Well it's been a few days since I've been around to blog.
This weekend I was fortunate to be able to go on a swim course to help my freestyle. Anyone that has seen me swim will know exactly how unfreestyle my swimming was. My previous approach was firstly change to enter water, stage 2 grow increasingly uptight, stage 3 become stressed, stage 4 thrash up and down the lane to a point of exhaustion and final stage was to get out of the pool depressed at my inability. So this weekend I bit the bullet and went to a swim course on Saturday morning.
There were 12 of us in the group all with different objectives and targets - mine was fairly simple I wanted to come away with the belief that I could swim and not get completely stressed every time I go near water. When I went to Lake Placid I had a panic attack in the water on the Wednesday practice before the race and it shredded my brittle confidence. At that point a personal coach talked me round and gave me some ways of tackling the problem should it arise on race day. It didn't and I somehow pulled off a 1:35 swim which was pretty fast for me.
So the morning started with an explanation of what was ahead, how the process would work and a chance for us all to talk about what we were aiming for. There were a couple of folk starting out on the triathlon journey, a couple more aiming to Ironman and few that just wanted to swim more efficiently. The course was led by Jai Evans of Total Immersion with support from Salka Hintikka and a local coach Jan Moffat Osband, they were all excellent.
You could see everyone was itching to get in the pool and show there swim techniques off. Apart from a couple of folk who had little freestyle experience I reckon that 90% of the rest of the people secretly hoped that the first video review would be a pat on the back and told that they were excellent and only need a minor change to reach perfection!! So the first session included the video recording and we started with the drills that would become the focus of the weekend. I should of said that the programme is geared up to give you the tools to go away and with practice improve your swimming. The journey to perfection starts with the weekend training.
So the start was easy - pretend to be superman in the water. Sounds easy because it's not superman as we know him but a drill to get your hands into the right place in the water and part of the balance drills. Balance I have learned is very important in swimming and finding your own balance point will help. I would get the DVD's that Total Immersion sells to get you started. Anyway after the initial drills and having spent time in the pool it was back to the classroom to review the techniques. This was again not as I expected because Jai picked out a lot of positives with everyone as well as some of the challenges that they faced. The chap I was sat beside was called Heston, not the Blumental version, but a really nice guy who was a regular and very competent swimmer.
So after the reviews it was back to the pool - sadly I missed that session due to a prior dinner engagement but Jai took me through the work that was going to be done. Day 2 started bright and early and we were in the pool just after 8.30. It wasn't very warm but 2 inches of fat and a rash vest kept me comfortable!!
We went back to some of the earlier drills to reinforce the balance stuff before progressing into being able to understand slipping through the water efficiently, relaxed hands, point of entry and timing. There were more classroom sessions which reviewed effective training and the good and bad of group practice sessions before heading back to the pool for more drills before we put it all together and started swimming.
I felt brilliant. Everything that we had been taught made sense and the tip of only focusing on one thing on each length gave me a few victories as the session went on. We then had the final video shoot and headed back to the class for the final review and advice of what to work on.
Jai had a iPad with sports video software so he could move quickly back and forward and show everyone the good and not so good parts of their stroke. One chap, a would be Ironman, seemed to have improved significantly and Jai drew a dolphin shape around him, I wondered if I would get a dolphin shape around me! Sadly not but the improvement is significant. Most of swimming is in your head and if you open your mind, forget the years of poor technique and free yourself from over thinking and trying too hard suddenly it seemed easier. To me the challenge was the messages that my brain sent when I go swimming were all negative. I enjoyed swimming at the end. The style of coaching suited me and because the learning experience was relaxed and good fun I think I approached the pool more relaxed and prepared to enjoy myself.
I look forward to my next pool session and I got the belief that I can swim and go on to be a better, more confident swimmer in the future. I've not explained it all very well but I remember the drills and will practice to improve my technique.
Our coaches in Jai, Salka and Jan all brought something different to the learning experience and I enjoyed working with them all. I think everyone will go to these sort of course with different expectations. My expectations were exceeded, I didn't expect to come home swimming like Michael Phelps and of course I didn't but I have now got all the tools to improve and be the swimmer I know that I can be. So no longer will I be the stone and soon I hope to be the fish! If you want to swim better then I'd happily recommend Jai and the team at TI because as you know if I can do it anyone can!
I kept it all real running 10 miles in the afternoon sun this afternoon. It was stunning! Maybe the miracle will be complete if I can run the 2.4 mile swim section of the Ireman! Ok that's impossible but maybe I might just enjoy it now!
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