November 11, 2007

Sunday, November 11, 2007

Drove to St. Johnsbury, VT today to check out the pool at St. Johnsbury Academy. Nice pool, 25 yards, 3 permanent lap lanes, good hours, very cheap ($20/month, more if you want to use the other facilities, including an indoor track!). Chlorine. Warm water/air. Downside is that it’s almost 40 friggin’ miles away. That’s 10 bucks in gas each swim! Plus the damn carbon. I’m going to check out the pool at four season’s aquatic in Lisbon. It’s 15 miles closer, and they use a saline purification system which makes too much sense not to try, especially as most of my swimming has been done in salt water.

Swam 1650 yards in about 35 minutes, mostly loafing. I normally don’t count laps, but thought I would use Kerry’s alphabet method for fun. I modified it a bit, using only foods which then needed to be mentally combined into an Iron Chef style meal. There was quite a fruit phase with quince, raisin, sloe, tangerine, ugli fruit, valencia orange, watermelon (which is where it ended, with x-salad). After 26 laps, the food had to double (blueberries, carrot cake). Anyway, I took splits at monkey brains (14:40) and zebra steaks (28:05). I think the gaminess really balances all the citrus. As most of the laps were just sightseeing with the pull buoy, I did a few 50’s afterward in about 45, just to kick a little. Shoulders began to tire over the last few laps. Nice.

Man, did it feel good to swim! If I’m going to train this winter and race next year, I need to swim more than I need to run. In fact, if this whole cockamamie scheme is to have any chance at all of succeeding, I need several winter training options. I like training at odd hours, but I’m too much of a pussy in my old age to run at night during winter in the “grand bois du nord.” Swimming, running, snowshoe running, skiing, treadmill, trainer … I need it all. I have a garage kept at 50-55 degrees all winter, so I could set up a treadmill and mag trainer/rollers there easily enough. All I need is snowshoes, skis, treadmill, bike and trainer. Well, I’ve got a bike, sort of. It’s a circa 1980 panasonic sport in near mint condition. 5 bucks at a yard sale five years ago when my son needed transportation to summer school. Impresses everyone at the bike races. I have swimming goggles and running shoes too, so I’ll go with those for now.

Weight 175 lbs