The swimgame concluded this afternoon even though technically I could score two more points if I made it to a pool tomorrow and swam 4000. I’ve got an MRI scheduled though and one of the stipulations is that I’m not allowed to have exercised earlier in the day. So be it, I certainly met my goal of scoring 20 points and am content to leave it at that. Plus I don’t want to make it too tough on myself to break my record if I decide to follow through and actually do do another swim camp sometime later this winter.

The totals were 38.8k and 13hours 27minutes in the pool over the course of two weeks. Those totals occurred over 6 days each week and the second was larger than the first: 18750 & 20050. At the moment I’m ranked 11th in the competition out of 34 people. I think I’ll get passed yet by one or two people. Only two people will have scored all 41 points available. I could actually imagine doing that now, I certainly couldn’t two weeks ago but I’ve definitely brought my swimming to a new level with this camp. Hopefully I’m diligent in keeping the volume up and with one or two more real surges in swimming focus over the winter I can imagine making a few more breakthroughs and might end up placing better in the swim than on the run at a triathlon next summer. That would really be cool.

I tried the twitter thing for the past two weeks and it still seems just about as dumb as before I started. It’s a great way to waste time though. In any case, here are my swimgame tweets outlining progress through the camp…

• @EnduranceCorner – I’ll be playing the #swimgame starting Nov 23. I’m setting the goal today = to score 20 points.
• Finished first swim of the #swimgame 2600 for 1 point. Club swim so no bonus pts: 12×125 as 50drill&75swim with 15sec rest as mainset.
• #swimgame Day 2. 2000TT today, 34:46 & split of 17:32 so -ve split to boot! Count as 2×1000 descend on 0sec rest? Don’t think so. 3 pts tot
• #swimgame D3 2100 as 6×200 on 3:29 3:30 3:23 3:29 3:26: 3:28 then 300 suicide set w/ p-ups and s-ups each 25. tot 4 pts: swim yet tonight.
• Second swim of D3 for #swimgame. 10×200 broken as 4/3/2/1 descending, range 3:35 to 3:23 last sprint in 3:04. 2 pts & 6 tot
• #swimgame is killing me and I love it. I surpassed my biggest weekly distance ever today with 2×1000 on 17:50 & 17:04. 8pts tot.
• Actually 9 pts tot, that was my 5th swim of the week, I’ll do at least two more this week so the #swimgame scoresheet will display correct.
• two more #swimgame points, longest swim ever, 4000! Depending how I feel I might do it again tomorrow. Fastest of 7×300 in 4:19. 11pts tot
• #Swimgame Day6. 4000 conts in 1:13:30. Outside-tops of shoulders ache, never ached there before, I didn’t know I could?! 14 pts total.
• Week 2 of #swimgame kicked off with longest swim of my life. 4200 and 30×100 as main set. On pace for bonus set until last 5. 3 pts:17 tot!
• #swimgame D9, 5×400 on 7:01, 7:00, 6:54, 6:44, 6:16. 2 pts today, 19 tot. Feel for water improving, 4th 400 felt awesome, normally I’d fade.
• #Swimgame Day 10, 1500 drills for 0 points. Moving too slow and ran out of time to score.
• 2600 for #swimgame as 5x(300pull 200swim). Focus on breathing from hip, coach’s orders! 21pts tot
• 2000 band/buoy for #swimgame: 24 pts. First swim with band, found it difficult to swim with much effort- I realize my balance is quite poor.
• 3750 for #swimgame, main set racing Ben 1/2/3/4/5/4/3/1 (00s). Final sprint deeply anaerobic, 7 people cheering on deck, called as a tie.
• #swimgame last bonus: 8x(25flykick 25 sidekick 100swim 100pull) Mrs. Physio said fly-arms are no go. +1000band took all I’ve got. 4000tot.
• #swimgame is over for me: no exercise prior to the MRI is allowed tomorrow. 38800 swum. 31/41 points scored. Certainly made my goal of 20!

So what changed? After 4 days of daily swimming I showed up for tri-club practice on Friday and felt ready to hammer. I was feeling quick in the pool and stuck on the tail end of the train a lane up from where I would normally swim. I really felt like I had developed a feel for what makes a good catch and what doesn’t. I had worked all week on making my long arms work to my advantage by taking a really long reach. Erin even noticed, I was reaching better – focus and dedication was paying off with muscle memory. I took a day off mid-way and the constant ache that I had developed in my shoulders and back had started to wane. Week two was all about developing strength, once I had a better catch I was far from strong enough to pull on it with any speed. To say that I managed to get strong during week two is totally bogus, but I continued to benefit from the volume by putting good muscle memory into my arms. I also identified that I was cheating on good balance by swimming with wide feet. The two band-swims that I’ve done really highlighted that I don’t have very good balance in the water. I need to really work on that to maintain a streamlined position in the water, and part of that is improving core strength. So, 13.5 hours in the pool basically gave me good reason to keep swimming, and concrete tasks to work on. I’m totally pleased with this endeavor, even though it may have turned into a make-work project.

I’ll conclude with a plot of my weekly distance over the period of when I started shoulder rehabilitation last fall up until the present. The past two weeks both doubled my longest distance in any week prior to that. [click it for larger]