Waterblogged

Why? Why do I get up at 5AM, swim an hour, come home to get my kids off to camp or to prepare for a day at home with them, work , and then stay up at night to blog my brain out with posts like these in addition to these and these ? Why, specifically, do I spend my precious down time writing these posts for the world which may not give a hoot what I have to say? There are two reasons. One: because I looooooooove to write. Yes I'm a tech geek but in a former life I was a political science and creative writing major. I even wrote a novel (not published, due of course to a giant conspiracy in the publishing world against me and having nothing to do with the quality of my manuscript). The second and more pressing reason is: folks like Mike. Who is Mike? A guy on our team who came up to me this morning after workout, when I was feeling tired not only from swimming IM's but from the week I've spent disciplining my scheming little five-year-old. My mood was not good. Until Mike c...

Today we did "pyramids with sharp peaks". These peaks were done at threshold pace. After we, in Lane 2, had completed 2,000 yards of these peaky things, Tim approached us. Before he could speak, Whitney exclaimed: "We made it! We made our times I'm happy to tell you!" Tim smiled. It was not...like...a: "Wow you did?!" smile. It was more like a "Oh my ! You mean, I gave you some times I knew you could make and you made them? Shall we have a deck party or just get on to the next set?" smile. "That's fantastic," he said, in the most sarcastic, not-excited-about-our-accomplishment tone thinly veiled by an honest to goodness smile I've heard in a while. Far from being offensive, his dry humor rubs me the right way in the morning. And I know that he knows that we know it's funny to him when we want our due praise. We may whine (at least Whitney and I) when the workout consists of stroke, but we do love to have our ego stroked ...

The report is that Menlo Masters did well at the Catfish Open Water Swim this weekend. Sue won her age group as usual, Joan Gerber did a fantastic job for her first open water swim, Anne Young killed it coming in third in her age group, and Swart and Texido finished #8 and #10 in the over-the-hill-wanna-be age group. Tim Ross was stellar and left his wedding ring at the bottom of the lake to commemorate the swim...and Kellerman crushed it with a 56.38 and Hewitt was not far behind at 59.37. Maybe this strong showing over the weekend explains the weak showing at the 10 x 400's this morning. :)

I'm off for a brief 24 hour getaway to Stinson beach tonight with a husband and... without kids ! It's anniversary time, and I could use a big fat nap and a glass of Cabernet enjoyed in the surf. Thanks to Rick or whomever came up with this morning's workout for kicking off my day right. *no real warm up, just get in and swim *2 x 500's free *1 x 1000 free *5 x 200's free (15 sec rest between) *however many 100's free you can do before the hour ends (5 for us)

The small trash wizard who lives in my car stole my yellow cap sometime in the night. I left my bag in the passenger seat, all ready to accompany me to practice this morning and blam! this morning the cap was gone. Thanks to one of those badass triathletes on the team who always carry 17 extra caps and other gear items in their bag, I was able to save the ends of my locks from chlorine abduction. But, in typical me-fashion I forgot to give the cap back to Mary. So until I see her again I will be busy guarding the cap from the trash wizard. Do not fear Mary. I will succeed or die trying. (How's that for a valiant effort?). The workout: *warmup with 200 free, 50 back, 50 breast, 200 free, 100 back, 100 breast *300 free, 100 stroke drill, 50 fast same stroke repeat 3 times drill to use on first second and third 100 are: 2 count pause, one arm, fist *4 x 50's stroke on the 60 sec, drill down, swim back; 2 x 100's free on the 1:30 *3 x 50's stroke on the 60 sec, drill down,...

I'm glad last week is over. Something just wasn't right. Despite getting out on the pool deck and cheering for the 10 x 400 set; despite loving the burn of that post-pulling extravaganza on another day; I just didn't care about much of anything but strategizing for a nap last week (my strategies never panned out). I barely wanted to go to the pool in the mornings. On Saturday morning I actually wanted Rick to explain each set slowly and methodically--was glad when we finished one set and he was still busy instructing someone in lane six for another five minutes. (We love you Rick). You know the kind of weeks I'm talking about. You go along in your life, an energetic spark plug of a an athlete/social butterfly/entrepreneur/mommy/daddy/doctor/superperson/whatever, and then one day the helium is sucked out of the heart-shaped balloon in your chest and into some little jar in the corner of the garage. Who does this sucking and why I don't know, but there it is. But toda...

What can I say except I'm tired . 10 x 400's yesterday and some sort of sadistic pulling rigmarole the day before. I heard today was swimming with shorts on. Let this be the first time I've ever openly admitted I am glad I couldn't get a free pass to swim this morning. As we all know, I'm inappropriately attached to less drag (very, very little material) in a suit; not more. Wearing shorts in the pool at this point would make me feel as if I were dragging a hot air balloon behind my hiney, and I just don't need that kind of frustration. Enjoy!

Overheard in the women's locker room after practice: "Whoever put the covers on last night should be shot." Sure, shooting is a bit harsh. But I know at least a few other folks who swam this morning would vote for some sort of corporal punishment for last night's coverer. Me? I want to give that individual a kiss. I'm always cold. After the 1600 yard set of IM-related crap we did my lane mate was panting. "Whew," David said, "hot in here today?" I looked over and saw Marianne extracting herself from the pool to await further instruction while cooling down, out of the water. "Nope," I said. "I'm a bit cold." I think I heard David mutter freak as he set off on the 500 IM set we did next. What I didn't hear, was anything from Chris, who had pulled out after 1100 of the previous set to "walk his dog". WTF? Tim informed us that Chris always needs to get home to walk the dog at 6:30 AM. Note to Chris: your dog ca...

Thanks to Blake for alerting me to the NYT article about swimming. My thoughts on it are here .

So I visited Borrone Friday night and since I happen to know the Borrones I am cursed/blessed with tasting some of their latest culinary wonders whenever I go there (and they see me hopping up and down in line hoping they'll call me out and woo me with wondrous food). This time they pummeled me with figs wrapped in some sort of delectable cheese and prosciutto and homemade balsamic reduction. I don't like figs. But I wanted to take these particular figs home with me and sleep with them. (Is that cheating?). Mildly sweet but with a twinge of bitterness that went perfectly with my white wine, I was immediately a prisoner to their charms. Unfortunately, they were followed by cream of spinach soup, salmon rolls with capers, a foccacia sandwich dressed in a pretty green guacamole prom dress and, (those bastards) a brownie sundae with pralines and cream ice cream, whipped cream, and homemade caramel sauce I would eat on anything. ANYthing. Let's just say the swim was tough Saturd...

I saw a number of you at the Menlo Park parade yesterday. It's always so cute: all the kids with decorated bikes and scooters; the music and fanfare; the old blue police cars and shiny red firetrucks; balloons, pinwheels, etc. It's also like taking a slow steamy walk through my own personal Hell. Sure, I look chipper in this photo, but the expressions on my boys' faces more accurately depict how we all felt after the initial "whoohooo America!" feeling wore off (in other words after the first five minutes): "Let's get into some shade and away from all these people ASAP". Although I was drained after yesterday's heat and evening Mai Tai's, the pool felt wonderful this morning. Here's what we did: *warm up with 500 free add paddles (no buoy) for: *3 x 600's free first 600 has one fast 50 embedded in it second 600 has two fast 50's embedded in it third 600 has three fast 50's embedded in it remove paddles for: *400, 300, 200 des...

It's 6:30 AM on July 4th and I'm just killing time until the special 7AM workout time. My body is used to 5:45, and therefore, I'm up. I don't yet know exactly what the workout will be, but it can't be more taxing than the day camp I ran earlier this week for seven 2 yr old kids. It was blissfully fun - I am more convinced than ever that I really am still a kid - but a lot of work. Anyhoo, I hope you all have a great July 4th and I hope to see you in the pool in a few minutes for this mysterious "firecracker" set. Enjoy the day!

Yesterday morning began with a 1,000 straight and I was very pleased about this. Following that, Tim announced we'd be doing 16 x 100's on the 1:25 interval. As we all, in lane 2, waited for him to instruct us to put fins on (an instruction that did not come), I asked Whitney whether she wanted to lead or whether I should. With a dazed look she simply said, "I'm just trying to come to terms with this set right now." I laughed through at least 4 of the 100's (which she did lead). I was done laughing by the end of the 16, and some of us were near tears when we heard the next set: 3 x 400's on the 5:00. Tim did say we could use any gear we wished--to which Gary replied "How about a kayak?"