Aging comes upon us all in different forms and fashions. Some people feel the gradual change in the early morning as they swing their legs out of bed; listening to the creaking and popping of joints. Others might come across aging in a flash as they lay recovering in the ER from a pickup basketball game injury. For me, aging arrived 600 meters into a 1500 meter swim this past weekend. (Do they make waterproof adult diapers in Speedo cut?)
My youthful mind must
have been lost in pipedreams of going a best time with this 40-something aging
shell. I should not complain, this recent 1500 meter swim (aka The Mile) ranked
third fastest since I began swimming it in 2009. My 18:22 is way above my
goal time of sub 17:30. The simple math of needing to shave off :03 seconds on each
100 split next time nearly crushed my resolve to continue swimming the race.
Why did the pain come so early in the race? Where had the seven months of solid
training gone? Has swimming and I fallen out of love? And, why am I talking to
myself at the counter of a Chick-Fil-A? Priorities!... Order first, then mental
melt down.
Thankfully in
swimming there is always another race to attempt redemption from a bad swim.
The 400 meter became the unlikely savior of my meet. In years past this swim has
caused me fits. Middle distance combines the strategy of long distance with the
backend speed of a sprint race. In previous years I would try to hold a faster
pace to stay with the field, instead of swimming my race. Inevitably all my
400s end with me crashing and burning three-quarters through the race. The
ghost of 400s past crept through my mind as I sat waiting for my heat of this
400. Then a lightbulb went off… I overheard a training partner tell another
teammate his 400 strategy. “I am not going to kick in the beginning.” BINGO! I
don’t use my legs in practice, so I shouldn't use them in a race. Why would my legs come to the meet if I’ve
neglected them all year? Hell, I didn’t even send them an invite.
I swam 300 meters
with no kick. Then on the last 100 meters I unleashed the legs. Like pissed off
hounds of hell my legs took out years of neglect on the end of that race. I blew
past the swimmers pacing next to me, and made a solid run for the younger
racers ahead of me. I split 1:05 on the last 100. (The first 100 split was
1:08.) I negative split the 400! We got it all wrong. The butler is innocent! It
was my legs who killed the mile swim… I have cracked my aging code. Don’t kick
until the end is near. Save the legs in workouts and in swim meets. If there
was a World Record for the fastest torso in the water I’d be the greatest of
the great in the 40-44 year old male age group.
Here is to another 20
years of swimming, aging, and finding work arounds to keep this flesh ship afloat.
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