Day 34

Swam 36 laps.

I don't know if I did better or worse today - I had to stop more and I feel much worse, but even with the stops I swam faster.  36 laps took me 40 minutes -- that's 2.22 minutes for 100yds down from 2.5 on wednesday.

I stopped 3 times -- after each 9 lap stint, but I intentionally swam fast for the last lap of each ennead.  I didn't consciously try to go faster in general, but i think I recognized at times that I was doing so.

Usually I feel good after swimming, but today i felt pain deep and low in my chest -- a feeling somewhere between heart-burn and birthing a xenomorph chestburster.  It may be that i was recruiting more of my core i swam -- i could feel something (obliques?) working as i twisted and rotated.  I'm not worried - it's fading and I am glad i was using the core.

Day 33

Weights -- I successfully completed three sets of 12 reps each of the standard routine.

It was still very hard on my arms - particularly the tricep push-down, the military press, and the bicep curls.  The dead lift seemed harder too, but I think it was because i was trying to do them better (using more rump and less leg).

I did a shorter warm-up (only 5 mins of vigorous walking and 2 minutes to cool down) and a brief but aggressive cool-down (I jogged for 4 minutes at 7mph).  Jogging got my heart to 185bpm, which is probably too high.

I was sore today - I don't know if it was residual from Tuesday's lift (I don't remember being as sore yesterday), or from the swimming (which doesn't seem like it should make one sore).  But it was fairly pervasive and concentrated in the shoulders, so maybe swimming is starting to hit my muscles more now.

Keep on truckin'.

Day 32

Forrest (Evanda) runs (swims) again!  I did my ~36 laps in two chunks of ~18, stopping for couple minutes in between.  It turns out that my staggering anomaly is repeatable!

I could have gone on, but I want to keep the bar reasonable, because I still get annoyed at how long it takes to complete.  36 laps took me about 45 minutes rather than the hour it did before when i stopped a lot.  It probably also means my heart rate stayed higher, which i guess is somehow good.

100yd time is a metric swimmers on the internet seem to use -- this morning on average I did 100yds in about 2.5 minutes, which is pretty slow by endurance racing standards, but not off the charts slow.  I am pleased with having a new metric to track -- I'll add it to the metrics tab soon.

Day 31

Weights today, but poorly.

I had a really hard time with some of the arm exercises today -- Tricep push went beyond "hard" and into "painful" and all the exercises following it seemed to use triceps.  I also got confused and thought it was 30 minutes later than it was and so I stopped the military press and lat pulldown after 2 sets each and didn't do the bonus ab twist or calf exercises.  I also did a shorter version of the cool down walking (but I jogged at 7mph for 3 minutes in the warm-up -- more aggressive than usual).

So not a great day, but I did get all the main exercises at least twice, and most of them 3 sets.  I think it was enough to continue progressing, at least.

I also brought myself a ton of stuff for lunch, since i was hungry yesterday:

• mango greek yogurt
• banana
• apple & cheddar cheese
• strawberries for my instant oatmeal (which i eat for lunch)
• week-old leftover fajita steak bits
• orange
• olives
• almonds

Day 30

I don't know what that was about.

Before starting i was reluctant to get in, after 3 laps i was depressed that i had 33 more to go, after 6 i was tired and cranky, and after 9 i was planning how to never swim again.  I persisted, though, and was feeling better as I rounded the halfway mark (18), and back to normal as I hit 24 laps.  Then something changed --

It was like a forrest gump moment - I swam but didn't get tired.  I wasn't getting more air, but I stopped feeling like i wasn't getting enough.  I swam 18 straight laps without stopping (so I hit 43 laps today), and only stopped because it was getting late.  I could have kept going, possibly indefinitely -- when i stopped I felt fine: more relaxed and less winded than I did after 3 laps.

I wonder if that is how normal people feel about exercise -- that it's boring, but not horrible the whole time.  I really hope i can hit that rhythm again.  Laps in that case wouldn't mean anything, I could just swim constantly for a period of time (which is less of a pain to manually count).

Week 6

Week 6 is a week of records and the start of a plateau.

My weight program has me where I am now for at least 2 more weeks before I'm supposed to tweak weight or rep count.

I don't intend to swim more than 36 laps in the near future either - I want to get better at the ones I'm doing, make sure my shoulder gets with the program, maybe take a lesson or two, increase the number of laps i can do at once, and start increasing my speed before I try for additional distance.

I'm glad - I feel my body has responded well to the aggressive program so far, but I also don't think I can push it much harder without repercussions.  Giving it a few weeks to settle in will be nice.

I haven't lost any weight, but i am visibly slimmer around the midsection - so i guess i am losing fat.  I know i'm gaining muscle - i can feel it in some places, see it in others, and prove it with my improved lifting.

I'm pleased and will continue.

Day 29

Swam 37 laps - 36 freestyle and 1 idle lap in the middle to rest.

I am pleased to report that despite swimming the same number of laps, I did it in a more demanding way: in groups of 3 laps at a time (rather than 2 which i recently managed after graduating from 1 which I moved to from increments of half a lap between breathers).

I wasn't as sore as I expected from yesterday's increased effort -- maybe its being lots of reps rather than lots of weight reduces that.  So I feel pretty good - swimming tires me for the hour afterward, but invigorates me for the following few hours.