster.
That is what Ion believes and what he has said several times. He will respond strongly to even hints that my summary is not true.
Look, friends. Whether you think it is true or not, or whether you think it reflects poorly on his personality, LET IT GO! Ion is a dedicated swimmer who can contribute much to this forum if we let the issue lay when Ion brings it up. There are some questions that should not be asked (you can find one of them if you go back through this thread.) Perhaps some of the newer posters need to know this, but the rest of you already should.
As an early bloomer (but a pretty small bloom at the time) I know that I will never do a lifetime best in my strongest events. Unlike Ion, I will not let swimming pick my job or my country, my family will always come first, and I get tired swimming 30,000 yards a week for very long. Also unlike Ion, I am competing against a 20 year old who swam more than 50,000 yards a week with near-personalized workouts and daily competition.
Ion's dedication is very impressive, if not something I want to copy.
Originally posted by aquageek
Another hijacked thread, starts with a decent idea, detriorates into blabber. I'm gonna go get a cup of coffee.
Yeah, what are you doing here?
Attacking the thread with sentiments, but no swimming data from you.
I reported your post.
