Redemption! 800 SC Meter Freestyle

Event 24  Men 35-39 800 SC Meter Freestyle
 
Mc Kenna, Joel        
9:40.61  
      
                33.08    
1:08.56 (35.48)    
1:44.70 (36.14)    
2:20.99 (36.29)
2:57.63 (36.64)    
3:34.41 (36.78)    
4:11.34 (36.93)    
4:48.17 (36.83)
5:25.01 (36.84)    
6:01.59 (36.58)    
6:38.16 (36.57)    
7:14.89 (36.73)
7:51.58 (36.69)    
8:28.39 (36.81)   
 9:05.17 (36.78)   
 9:40.61 (35.44)

HOLY 36!  Holy Fast!  Gotta admit it felt good to swim one good race this weekend.  Funny thing was that when I finished I was a bit confused at what was my previous best time.  I had thought I was about 1 second slower but turns out I was 9 seconds faster.  Can't even begin to explain how happy I was about 5 minutes after my swim when I realized that.  I was having a shitty weekend and one little event of 32 laps turned it all around for me.  Redemption!

My 200 SCM Backstroke Video

Part of my 200 SCM Backstroke at the 2009 SPMA Championships in Long Beach. Filmed by Super Swimmer Ahelee Sue Osborn!  Thank You!

My 200 Butterfly

Continuing on today's trend of swimming the worst times in my life here is my butterfly...

Mc Kenna, Joel  39 WH2O   
2:33.25         
                 
        34.93    
1:13.00 (38.07)    
1:52.19 (39.19)    
2:33.25 (41.06)

My 400 Freestyle

This was officially the slowest I've ever been in this event...

Mc Kenna, Joel  39

4:41.34         
                32.15   
1:06.68 (34.53)    
1:42.26 (35.58)   
 2:18.04 (35.78)
2:54.03 (35.99)    
3:30.11 (36.08)    
4:06.13 (36.02)    
4:41.34 (35.21)

My 1500 SCM Freestyle

Here are my previous 1500 SCM Times:

18:02.14     
18:26.03       
18:45.69       
19:37.94       
20:16.02

Today I swam the 1500 in 18:32.41   

              33.51    
1:09.37 (35.86)    
1:45.89 (36.52)    
2:22.50 (36.61)
2:59.51 (37.01)    
3:36.64 (37.13)    
4:13.97 (37.33)    
4:51.24 (37.27)
5:28.55 (37.31)    
6:05.86 (37.31)    
6:43.27 (37.41)    
7:20.51 (37.24)
7:58.09 (37.58)    
8:35.38 (37.29)    
9:12.37 (36.99)    
9:49.65 (37.28)
10:27.15 (37.50)   
11:04.56 (37.41)   
11:42.01 (37.45)   
12:18.89 (36.88)
12:55.99 (37.10)   
13:33.26 (37.27)   
14:10.97 (37.71)   
14:48.32 (37.35)
15:25.94 (37.62)   
16:03.44 (37.50)   
16:40.68 (37.24)   
17:18.53 (37.85)
17:56.18 (37.65)   
18:32.41 (36.23)                      

It may have been slow but at least I can pace!  LIke 37 much?

Meet Timeline and Psych Sheets Are Up For SPMA Regionals

And with these words let the panic attacks begin:

Meet Timeline and Psych Sheets

A meet timeline and psych sheets are now online!  Go to www.lbgrunions.org and click on the Swim Meets.

Friday is currently scheduled to run from 9:00 AM to 6:50 PM
Saturday is currently scheduled to run from 9:00 AM to 6:07 PM
Sunday is currently scheduled to run from 9:00 AM to 6:01 PM

Please note that these times are just our best approximation.

It's going to be a very long weekend!  Oy!  This will be my last time wearing my B70.  And the last swim meet in the age group 35-39.  Starting in February I'll be 40!  But this year won't be a walk in the park for me.  Three days of swimming the 1500, 400 and 800 freestyle with the 200 backstroke and butterfly in between.  I'm getting too old for this!  Need to learn to be sprinter and just swim 50's!  I did notice one super fast human in my age group so I had to google him.  Here is what I found:

Many of you know Alex from Active.com, where he inspires and motivates you with his column about swimming. For those of you who don't know Alex, who swam on the collegiate level for Stanford, here are a few of his stellar accomplishments: a member of the US National Team for eight years, three time gold medalist in the Pan American Games, and holder of 6 Masters world records. - source

Luckily I won't be any where near him as I belive the heats are mixed by sex and by speed.  Unlike Nationals when you race against your own age.  Not that it matters as when I do swim any distance event I mostly swim it on my own without looking at other swimmers.  Well except twice.  Once I tried lapping a fellow mate in the 800 which helped push me.  Another time I was close to another mate during the first 500 of a 1500 and then felt strong enough to move ahead of him.  So yeah sometiems I look at other swimmers but not this weekend.  Don't want to see myself getting lapped.

Sandbagging SCM Regionals

Yeah...these times are all fake.  Hey I'm slower these days.  Added a few seconds here and there.  Here is my entry...

 

It's The Results. Don't Look!

The results are up from this weekends SPMA meet at UCLA. First a few  facts about the meet from the USMS website LINK:

Meet Statistics
38 teams represented.
228 swimmers entered.
686 individual event splashes, 2 DQs, 137 scratches or no-shows.
30 relay event splashes, 1 DQs, 1 scratches or no-shows.

Hmm...2 DQ's and 1 Relay DQ!  Wowser.  I didn't even see any officials on deck.  Seriously I don't think anyone was looking for two handed touches or anything.  Oh well.

As for my swims.  Well here is the one good one:

Event:     800 SCM Free

Heat/Lane:     Heat 7, Lane 8

Seed Time:     10:12.36

Final Time:     9:49.82


Splits
 Leg      Cumulative      Subtractive
 1      33.86      33.86
 2      1:09.91      36.05
 3      1:46.64      36.73
 4      2:23.41      36.77
 5      3:00.43      37.02
 6      3:37.54      37.11
 7      4:14.73      37.19
 8      4:51.97      37.24
 9      5:29.26      37.29
 10      6:06.54      37.28
 11      6:43.14      36.60
 12      7:20.58      37.44
 13      7:57.85      37.27
 14      8:35.32      37.47
 15      9:13.18      37.86

And now for the bad swimming...

Event:     100 SCM Back

Heat/Lane:     Heat 5, Lane 1

Seed Time:     1:07.75

Final Time:     1:12.18

Splits
 Leg      Cumulative      Subtractive
 1      35.36      35.36

Another one...

50 Back      
H6 / L1      
34.69

And last and very least...
Event:     100 SCM Fly

Heat/Lane:     Heat 5, Lane 8

Seed Time:     1:08.57

Final Time:     1:12.36

Splits
 Leg      Cumulative      Subtractive
 1      34.04      34.04

Funny either I was the only person in my age group to swim the 100 Back or luckily they had a worse day then me as I came in 1st in this event.  Oy!

A Few Pictures From Saturday On Deck

I took a few pictures with my iPhone at the SPMA swim meet at UCLA on Saturday.  Here are a few of them.

Ahh...morning on deck.  They had a pretty cool score/time board.

 

Then it was time to turn in my event card.  Yeah I sandbagged my times.  Added 20 seconds to my 800 and 1 or 2 seconds for everything else.

 

Next up is Rob from Robaquatics LINK after doing a sprint 25 during the second warm up.

 

After my 800 I switched from my Blueseventy suit to my Splish suit.  So pink and shinny!

  

But I wasn't the only swimmer in pink.  In this picture you can almost make out the guy in lane three with the pink suit. 

  

After the 800 Free, 50 Back, 100 Fly and 100 Back I decided to scratch the 50 Fly.  But I still had to swim the 50 Fly in the relay.  Here I am waiting for this damn day to end.

  

Ahhh...tacos!  Done and Done!

 

Race Report

So yesterday was the USMS SPMA SCM swim meet at UCLA.  I guess that would be the USMSSPMASCMUCLA.  The meet was held at the new pool complex which is amazing.  Although I did have a few issues.  The locker rooms were too small, the water was a few degrees to warm and the pool itself is great but they didn't have the best lane lines.  I thought the pool was a bit choppy when I was swimming and those big wave busting lane lines would have made it an even better pool.  But damn it's a nice pool with a nice setting on campus. 

I got to the meet pretty early and warmed up as soon as it started.  I didn't warm up that much as usual.  In fact I think I warmed up way less then usual.  I figured I'd warm up closer to my heat.  With the 800 being first I gueestimated I'd have an hour between warm up and my heat.  I wore a pink splish bathing suit for warm up.  Sparkle Sparkle!  A few heats before mine I went and put on my blueseventy nero comp suit.  With the hot sun beating down on me I soon discovered I had put the suit on too early.  Oh well.  I got in the water and did a few laps to cool off, warm up and adjust my suit.  Then I had to pee so I had to get back in and re-adjust my suit again.

As I got on the blocks I was a bit upset that we didn't have a chance during warm up to dive off the blocks so I'd have a feel for it.  So I slowly edge my feet with little baby steps till I got to the end and slowly went down with my arms for the start.  I gotta admit I was nervous of making a false start.  Once in the water I had a pretty descent start and streamline.  I did feel a bit to deep so I made the mistake of looking up to see.  The first 250 felt great.  I didn't feel like I was going to fast and actually thought I could pick it up a bit.  I haven't seen my splits so who knows if this was the reality of the moment or just something in my head.  I stepped it up a little bit for the next 200.  Then disaster hit at 450 SCM!  On my 19th lap I seemed to be taking in water.  Swallowing water when I was trying to catch oxygen.  It wasn't a big deal at the time but another 200 meters and disaster came calling with dry heaves.  It was like my body was going into shut down and rejecting the water I had swallowed.  I was dry heaving and the flip turns were becoming the time when I just thought I was going to toss my cookies.  Turn after turn.  I was dry heaving while I was swimming so breathing was getting tough.  So much so at one turn right before my flip I picked my head out of the water as if I was doing butterfly.  I did that on 2 turns.  Finally with about 5 laps to go the turn of hell happened.  As I was flipping over the dry heaving became a not so dry heave and chuncks flowed down my face as I was flipping over.  At that moment my turn came into a freeze frame and I had to decide if I was to go on or just stop.  I pushed off the wall and just prayed that I could swim these last 5 laps.  I was still dry heaving all the way on every lap.  I was getting tired, worn out and stressed out.  I kept thinking I can just stop now.  No big deal.  When I got to my last 50 I pulled myself together and tried to go as fast as I could.  On the last 25 I figured I just needed to get to the wall and then I could puke as much as I wanted into the gutter.  When I finished I was shocked at my time.  9.49:82.  That is three seconds faster then my fastest 800.  Wahoo! 

Of course that  would be the only joy in my swimming for the day.  My 100 fly was just a mess.  It's not that it felt bad for the first 50 I was just slow.  The last 25 of the 100 fly wasn't pretty and I was just trying to get going.  I ended up swimming my slowest 100 butterfly ever and was off my best time by 5 seconds.  The 100 backstroke was in the same league.  What had happened?

I guess I can try to over think my swims yesterday.  Why were my 100's such slow swims.  I've been sick.  It hasn't been a good swim year for me since Nationals.  So many choices of excuses to pick from.  My first reaction to my swims was that I'll just not swim 100's anymore.  That isn't too smart.  Looking back I have to be happy with my 800 as for the 100's it just gives me something to work on in the pool.  Maybe I've been thinking too much about distance freestyle swimming and not enough time on fly and back.  Tomorrow is another swim day and I'll just keep at is and see how I do at Regionals in December.  This will be my last meet before I age up in swimming.  The Big 40 is coming!