After a fun filled (and a lot of hard work) weekend of swimming at the 2014 Canadian Masters Championships in Windsor, Ontario with the London Silver Dolphins were crowned Canadian Champions! Yeah!!
I learned a great deal about the differences in swimming a competition over various days in a pool, versus 1 steady continuous swim in a triathlon. Despite the many mistakes I made (primarily in the pacing department) I walked away from the weekend’s competition a much more confident swimmer.
It was also a great way to spend time with some of my LSD teammates whom swim in different lanes and I hadn’t yet gotten to know very well. A great group of strong swimmers and kind people, all of which were great in helping me orient myself throughout the weekend as I was somewhat lost at times with timing of events, heats, relays, warm ups, cool downs, counting laps in the long swims, not wearing a watch, tips to keep goggles from popping off etc etc etc.
I am glad and thankful that coaches Ken Fitzpatrick and Jay Nolan were able to slowly convince me over time to come out and try the swim meet experience.
That is over 500ml of ice cream….it got smashed in record time as well!!
I was also very fortunate to be hosted by Ramon and Penny Gallardo, one of my good friend’s parents who live in Tecumseh just minutes outside of Windsor. They provided me with a comfortable bed, my own bathroom, and dinner/breakfast every morning as well as a huge bin of pb cookies to share with the team as well as a celebratory ice cream at the end of the week for the accomplishments of having grabbed a few medals and being part of the winning team. Couldn’t have asked for a better place to stay!
Following is a quick summary of the events and results I participated in.
Events & Results
1500m Free – 20:29.86 (1:22/100m) – 1st place.
First ever race, was a little nervous. This turned out to be the best race of the weekend for me. Well paced, PB by a long shot and enjoyed.
Only rookie mistake was not swimming a cool down after. My arms turned to cinder blocks later. Lesson learned, you should do a 5-10 mins warm up and cool down before and after each race…a lot of swimming when you do 4 races in one day. Sometimes you can time them- Mixed 200m Free Relay 2:06.88 (28.88) – team 4th place.
First every “Flying start”, meaning you dive off block as your teammate is touching the wall right below you. - 400m Free – 5:13.04 (1:18/100m) – 4th place.
Had a major meltdown at the 200m and tried to hold on for dear life to the end. I went out 100% gas and got slower with each 100m split and thought I was having a heart attack!! - 100m Free – 1:04.06 – 12th place.
Was very happy with this….damn swimmers are FAST!!
- 200m Free – 2:22.15 (1:11/100m) – 8th place.
I thought I had learned my lesson in the 400m about pacing. NOPE, I roasted my first 100m in 1:05 and suffered a 1:17 the 2nd 100m with arms that refused to turn over. Whoops! - 200 Meter Medley Relay – 2:10.55 (50m Free in 28.27) 4rd place team.
I was the free style swimmer. Good fun. - 400 Meter Medley Relay – 4:24.49 (100m Free in 1:03.92) 3rd place team.
No surprises here, I was the free style swimmer again. Had a PB swim split for the 100m. - 100m Medley – 1:19.40 – 10th place
A very exciting battle with my teammate Jamie Talbot. I was able to eek by and win it by .4 seconds! See video below. - 800m Free – 10:49.96 (1:21/100m) – 3rd place
This was a tough race. I wanted to fix my pacing from the 400 and 200 where I went out too hard and fizzled out. I was on pace and doing everything well. At the 500m mark my lack of swimming fitness resulted in me slowing down about 2s / 100m. I tried to hold on and got my last 100m split back to a 1:20…but was full gas to do so. Happy with better pacing, but shocked by difficulty of event from fatigue accumulation. - 50m Free – 28.89 – 7th place
SUPER FUN event. Dive it and give it everything you’ve got!! The less you breath the better. Very addictive distance for me….probably since it is difficult to mess up the pacing 🙂
Video of 100IM – the dreaded swim for non-swimmers (since you have more than just free style swimming)
Video of First dive start / first 100m of the 1500m Men. I am in the middle (lane 6) with the yellow cap.
Ok that’s it for now. Now back to the pool!