Mass swimming

I guess you can tell by previous posts that I love to swim. I've always been a water baby, but who wouldn't be when you grow up in Southern California? I remember days after my parents divorced, we'd spend weekends with my dad on his sailboat where he lived. The marina had a small pool that was always over-chlorinated. My brother, Rob, and I would swim until Pop would pull us out, our eyes swelled shut from all the chemicals. Even in high school I swam my senior year and felt completely at ease. It was a place where the sweat wouldn't show.

But now I'm sort of re-finding my love of swimming through triathlon. It's a sport where I feel more competitive than most I do.

Today, my triathlon training buddy, April, and I did our first workout with Texas Triple Threat, a local triathlon club. They hold a swim every Sunday morning. This time of year they practice in a pool, but come late March, we'll be in Lake Lewisville doing open water swims.

April and I felt a bit of trepidation showing up at 7:30 this morning with about 25 other people. We thought we'd be outmatched by far. She set herself with the slow group and I set up about in the middlle as I eyeballed many a tattooed person with the Ironman symbol. It's terrifying.

Lo and behold, I warmed up and was held up by some of these guys. The coach suggested that I move up not one, but two lanes to the nearly fastest folks. After a warmup, we did 30 minutes of a continuous swim. The water was boiling like it does when you throw fish food into a pond full of koi. There were no lane lines to break the surge. It felt like it would in open water. It was incredible!

I got in with the guys in my group and was starting to pass... or try to pass. The guy with the purple cap and giant feet ahead of me apparently didn't get the memo that when someone touches your feet (several times, I might add) that he should've stopped on the wall and let me pass. I'd even hang out on the wall until he was halfway across the pool and catch up to him without much effort. I could see his inefficient stroke ahead of me and he drove me nuts. Finally at one point about halfway across the pool, I noticed that there was plenty of room, so I turned back around and got ahead of him. It worked until later when he was able to somehow get back ahead of me by sitting on the wall for a break. Bastard.

Thankfully the coach saw my frustration and suggested I move up to the fast lane. Finally I was in my element and excited to be pushed to keep up more. Where I enjoyed the more even pacing of the slightly slower lane, this lane really made me fight more to keep the pace higher. I think I'll go there next time. It felt so good to be in the top tier of swimmers. My biking and running aren't nearly as good so it feels great to be adept at one of the elements of triathlon

After the 30 minutes continuous, we did a few drafting/mass start drills which were a blast. We paired up and tried to keep up or physically pass some of the other swimmers. One guy pushed hard on me and game was on! I drafted him for the rest of that lap, but on the return, I pulled on his ankle and slowed him down, allowing myself to get just ahead of him. Yay!!!

On a side note, oh my Gawd triathlon guys are great looking! Holy cow, I think I finally may have found a bit of heaven. Now if I could only snag one of them...