Iron Pol

Part of the B-Fit B-Day challenge is to swim the first digit in your age, in miles. Turning 40 this year means I must swim four miles to meet the challenge. Since my goal is the gold, I must accomplish the swim within a 24-hour period. Tuesday provided a reminder of just what that will take.

Mrs. Pol had a conference to attend, that day, so I took the day off to watch the kids. Her schedule left me with a considerably more training time than normal, and I put it to good use. I got about 30 minutes extra sleep in the morning, and hit the pool for a planned 4000 yard swim.

While motivated for the workout, I wasn't feeling very creative. I decided to do a 2000 yard warm-up followed by a 2000 yard cool-down. I took a few minutes between sets to chat with some fellow Tri Foxes. In all, it took about 83 minutes to complete the swim.

I'm proud of this for a couple reasons. First, it means that without the pressure of an Ironman, I have at least maintained my swim fitness from last year. My swim time (#1675) at Ironman Louisville was 1:31. I'm guessing that if I'd gone the full 4224 yards without a break, my time Tuesday would have been very close to that.

Second, I'm always proud when I can pound out major swims. Granted, it falls way short of what many dedicated swimmers accomplish, but it's pretty major, for me. And given my disdain of swimming, any time I spend 90 minutes in the water is worth mentioning.

As I mentioned, Tuesday was also a reminder of what is coming. Perhaps "warning" is more accurate. With the birthday challenge on the horizon, I have to be ready to swim a minimum of 6600 yards. That's a bit better than an Ironman swim followed by a half-IM swim. I think I've mentioned before that it's also 1600 yards more than I've ever gone before.

So, it's one of those "good news, bad news" stories. It's great to see I've been maintaining my fitness at a pretty decent level. It's frightening to think about how I might feel after pounding out 6600+ yards in a single day.

Oh well, shoulders are overrated.