Wow! We are now well into May! Finally I have managed to get round to doing a quick update. Spare time is very minimal at the moment. How I love this time of year! We get to swim outside in the Cheltenham Lido and the Lake (32 at Keynes Water Park in Cirencester). This is bliss compared to the warm chlorinated swimming pools we have been ploughing up and down throughout the winter months!!
My cold water acclimitisation has been going well. We dipped our toes in the lake mid Feb after a hard frost over night, and then became fully submerged (nutty I know!) Each week following we managed to stay in longer and longer (non neoprene of course!) At one stage we were in for over 20 minutes in only 6 degrees! We built this up until 45 minutes was fine. It's just the getting in that is always hard, but you do get used to it. It's all about keeping calm and breathing and focussing - no panicking! This type of training is crucial though, and I will grateful for it if the sea and Channel is only 15 degrees when I am racing and doing my long swims in the next few months. It will feel positively balmy then!
April saw a trip to Guildford Lido, there was an event for Help for Heroes. It was to swim a mile on the hour, every hour, for 24 hours! Solo and Relay Channel swimmers all took part. I planned to take part as part of my training. It was stop / start and a very different approach. We had to concentrate on getting dry in between, warming up, feeding well and recovering enough to go again in approx 30 mins! I was chuffed with my consistency. I completed 10 miles. All between 24 mins 55 secs and 26 mins 19 secs. I can see how my strength endurance has improved. However, due to a sore/spasmy shoulder blade/back, I did the sensible thing and called it a day after 10 miles. There were no prizes for completing 12 at that pace and injuring myself in April! A great event, good training, and luckily I recovered well and was back into full training the following week, no problems. Thanks to swim buddy Dave (he was fab and did 24 miles), also Matt and Sambo who looked after us!
So, all races are entered for the season. There are fewer than last year, as there is a need for me to do longer back to back training week ends. I will be doing long swims on both days. I will however, be doing a 3.8k lake race in June, followed by the Champion of Champions in Dover (9 miles total). July takes me to Torbay for an 8 mile paddle across the bay to Brixham and back! Then to Bala for a week end of a 6 mile and 3 mile spalsh in the lake there! I also have to complete a 6 hour verification swim in this month, so I am allowed to attempt the Channel. Lots to keep me occupied!
I will endeavour to keep you all informed of my progress. It all seems very real now, especially as we are edging towards summer, and are now officially 'open water'! I have a week of sea swimming in Cornwall and Devon coming up, so am hoping to get in a lot of meterage in cold ish water (approx 12 degrees at the moment) and different conditions. Will be tiring, fun and hard work all at the same time, but essential boxes need to be ticked! I will try to keep posts coming shorter and more frequently from now on. Thanks for your interest and suppport..........Until next time..........Keep swimming :-)
