Hi folks,
There's a question at the end of this rambling, so if you're time crunched, please feel free to skip the starred section and proceed to the question...
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It's been so long since I posted here! Crazy, crazy hectic life--you know, that thing you do when not in pool or (in my case) when not in pool or running.... Three jobs lately, so kind of nuts! But at least nuts with $ accompanying... ;)
But thankfully, since these involve fairly flexible schedules and I'm not currently training for any marathons, I decided it was time to bump up the yards and the swim workouts (marathon training kind of ate that all up... ran marathon w/ knee acting up at last minute... finished, and that's all I'll say about that for now).
As for master's swimming... coach last year also over-committed schedule-wise so could not get back to coaching the masters' group. I kept up the swimming at the kind of distance I did during his workouts, until the fall and the marathon craziness set in... then just tried to get in my swimming whatever way I could, maybe 3x/wk but not so many yards (600-1000), just to "keep my feet wet" as it were.
But then I missed the workouts and wanted to get back. Fortunately, the "companion Y" to the one I belong to (there are two in my area that team up and my membership is good for both), has a masters' group--could only join one of the three sessions per week, so checked w/ the coach about how he'd feel if I did that.
He was cool with it--even understanding about my needing to restart gradually, very encouraging....
Still not the yards I was swimming before but now doing maybe 1700-2000 per workout.... and getting a different coach's perspective.
Glad to be back in any case!
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And the question: the coach is having us do 100 yds. underwater near the end of workouts (followed by the easy 100 cooldown). I'm of the "whatever doesn't kill you will make you stronger" frame of mind...but having trouble with this one. Partly, it's my buoyancy which has sometimes been very convenient, but not for this exercise... and partly it's the breathing... We do four laps and can pause between them. Ha! My pauses are sadly more often than that. I'm working on setting small goals, like "get to the first ladder" then "get to the line in the middle..." etc. until I'm coming to the T at the end and try to persuade myself to reach it. It's actually kind of cool to be underwater, if I could only manage to stay there a bit. I notice that my breathing afterward during the easy swim feels MUCH easier. Of course, I suppose that's something like hitting yourself on the head and feeling so good when you stop! :)
So what's your experiece with underwater laps and how do you stay there and will I ever "find my inner fish" down there?
Thanks for your perspectives! I'm relatively new to swim workouts of this kind (not to swimming, which I've known how to do since I was a kid--just never tried to swim competitively until recently). As a newbie, I kind of take it all in, figure whoever's coaching has his or her purpose for the workout element, and I try to be open minded about learning new skills.
As for the underwater work, during my cooldown, I took a couple of dives to look at what the more experienced swimmers were doing--some looked as if they were doing dolphin kicks, others freestyle kicks, others a sort of *** stroke... so there didn't seem to be any one method that all agreed on. I *** stroked (awkwardly) while I was doing my underwater swimming.
My first experience with the underwater laps was a week ago Sat.--with the usual coach not there, someone else substituting. She said the same thing about pushing the air out of my lungs. But that seemed to me a guarantee I'd be right back up to grab whatever air I could get hold of.
But interestingly, sometimes when I'm just swimming an easy *** stroke (and this was before I did any masters' practices), I'd keep myself under as long as I was able just to enjoy the view (especially true in open water)--came up when I wanted/needed to, never thinking it was too big of a deal, just something fun to do. Only wished I could stay under longer b/c there was so much to see. :) I think if I take it that way, not worry about whether I stay under for two strokes or 5 or 10, just enjoy what I can do, I get the feeling it'll go more easily.
There is a Catch 22 with underwater swimming. The more air you hold in your lungs the more buoyant you will be, requiring more effort just to stay under. By exhaling completely before you submerege you limit your time under water but you also have less of a fight on your hands. At least this has been my experience.
I don't do 100's under water but I do practice dolphin kicking and *** kicking under water when the mood strikes me.
