Swim class No. 8

Speedy and swimmer are two words that aren't ever used to describe me.

A slow, steady swimmer. Yes. A speedy swimmer? Not so much. But today? Today I felt speedy in the pool.

Swim class started off with our warm up and some work with a pull buoy. Then we did a little work on open turns (Coach said flip turns are in the near future...that scares me). After that, it was time to work on pacing.

Coach has talked to us a lot about pacing, how swimmers take a different approach in terms of speed depending on the distance that needs to be swam. A short distance? The swimmer goes all out from the get go. A longer distance, like a sprint tri? The swimmer still swims hard, but at a pace they can maintain for the distance they need to cover.

So we started with 4x75. We were supposed to swim the first 25 at an easy pace, gradually get faster over the second 25 and be at an all out sprint during the final 25. When I was done with the 75? I felt like I was working, but it felt good.

We moved on to intervals then, but first Coach did some moving around. There were four speedy swimmers. They were in the two outermost lanes. And then there were the four not so speedy swimmers. That's where I was hanging out. And I was OK with that. Remember, speedy and swimmer are two words that don't go together when you're talking about me.

So we were doing 50s at an easy pace. And since there were only two swimmers in a lane, we were all starting at once and it felt very race like. We swam. I finished my first 50 in 60 seconds, the second in 61 seconds and the final 50 in 59 seconds - an average of 60 seconds. And all four of us slower folks were finishing at about the same time.

We had a minute or two to rest and then it was time for the fast intervals. The second hand on the clock hit the 12 and I got a good push off. I swam hard. Pushed myself. And whenever I took a breath, I saw that I was pulling ahead of the other girls. Hmmm. Maybe I'm just lucky, I thought. I hit the turn around and pushed it the final 25. Finished up the 50 in 55 seconds. Nice. The other girls finished about 4 seconds behind me.

I was breathing hard. But it felt good. I had just enough time to catch my breath and we were off for round two. Same thing happened. About halfway down the first length of the pool I noticed I was pulling away. I kept swimming. Kept pushing myself. Finished the second at 57 seconds. Still breathing hard, but still felt good. The other girls said their easy was obviously their fast. Not me.

Third time. Really pushed it. Swam hard. Came in at 56 seconds for an average of 56 seconds. Not bad. The other girls all had averages of 60 seconds, same as their easy. Me? I shaved 4 seconds off. I was the speedy swimmer in the slow kids group. And I liked it. And I think the Coach noticed. Today I got the feeling the early mornings are starting to pay off.

As a reward for being the speedy swimmer in the slow kids group I ditched the planned run and spent some time in the hot tub. I deserved it. The run can wait until tomorrow. Because today? I was a speedy swimmer.