I started swimming at the Mt. SAC pool over a year ago, when I found out that they had open lap swimming. Now I’m doing the Masters Swim program and it costs no more to do that than to use the pool for open lap swimming. In fact, they offer all kinds of programs. These programs used to be free to the public, but due to state budget cuts there is currently a fee. The fee is reasonable and the facility is nice. I just really love swimming here so much more than at the gym, and now that I’m getting coaching as well, it’s a no-brainer for me.

In addition to the Masters Swim and open lap swimming, they also offer water aerobics, low impact training, triathlete training and cardio vascular training.

Signup Options

Fall session starts on August 23, 2010. They will be offering the following options.

Open Fitness Swim: Even though the title for this “class” says “Open Fitness Swim” on the website registration, it is actually good for all of the programs listed above. Masters swim, triathlete training, water aerobics, etc. and just plain open lap swim on your own.

Hours for this option: Mon-Thur 11am-1pm, 6pm-8pm and Sat/Sun 8am-10:30. The cost is $110 for 8 weeks (August 23rd-October 17th). You can register for this option by clicking here. To see the evening hours you need to click on the “More” link.

Masters Swim: The Masters Swim option is really more than that. It includes all of the hours and training options from the Open Fitness Swim above, plus there is also an early weekday morning time slot that offers open lap swimming, Masters Swim and triathlete training on Mon-Thu at 5:30am-7:30am. The cost is $120 for 8 weeks (August 23rd to October 17th). You can register for this option by clicking here. The description at this link does not show the weekday afternoon and evening hours unless you click the “More” link.

Session Swim Cards: What if you don’t want to sign up for the whole 8 week session but would like to go swim at the pool every once in a while? Well, then you can buy a swim card that gets you 5, 10 or 20 swim sessions, depending on your preference. The costs are $20, $35 or $60, respectively. The swim cards are described here (click). They are good for all of the hours…Mon-Thur 5:30am-7:30am, 11am-1pm, 6pm-8pm and Sat/Sun 8am-10:30.

Masters Swimming

I want to talk a bit about Masters Swimming. It sounds intimidating. But it does not imply that you are good at swimming or fast or anything like that. Masters Swimming simply means you are at least 18 years old. You can be a beginning swimmer, a former competitive swimmer, or anything in between.

If you think that your swimming could use some improvement, and that you would benefit from some coaching, then you should give Masters Swimming a try. Don’t wait to get better or faster until you consider participating in Masters Swimming. You might as well take advantage of this program and get help with your swimming now. Don’t put it off!

The coach at Mt. SAC is Louis Boehle. He swam for California Baptist University, has experience with adventure racing and was also a member of a relay team that swam a double crossing from Camarillo Beach to Catalina.

When you first come to workout Louis will probably ask you what you have been doing for your recent workouts and about your goals so he can choose an appropriate workout for you. I’ve found that he gives a lot of individual attention and encouragement. If you want to contact Louis with any questions you can send him email at l.d.boehle@gmail.com.

My swimming workouts this summer have mostly been under Louis’ guidance. Since my goal is to train for triathlon and hopefully get faster, I’ve been working out pretty hard. I’m really enjoying it, though. That’s why I signed up for this program. I needed someone to kick my butt in the pool, because I just don’t do it myself. Maybe that’s not what you want, but whatever it is I’m sure he’ll work with you to pick drills and sets that are suited to you.

Parking

You can buy a parking permit in Building 40 for $40 for the semester. The coin parking meters charge 25 cents for 15 minutes, and the day permits are $2 per day.

And then I started my Masters Swim workouts. And the coach was having me do a fair amount of kicking. Although I thought I didn’t really need to be doing kicking drills, I tried to just suck it up and say nothing. After all, I was seeking the expertise of the coach. He knows more about this than I do, right? That’s why I was doing the Masters Swim. Eventually I did ask him about it and he said I needed to keep that end of my body up, or something like that. So…ok. Still doubtful but…just doing the drills like he said.

Well, about a week or two ago I saw this article on TriSwimCoach.com that discusses this very thing. His point is that in triathlon while we don’t need the kick for propulsion, we do need it for balance. It will help a lot with the swim with just some bit of kicking. Really good article: A Little Kick Goes a Loooong Way in Triathlon Swimming

Then today someone on Daily Mile shared a link to this YouTube video of Dave Scott giving tips on kicking drills. Dave Scott being, of course, one of triathlon’s all time greats and 6-time winner of the Ironman World Championships at Kona. These kicking drills look really good. I think I would enjoy trying these.

Well, the kicking drills from Masters Swim are seeming to finally pay off for me. I’ve actually been feeling more balanced in the pool, like my back end is floating up higher. And the coach even told me a few days back that my kicking was looking good. Or did he say “better”? Maybe it’s not good, yet, but just better. Hahah.

But nothing brought home to me how important it is to keep the back end up when swimming like a drill he had me do this past Tuesday. He had me do a “pull” drill, with the paddles. But I was not kicking or using a pull buoy. Instead I had to cross my legs at the ankles and just let them trail behind me. This was VERY tough. My legs just sank. I could not really swim. I was almost vertical in the water at some points. He told me I had to pick my tempo up and have a faster turnover (faster stroke). I tried and that did help some. But wow, how much harder it was to stroke and pull with all that dragging.

Now one thing I did notice was that a lot of the reading material encouraged drills. The TriSwimCoach specifically encouraged doing as much drills as you could stand. And other sites also recommended drills for improving stroke technique and efficiency. It makes sense. In running I do speedwork on the track and I would say that is analagous to drills in the pool. I know that speedwork really does help me. I have to assume with all these articles recommending swim drills that that would help me, too.

But I really hate drills. Or at least, when I was trying to figure out swimming on my own, I really, really disliked them and almost never did them. I would maybe do a few laps of drills. Less than 1/4 of my workout for sure. Maybe much less than that. And then freestyle all the way, baby, because that seems to be the most fun to me.

Well, the coach at Masters Swim has me doing lots of drills. And I chose Masters Swim to help me, so I’m going along with everything the coach recommends. He’s supposed to be the one who knows a lot more about swimming than I do. I also post my workouts on the DailyMile.com site, and try to list out all the drills, etc. on my workouts.

So today @bfrien asked me on Twitter:

@sheswimbikerun Do U find that the drills actually help? Fists, kicking, etc Would U rather just work on endurance? Im just not into drills

Well, Bob, I’m sure at least some of the drills are helping. I know that some of the drills have got me lifting my arms up higher out of the water and in the ocean swimming this is really helping so that I don’t drag my arm or hand through the water. And the angle that my hand enters the water has changed, to good effect I think. And I’m pulling better through my stroke. I can increase the turnover/tempo of my stroke when I really think about it (hoping this becomes more automatic, soon). I think I’m developing a better feel for the water, which definitely helps to work with the water and have less resistance.

I’m not sure about all the drills he tells me to do (they vary from day to day). He’s had me do some butterfly and breaststroke drills (if you ever want to see something funny come watch me try to do butterfly). I did ask him specifically about why he was having me do those for triathlon (he KNOWS I’m a triathlete and we focus on that a lot). He said for cross-training and building some of my other muscles. There are other drills I’ve asked about, too. Haven’t asked about the fist swimming, but I think the point of that is to develop a feel for the water on the underside of the forearm to improve the stroke.

Also, I had the opportunity a while back to do a swim workout with Coach Gareth at UCLA. He had us start with drills. First kicking only on the left side, a few laps. Then on the right side, a few laps. Then swimming with only one arm stroking. First left side for a few laps, then on the right. Then we did catch-up drills. Then we switched to doing “nearly” catchup, with focus on getting a rhythm going. This was kinda cool, and for a bit I had this really nice rhythm going and it felt fantastic. I think that getting a rhythm like that down would help a lot with cutting down resistance in the water and helping the speed be better. I want to try and repeat that swim session some time on my own. Haven’t felt that way since, but haven’t really tried to repeat it. But doing the drills…building up to the “nearly catchup” was the key. So the selected drills for that buildup workout really did help.

In summary, I know much of the drill stuff is helping and I’m just trying to put my trust and faith in the coach, which is why I signed up for Masters Swim in the first place. I know he has much more knowledge of swimming than I do.

I’m planning on re-upping at the end of this term. I think it is helping me lots more than when I was just trying to figure out swimming on my own.

Saturday, the day before the race, we went down to the packet pickup. We got there late in the afternoon, about 4:30 PM. It was chilly and windy. After the 100-degree temps we’d been experiencing at home the past week, the tank top I wore was just not sufficient. It seemed the race might be cold the next day. Packet pickup was well-organized. Transition area was nearly set up. We drove the bike course just to see what I had in store the next day. One thing about this race, the run and bike courses are some of the flatest I’ve had the opportunity to run on.

So early Sunday morning we arose and left the house at 3:30 am. Ugg! Got to the race site about 5:10 am and got primo parking. The weather was nice. Not windy. Calm and a bit cool, but not cold. Got my body markings. Set up my transition area. Note that positions on the bike rack are assigned by your bib number. You have to find your spot and set up there. This is different from any of the 4 races I did last year where you just show up and choose your own spot pretty much. Sometimes your age group goes on a certain rack or two. Anyhow, I got very lucky with an end spot. It had nothing to do with my arriving early. It was assigned.

The spacing seemed a bit cramped on the racks, too. But the other races I’ve done have been the same, so…? Another racer complained about it and it seemed like she meant in comparison to other races she’d had more space. Dunno.

Took a walk out onto the beach to see the water/surf conditions. (It was still pretty early and we had time to kill.)

The waves looked pretty mild. Looked like it wouldn’t be much trouble at all getting out past the waves. Went and stood in line for the porta-potties. Did my warmup run.

Then it was time to put the wetsuit on, listen to the pre-race meeting, the national anthem, and parade down to the beach where the swim start would be. The olympic distance swim was starting quite a bit further south than the sprint distance, so we had to walk a ways down the beach. Things were pretty casual and people were taking warmup swims. That suited me fine. Some races I’ve been to have been very restrictive about swim warmups, only allowing them during a certain time-window and when the life guards were in position. This was pretty casual. I need a swim warmup.

The water was fairly chilly (about 61 degrees) and unfortunately the waves had gotten quite a bit larger by this time. I went and swam out about 2/3 of the way to the first buoy and then back in. Very glad I did that and acclimated myself to the swim conditions. Then we had to stand around and wait for quite a while. Women’s Olympic distance was the last wave of the day. But finally it was time to start.

I am quite confident in my swimming, at my pace, which is medium. Not fast and not too slow. A bit slow. But anyhow, I definitely don’t start in the front. I start in the middle and towards the side. We had to run about 50 feet or so down the sand to the water.

And then you had to get through the waves, and by the time my wave started my hubby agrees that we had the roughest conditions of all for the day. Still, not terribly horrible. But not as nice and calm as it had seemed at 6 am (it was now after 8 am).

I probably need to learn to be more aggressive at getting out there, but I didn’t hang back too far. I was in the middle.

And once we cleared the waves and got to the first buoy I settled down into a fairly good rhythm. Turn right at the first buoy and swim parallel to shore, following the buoys for about 3/4 mile or so, I guess. There were people swimming over me, and I was swimming between others, and around others and getting bumped or kicked. Not too bad. But in any case, I didn’t skip a beat. I’ve been practicing my ocean swimming about once every week or two with the L.A. Triathlon Club, and the practice really helps. I was not unsettled in any way by all of this. And the waves were tossing about, 2-3 foot swell, but I just kept plugging away with my head down. I really did feel like I did a strong swim. We were swimming against the drift in the current, too. Made for a challenging swim. I also thought about some of the stuff I’ve been practicing in my Master’s Swim classes…powering through my stroke, stroke below the water surface,  faster turnover/rhythm on my stroke. I’m sure it helped some.

At the last buoy, as I turned right again to go into the shore, there were two less confident swimmers just kind of stopped there and blocking my way talking to a life guard who was hanging out there. Kinda irked me. I said, “C’mon…move!” but they didn’t. Oh well, swim around them and get on with it. The life guards were very helpful as we came in, cautioning us of waves and directing us towards the swim finish area. Finally, after about 39 minutes I emerged from the waves.

We had to run up about 100 feet or so on the sand to the beach path and then to the transition area. Total about 1/4 mile from the water to transition. I do not know why, but after I came out of the water and tried to run I was quickly out of breath and panting and found it very hard to run, even an easy jog for a short distance was very hard. I guess I recall experiencing the same thing in my Santa Cruz triathlon last year, too. While I was in the water I was fine, but trying to run through the sand…out of breath. Maybe I need to practice this more at my ocean swim practices.

But a fairly decent transition and I was off on the bike. My transition was better than similar ones last year. Not the slowest in my age group. The few minutes of rest in transition let me recover my breath and I was strong and running with my bike. Passed up a few people coming out of T1. Heard Bob Frein yell “hi” to me, saw my hubby and daughter, too. You do have to watch out for some curbs and bumps as you head out. Don’t trip!

As I mentioned above, the bike course is pretty flat. There is an 11-12 mile loop. The sprint race rides it once. The olympic distance twice. Near the end of the loop is a moderate, short hill. Other than that, pretty flat. I tried to keep my power up and ride at a pretty fast pace, but was concerned about having enough oomph for the 2nd loop plus the run, so I didn’t give it everything I had. Never could get up to 20 mph, although close some times. It was exciting having some of the elites passing me (they were on their 2nd loop while I was on my first). Although this is advertised as an “open course” and that cyclists must watch for traffic and obey laws, they really did have it marked off with pylons and cops directing traffic, and I had no need to stop at any time. I was able to ride as fast as I wanted.

An Olympic course is supposed to have a 40K bike which is about 24.85 miles. This course advertises itself as 23.8 miles, so that is short, but I didn’t even get 22 miles on my Garmin 305 watch. So definitely a short bike course. 1:14 for me to ride the bike course.

On the bike I ate some little pieces of PB&J sandwiches I’d made the night before, drank Nuun and water. Also ate a Hammer gel near the end of the bike.

I got passed around mile 18 by a young woman who said to me, “Almost done.” I caught up to her in T2. She was just two bikes over from me. She was getting ready to run out as I came in. “Now comes the hard part,” she said. “No, this is my good part,” I replied. And she was off. I was pulling on my running shoes as quickly as I could. Helmet off. Running cap on. And off I went.

I was in a hurry. And I felt strong on the run. Still, I always need to be careful not to go out too fast. I can feel strong for the first mile or so and then fade or have trouble to hang on. It’s kind of funny…I felt a bit slow for the middle 2/3 of this race, but my run results actually came out pretty good. I did stop to get water 3 times during the run. The day had warmed up and I took some slower steps while drinking.

But as I ran into the finish I really hauled. So excited to be done!

Strawberries for the finishers. Yum!

My results (Bib 1055. 17 total in my AG women 45-49):

Swim: 41:40 (11th in AG)
T1: 3:08 (10th in AG)
Bike: 1:14:44 (10th in AG)
T2: 1:31 (10th in AG)
Run: 47:07 (1st in AG)
Total: 2:48:12.1 (7th in AG)

The funny thing is I felt so good about my solid swim while I was doing it. And I was passing people up on the swim, although they would have been the slower peeps from the earlier waves, I guess. When I saw how low I placed ranking-wise in my AG for the swim I was quite disappointed. I’m over it now. I realize this was so much better than I could have done last year. And this was my first triathlon of 2010 and I wasn’t even sure how I was going to be able to hold up for the Olympic distance. My recovery from my two marathons in March went really slowly and only recently have I begun to feel like my old self. So honestly, these were pretty good results. And my transitions…middle of the AG instead of at the bottom like last year. Still room for improvement, but…I need to practice them more, I guess.

But the run…which I felt I could have done better…I not only got first in my AG but 2nd for all women 40 and up. Only one lady in the AG below me ran faster.

I really enjoyed this race. Well-organized, and that is very important to me. I think I would probably fare better in the bike standings if the course were hillier, since I train a lot on hills. But that wouldn’t prevent me from doing this race again. The enthusiasm of the community and participants, the goody bags, the shirts, the after-race food…all was satisfactory or good. Also, well-marked bike and run courses with lots of police officers or volunteers directing traffic. Made for a very smooth race. I also did not have trouble on the bike course with people passing on the wrong side or preventing me from passing (due to being generally clueless about ettiquette). I did hear someone else complain about it, but it was not my experience.

More pictures here: Strawberry Fields 2010 – a set on Flickr

Official race results here: Results by Prime Time – Strawberry Fields 2010 Triathlon/Duathlon

Thank you to my Trisherpa and daughter who supported me, cheered for me, took photos, waited for me and encouraged me. They are the best.

So last night about 6:30 PM as I road west on Temple approaching Valley Blvd a motorist in a large SUV whizzed past me in the left lane, honking, and then swerved just ahead of me into the right lane where I was riding.

There is no bike lane on this street and the lane is not wide enough for me to ride to the side and still accomodate a passing car, so I ride smack-dab in the center of the lane. This is for my own safety. I want cars to see me and to know that they need to change lanes to go around me. I don’t want them to try to pass me closely in the same lane.

As it turns out the light at Temple and Valley was red and the motorist had to stop at the light, about 3rd car back. I was close and approaching the car. Her driver’s side window was down. So I pulled up alongside her and said, “Were you honking at me?”

“You need to get over to the right. You were riding right in the middle of the lane!” she informed me.

“There is no bike lane here. I have a right to use the lane.” I replied.

Really, she was not listening to me or receptive to anything I said. And the light turned green and we both took off.

But it was really ridiculous, because the left lane had been completely open and there were no other cars around. It was really no inconvenience to her to change into the left lane to go around me. She was just pissed that a cyclist would think they had a right to occupy the lane. And driving so quickly past me, honking, trying to intimidate me…that is just wrong. Motorists who try to intimidate cyclists should be cited for unsafe, wreckless driving. Such tactics can lead to accidents and the cyclist will always lose against a car, frequently with extremely serious consequences.

So I went off on the rest of my ride, fuming as I rode. But I was destined to have another incident with a motorist last night. Coming southbound on Brea Canyon Rd approaching Golden Springs Dr. in Walnut, I have to ride past a freeway onramp. There is a right-turn-only lane for the motorists entering the freeway. I do not want to ride in that lane. Obviously  it’s wrong, as I’m not getting on the freeway. Also, if there are any cars in that lane, I hold them up. So I move over one lane to the left into one of the two lanes that goes straight through. This is a busy intersection and I watch carefully. I look behind me to check traffic. I put my left arm out, slightly down, waggling my fingers to make sure cars see me and understand I’m intentionally moving into the lane and please slow down or go around me.

Last night I looked behind me and it was pretty wide open. No cars there immediately. I moved over cautiously. All of a sudden there was a car…camaro? something sporty like that… zooming along in my lane, speeding I’m sure, and honking at me. Note that the lane to the left was wide open and no other cars. But this car had to stay in my lane, honking and speeding warning me to stay out of his way. Obviously I yielded and got into the right-turn-only lane. There were fortunately no cars in that lane at the time and I certainly wasn’t going to insist on my right to use the other lane.

But why would a motorist do this? Just want to make sure those cyclists know they’re in his way and to make sure we stay the hell out of his way and not inconvenience him. God forbid he should have to change lanes to safely go around me. What if I had not gotten out of his way? Uggg!

Really, not a good night with the motorists last night. Generally the motorists in our area are pretty cooperative and respectful. I just got two rotten apples on the same night. But it is scary because it takes only one to put the cyclist out of commission. I sure wish I could ride the streets and feel safe.

http://www.active.com/swimming/Articles/Survive_the_Surf__Entrances_and_Exits_in_Open_Water_Swims.htm

Going to check out their open lap swim in the next week or so. Summer hours start on Mon. June 21st. Until then the open lap swim times are:

Well, at some point I will probably look into the whole heart rate thing. Here is a good article on the topic that seems to go into quite a bit of detail and I will want to come back and review it again. Seems balanced. Pros/cons. Alternatives. Etc.

Triathlon Training Principles: Heart Rate Training | Trifuel

Anyhooo… I’m 2 weeks out from the Napa Valley Marathon. March 7, 2010. Training is going “eh”. I will finish the race, but I have no expectations for my goal or finish time.

Two weeks later… L.A. Marathon. So that’s going to be interesting to see how it goes running two marathons two weeks apart. March 21, 2010.

After that, my plan was mostly triathlons for the rest of the year. But, looking at my availability, I am really not able to get to one until July. So, I will focus my training on triathlon after March. But I will do some running races until I can get some actual triathlons into my schedule.

Here is my tentative schedule for this year (2010):

• Feb. 7 (Sun) – Surf City Half Marathon – (done)
• March 7 (Sun) – Napa Valley Marathon
• March 21 (Sun) – L.A. Marathon
• April 10 (Sat) – Seal Beach 5K – Family Run. Chris, Jenny and I.
• May 8 (Sat) – Xterra Malibu Trail Run – maybe. maybe not. Have done this event before.
• June 5 (Sat) – Fontana Days Half Marathon – Running for sure. maybe a PR?
• July 4th – some 5K race? Not sure which one …
• July 18 (Sun) – Strawberry Fields Tri – for sure. Sprint or Oly? Not sure.
• Aug. 14 (Sat) – Hansen Dam Tri – Highly Likely. Did this last year. Date is a guess. The website is not updated for this year yet.
• Sept. 11/12 (Sat/Sun) – Malibu Triathlon. Oly on the 11th. Sprint on the 12th. Not sure which.
• Oct. 10 (Sun) – OC Triathlon in Mission Viejo – possibly? maybe not.
• Nov. 8 (Sun) – Catalina Triathlon – Chris says he’s going to do this too. I had a lot of fun at this event last year.
• Nov 23 (Thu) – some Turkey Trot … again…not sure which one…

You may notice, from my previous post in 2009, that I left the Ragnar Relay off. I have already taken off time from work for the Surf City Half Marathon, the Napa Marathon, the L.A. Marathon and I will probably have to take off time for the Catalina Tri. I don’t want all my vacation days to be for races. So…decided to give Ragnar a miss this year. Maybe next year. (Anyhow, my daughter Kaitlin is graduating from college this year…have to save some days off from work for that!)

For the past 3 years I’ve done the Huntington Beach 5K on the Fourth of July. May do that one again, but there are certainly other possibilities. Probably won’t be trying for a PR this year, though, given the proposed race schedule.

Also, we’ve done the Dana Point Turkey Trot for the past 3 years, also. But that event is really crowed and… dunno…might do a different one this year.