Friday, I woke up really early. Most of the time, I can go back to sleep. Sometimes, I can not. Today was a not day. Instead, I turned a negative into a positive. I took advantage of the earlier time and worked out earlier. My rationale is that the time is springing forward an hour this weekend. I might as well get used to the earlier wake up now.
A different day in my past history, I would have skipped my workout altogether and tried to sleep. I would complain about waking up early. (I might still have mentioned it to my wife, but I don’t know I was complaining.) Not only am I more physically fit, but I am also more mentally fit.
Like I mentioned in my previous post, we are not perfect. The key is to try not to skip more than one day. So even though Wednesday I was in no mood to write, but I did. Thursday, I skipped writing. I wrote that on Friday and just pre-dated the publish date. I am back on the writing bandwagon today.
Thursday my eating plan was to eat too much. Again, the past, that would cause me cycle off and have a string of days, weeks, months of bad eating. Instead, I tried to adjust back to normal today. I did okay, not great, but better. That’s what I ask of myself try to be better than the previous day. Don’t compare myself to others, but compare myself to myself. My fitness is dramatically better than before. My food choices are much better. My weight is near my adult low, and I feel stronger and faster. I feel better. That’s the beauty of compounding consistency. Do the work. Experiment and try different things. Alternate. But also rest and recover.
When the challenging days happen, and they will happen, Give yourself a break. It’s okay to not be perfect. However, as soon as you can, get right back up and start again with your healthy habits. Your future self will thank you.
Today’s swim workout
Usually, on Friday’s, I swim long swim. However, my schedule did not allow that. So, I did a slower 3,000 mile swim with a mix of strokes.
Dryland Pre-Swim Drills:
- Warmup with a 60 seconds of jogging in place.
- 4 sets of the following:
- Calfs: 12 reps standing raises with 15lb weights
- Butt: 12 reps Butt straight leg lifts (focus on hip joint movement).
- Followed by Core Workout:
- Upper Abs: 15 crunches
- Lower Abs: 12 knees ups
- Lower Abs: Crunch with legs up.
- Side transverse abs: Oblique V Up’s (both sides)
- Back: 12 Reverse crunches on an exercise ball.
- Final: 65 second plank
- 1 minute of stretching.
At the pool pre-warmup:
Stand up straight: Put arms out straight, Swing arms around in slow circles. Starting with a tiny slow circle diameter, increasing until the arm swing circle slowly for larger and larger diameters. Go forward for a bit, then go backward for a bit.
At the same time, Warmup legs by stepping side to side. Then after arm swings, Lift knees to chest.
500 yard Pool Warmup
Focus on keeping those breath’s every 3rd at moderate pace. Fewer rests.
- 50 yard Freestyle no flip turns (Googles were fogging up. So, stopped to reset)
- 100 yard freestyle no flip turns
- 150 yard freestyle
- 100 yard Backstroke
- 100 yard Breast stroke
2000 Yard Main Sets
- Kickboard (2 sets)
- 150 yard freestyle kickboard
- 100 yard breast stroke kickboard
- With Pull Buoy and Paddles 2 Sets of the following:
- 150 yard freestyle
- 100 yard backstroke
- No Tools: 2 sets:
- 150 yard freestyle
- 100 yard breast stroke
- Flippers 2 sets of the following:
- 200 yard freestyle kick with kickboard
- 50 yard sprint Butter fly (no kickboard)
These just added to kick that heart rate up a bit since it was a shorter workout today. This really heats up the intensity for me.
500 yard Cool-Down
- 250 yard freestyle with pull buoy and paddles
- 250 yard freestyle no tools
After the swim, in the pool, Stretch: I’ll stand very wide legged. Do some Yoga-esque warrior poses. Arms Straight to sides. Arms straight up. I’ll interlock my fingers and stretch to the ceiling. a little mountain pose here. Then, bring my knee to chest. Then some calf and achilles stretches using the pool wall. Finally, some hip stretches.
That’s it for swimming this week. Next week will be different. I’m not swimming. I don’t know that I’ll have a pool long enough to swim in. So, I’m taking a break off to allow my body to recover. I’ll do some dryland exercises instead. Walking, maybe running, and some body weight exercises.