Earlier in the summer I had turned a wishy-washy desire to swim butterfly into a specific and measurable goal. So, well, I missed that goal in so very many respects! :( I spent many an humorous hour in the pool trying exactly what the books warned against: trying to muscle and power my way through the butterfly. My effort and enthusiasm lasted ( Read more... )

My favourite movie of all time is "The Italian Job (1969)". It riles me that I have to add the "(1969)" qualifier. But ever since the "remake" (ha!) cum sequel in 2003 the qualifier has been necessary. It has the best car chase bar none, is funny, has action, pits the Brits against the "bloody foreigners" (the Italians, in this case), precision ( Read more... )

I send out a little e-mail nudge for a swim group each week (SwimSpam). It might be a catalyst around which a small group of us gather; it might not, maybe we'd each swim anyway. Regardless, in it I usually say what time I'll get there, how far I'm swimming. Armed with that knowledge, others can specifically be there at that time (or, I suppose, ( Read more... )

Sometimes, when the sun has just come up, when the air is clean, when I think (but what do I know?) it is great light for photography, I'll stand up at the far wall of the Barton Springs Pool, interrupting my lap, pausing to look down over the edge into the doggy-paddle pool just in case. It happened that I was leading this particular lap this ( Read more... )

Oh, tsck, do I really need to cut and paste the lyrics from there to here and global-replace "singin'" with "swimmin'"? And futz around the edges of "dancin'"? Can't you just consider it done?

Austin Triathletes' Open Water Swim 2008

The bad news -- as bad as "bad" can be on a cooler day than of late, overcast, on a non-workday morning, surrounded by fellow swimmer friends -- is that my time was woefully below what I had wanted/assumed.

Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, I had a great swim. I actually liked the water temps, despite grumblings ( Read more... )

Putting the horse before the cart

( Read more... )

We all like compliments.

I did my Quality Swim at my warm fluffy towel gym this morning. I'd taken a workout to do, but liked the one that the Masters had left on the White Board more, so followed that for a tough 60+ mins 2.7K swim.

It's not usually a rush to get a lane, but doors open at 10:00am, three lanes, two bods per lane (no, there isn't ( ( Read more... )

Monday used to be my day off from training. Religiously. All the time. Week in week out. For various reasons, I've changed days now. But I'm still having trouble getting out the door to run on a Monday morning. At the risk of sounding all "Is someone having a Monday" (or whatever that "Office Space" quote was) it just "seems wrong" to laden Mondays ( Read more... )

This morning's "40 easy" run was nice in the lower temps that the rain-damp ground seemed to hold. Low-70F's? Still just an out-and-back in the hilly 'hood (it seems to make so much time-economy sense for me to run from the house) but a bit of an "adventure" through the business parking lot: I thought there may be a different route through it than ( Read more... )