Hey, solo swimmers! :wave: Welcome to the thread for all of us who train solo. Whether you train on your own due to a lack of a Masters team in your area (or for any other reason), this is our virtual locker room. Please post training tips that you think would be helpful, or anything else you would like to share with the rest of us. Have a rant? Go ahead and vent here! :rantonoff:
I'll start with a tip:
The most frustrating thing for me training solo is not having a coach on deck to evaluate my stroke and keep me on track, so I bought a waterproof camera and enlisted the help of my husband to periodically shoot video of all four strokes. Shooting underwater video became a knee/back buster, so I bought a camera mount and attached it to PVC pipe, so my husband could stand up straight to shoot underwater video. The camera gets dunked underwater, and he twists the pipe to pan the camera as I swim by.
Today, I bought a 2-pack of 12-inch "Gear Tie" reusable rubber twist ties (available at Home Depot), so I can tie the PVC pipe to the pool ladder (located in the corner of the pool) and shoot video myself. (If I angle the camera just right and keep it on wide angle, I can video me coming and going.)
10687
After each video session, I upload the videos to my desktop computer and compare my stroke to my favorite Go Swim stroke videos to see what I'm doing well (or not). I also post them on the Forums for feedback.
Ok, solo swimmers, what's your tip?
Now my freakin' lower back is killing me. Icing helps, ibuprofen. Standing KILLS me. I am guessing it may have been the UDK set, not sure
Okay, so it turns out.....I'm just broken. After a few days, I thought I'd get a massage. Wife (physician) has a partner whose wife is a PhD level PT at a pretty well known sports medicine group. At any rate, I go there, and I've got serious movement limitations. Thought they'd just rub down my back, but I got to be show and tell for the whole staff. They had 3 people come marvel at my condition. I joked that I was about as flexible as a 2X4, and let's say that didn't do it justice. Apparently I have so little hip flexibility that I compensate when I walk by arching my back slightly. They had a different PT who looks like the Aquaman actor (Jason Mamoa?) try to break me, but he couldn't. So I've got weeks of PT, and they actually sent me to a chiropractor to see if he can break me.
Let's just say if given teh choice of a back to back 200 fly and 400 IM long course rather than the chiropractor, I'd rather do the swims. Now, I thought Aquaman was big. But this guy is like ANdre the Giant. And he proceeded to try to yank my right leg off. Didn't come out, but it popped. Yeah, that hurt. And I mean, it REALLY freakin' hurt. Like lights out hurt. As in literally, things went dark - I thought he turned out the lights in the room. I don't know what it was all about, but about the time I recovered, he moved to the next part. Then he made my legs do something resembling a pretzel, and then took revenge on me for all the times I used to jump on the bed as a kid. It hurt so darn much I was laughing. He was joking it was good I was his last appointment before lunch because I would have scared off all of his remaining clients. I told him I assumed he didn't rely much on referrals. And I get to keep going back. Good thing I on't run, as apparenlty my left leg is about a half inch longer than my right. It was probably 5-6" shorter before he yanked it. Who knew the optic nerve ran through the hip socket?
Anyway, the PT side of things told me to stay out of the water for 10 days. And gave me stretching exercises to do. WHich is kind of like asking a steel i-beam to stretch, but I get to give it the ole college try.
Now my freakin' lower back is killing me. Icing helps, ibuprofen. Standing KILLS me. I am guessing it may have been the UDK set, not sure
Okay, so it turns out.....I'm just broken. After a few days, I thought I'd get a massage. Wife (physician) has a partner whose wife is a PhD level PT at a pretty well known sports medicine group. At any rate, I go there, and I've got serious movement limitations. Thought they'd just rub down my back, but I got to be show and tell for the whole staff. They had 3 people come marvel at my condition. I joked that I was about as flexible as a 2X4, and let's say that didn't do it justice. Apparently I have so little hip flexibility that I compensate when I walk by arching my back slightly. They had a different PT who looks like the Aquaman actor (Jason Mamoa?) try to break me, but he couldn't. So I've got weeks of PT, and they actually sent me to a chiropractor to see if he can break me.
Let's just say if given teh choice of a back to back 200 fly and 400 IM long course rather than the chiropractor, I'd rather do the swims. Now, I thought Aquaman was big. But this guy is like ANdre the Giant. And he proceeded to try to yank my right leg off. Didn't come out, but it popped. Yeah, that hurt. And I mean, it REALLY freakin' hurt. Like lights out hurt. As in literally, things went dark - I thought he turned out the lights in the room. I don't know what it was all about, but about the time I recovered, he moved to the next part. Then he made my legs do something resembling a pretzel, and then took revenge on me for all the times I used to jump on the bed as a kid. It hurt so darn much I was laughing. He was joking it was good I was his last appointment before lunch because I would have scared off all of his remaining clients. I told him I assumed he didn't rely much on referrals. And I get to keep going back. Good thing I on't run, as apparenlty my left leg is about a half inch longer than my right. It was probably 5-6" shorter before he yanked it. Who knew the optic nerve ran through the hip socket?
Anyway, the PT side of things told me to stay out of the water for 10 days. And gave me stretching exercises to do. WHich is kind of like asking a steel i-beam to stretch, but I get to give it the ole college try.
