Dear Team,
Firstly, let me apologize sincerely that I'm doing a pretty bad job explaining most of the items in this week's training session. I felt very bad because there are too many puzzled faces in the team and I couldn't seem to find a way to synchronize everybody's thoughts and enlightenment about the coordination of movements..
Despite the fact that I used many many ways to describe how it should feel like and mental cues to help you mimic the movements and feelings that is correct, I still felt that the session wasn't as fruitful as it ought to be in my expectation.
I also purposely set the swim to be many 50m laps with rest and analysis after each lap to try to make it more productive and for you to have immediate mistake feedback.. I don't know if it worked well for all...
What do you think?
Anyway, assuming that the session was like a big big puzzle broken into even smaller pieces and getting more and more confusing...do allow me to explain why this is happening.
The team is not "young" and "beginner" anymore. As the coach, I cannot keep asking you to swim laps after laps and I have to share with you more perhaps not profound, but in depth knowledge about both performance swimming and swimming as a skill in itself.
And as the skills gets more in depth, it gets harder for me to explain (that is not a defence to my lousy coaching. I'm sorry about that.) and the part you need to understand most is that the coordination also gets harder to grasp and FEEL.
Using mental cues (hugging a person.. bodybuilder's pose. etc..) and visualization (looking at my movement in the water and out of water.. ) are perhaps the best and only ways I could think about right now to show you what is right. After discussion with sam, vincent, teckbeng and KH, I decided I will do a video of my own movement on dry land and allow you all to access through the blog to see how is the movement done frame by frame perhaps? That will need some time and I will have to find them.
I will do a description of what we're trying to achieve then I will go on with INDIVIDUAL SWIM ANALYSIS for each and every one of you. I hope you find them fruitful.
Rhythm of Freestyle Arm Movement..
Starting from catch phase...
1) Imagine beer barrel in front, slip the fingers, wrist and then forearm over the barrel conforming to its round shape.
*The earlier you can get to this position (about 130-150degrees elbow flexion) of elbow higher than wrist higher than finger tips and finger tips pointing towards the floor, the better. Earlier as in the elbow is still in front of where the forehead is - Recall Early Vertical Forearm but this time with LESSER ELBOW FLEXION (previously was 90degrees).
2) Once you have a firm hold of the barrel, HUG IT closer into your body
3) Once the barrel touches the body, push it backwards immediately.
IF you get part 1 and 2 right, you'll be able to feel tremendous amount of resistance here as you push back. If you feel that you're slicing through the water with your arm, you've slipped the hold of water and got the first 2 parts wrong.
*When pushing barrel backwards, remember to make sure forearm and palm is facing directly backwards all the time.
Imagine this: After pushing the barrel backwards, the barrel should ROLL backwards just underneath the surface and not fly out of water.
- If you cannot follow me, go from step one and REALLY imagine that there is a barrel in front before you start the catch
4i) At the end of the push, the arm should be almost straight but not locked.
ELBOW should exit the water first, then with the elbow going up towards the sky, the forearm follows the elbow and the wrist and fingers will also follow to exit the water promptly.
4ii) When the fingers exits the water surface, move the elbow forward using the shoulder joint and again the forearm, wrist and fingers follow. Feel the stretch at the lats when the elbow is at the front then drop the hand into the water surface until its wrist deep and extend UNDER the water relaxly.
*Extension under water means reach forward with the hand, arm and also the shoulder. I.E the furthest reach.
Notes:
i) Stage 1&2 should be slow, stage 3 is the POWER phase.
ii) Stage 4's relaxation need to be CONSCIOUS control of muscles especially DELTOIDS (shoulder) and triceps and forearm.
iii) There should be no pause in any part of the stroke no matter how fast or slow you're swimming.
iv) There is only one part of the arm movement that you use power.. and that is stage 3. Stage 1,2 and 4 should literally be tofu arms just merely holding a streamline or recovery position/posture.
Coordination of body rotation with freestyle arm movement.
1) Body rotation initiates the Catch phase or stage 1. Body move first then start the hugging of the barrel.
2) As the body rotates to your side, continue through the stage 2 and 3.
3) The rotation to the side Ends TOGETHER with the end of stage 3. When body is at its side, the arm is straight. Note that rotation and pushing is done simultaneously and not one after another (NOT rotation to side ends then push or push then rotation ends).
Coordination of kick with body rotation.
When you rotate from the hips, the hips move from one side to another. Keeping your legs straight and let the hip pull the leg to its correct position. When the legs get pulled by the hips, the 2-beat kick will automatically fire. - my brain says: "damn, that's easy."
For individual swim breakdown:
Pauline
Somehow I got this idea that you're one of the smartest in the group maybe because you're a surgeon.. :P But you're one of the fastest to grasp completing the movement of the arms and body in a coordinated fashion.
The two things you need to change is that there is a minor imbalance in your stroke and also a wrong execution in your breathing rhythm which you already clarified before you go.
I could tell that you're still not absolutely comfortable with your breathing side (not fully automatic yet) and that resulted in the left arm(non breathing side) execution being totally neglected. That said, you're still able to finish the push on your left side together with the rotation.
Problem with breathing:
When you breathe on the right, you tend to turn your neck solely by itself then follow with the body rotation. It should be the other way round letting the body rotation lead the neck to turn. When you reverse the cycle, what you did was to lead the movement with your neck and it wouldn't have enough rotation for the mouth to clear the water surface to take a breathe.. As a result, the body rotation is slower than the neck since it is following instead of leading, you will have a tendency to crunch the body side way to lift the head slightly higher because you want to keep the head resting on the extended left arm to maintain a streamline position.
What should happen is when you rotate your body from the hips, let the hip/core pull the shoulder and the neck to the side and then slightly rotate your neck a little more as if looking over your shoulder to see what is behind you. The neck rotation should not be severe as the head and neck alignment causes a lot body alignment problem.
Problem with left arm pull:
Because of the focus on the breathing, the left arm is neglected. The catch phase was done with a small elbow angle and the fingers were pointing to the right side instead of directly downwards. And problem starts from here because if the catch phase is not done correctly, you won't feel resistance and thus you'll be pushign nothing backwards even though you got the rotation and push timing right. Make sure that when you take a breathe and recover the elbow back to the front, you pay a lot of attention to how your left arm is starting and getting into the catch phase. Get the catch right and you'll be flying in no time. :)
Having said that, it is still impressive to get the coordination right. There is a reason why scientists and sports specialist says age trumps when it comes to endurance sports. First of all, swim/bike/run or any endurance sports are skill based and repetitive movement. The more you do them, the more impressive is your body rhythm - Thus, I'd attribute the quick coordination pick up to your running age. Keep up the good work and share with robert! :)
Marianne
Problem 1:
Your pull is broken into 2 parts. You have to do the phases in a continuous manner with no pauses or breaking down into robotic parts. Think Silky smooth movements.
Problem 2:
Your catch is still not deep enough, i.e the angle of elbow flexion is around 90degrees only.. should open up more and "dig" deeper into the water at the catch EVF phase.
Saori
You always never push back one lor.. must push until arm is straighten.. cannot pull half way and quickly exit the water with your elbow still bent la..
Yukari
Problem 1:
Fingers always opened! WHY AR???? :pPP
Problem 2:
Recovery with elbow high but the hands are flaring outwards. Have to keep the hands closer to the body from the start of recovery to the entry. It should travel a straight line from when the hand exit the water.. along the side of body above the surface and that will lead to an effective entry in front of the forehead.
That is because the hand was already travelling beside the body when it started recovering.
Problem 3:
Push phase is not hard enough on hard swim.. need it to be EXPLOSIVE. :)
Take
Same as Yukari for high elbow recovery LA.
Problem 1:
Recovery with elbow high but the hands are flaring outwards. Have to keep the hands closer to the body from the start of recovery to the entry. It should travel a straight line from when the hand exit the water.. along the side of body above the surface and that will lead to an effective entry in front of the forehead.
That is because the hand was already travelling beside the body when it started recovering.
Problem 2:
head a bit on the high side, water is at hairline at forehead.. it should be submerged LA.
Other than that, SUPERB LA~!
SamSam
Crazy amount of improvement tonight. Remember that only when you persist then it will be consistent. You got it right for 50m swim but you must know that it will take a lot of practice to continuously have that same catch water feel lap after lap... and the longer the swim, the harder will the push phase become because we're all not used to swimming this way yet for long distance.
You'll feel your tricep and deltoids aching as the distance increases and you'll then find it hard to push the enormous amount of resistance backward and even harder to relax after the push phase because of the force applied.
BUT - You still have to consciously try to work on it persistently and you'll find the improvement to soon become permanent.
The only issue is your left arm still not recovering with elbow first. It is still hand first recovery. I don't need to type much about it here and you know what to do right Coach Sam~~~
KH
You more or less got the concept right but you need more practices. You felt a lot of frustration because there is a lot to think about and you're too clever but lazy to think about them. I like that.
Problem 1:
Left arm catch is not done correctly.
The left elbow is dropping when doing the catch phase. You need to make sure the left fingers are pointing almost straight down to the floor when you do the catch. When you breathe, you have to shift the attention to making the next catch right.
Problem 2:
Your catch is too fast at times. Swim speed does not affect the catch speed. Catch is always slow as its the push phase that you alter to swim fast or slow.
For visualization purpose, speed 1 is slowest and 5 is fastest.
Catch -> Hug barrel in -> Push back powerfully = 1 -> 2 -> 3 OR 4 OR 5 (depending on how fast you want to swim)
Problem 3:
When you breathe, the extended left arm tend to stay outside. It should stay fully extended and let the whole body rotation.. in your own words - you don't have to make the left hand stay where it is when you rotate to the right to breathe.. just rotate together in the same plane and alignment. :)
Problem 4:
Your left arm tend to extend til its almost straight before you enter and thus pressing air into the water with your palm.. that resulted in the bubbles you saw in your catch and push. The lesser bubbles the better, no bubbles = best. Solution: left arm entry should be earlier, in front of forehead.
Problem 5:
Remember to follow through the push phase with your forearm and palm facing parallel to backwards as far back as possible. You tend to drop the elbow and use only the elbow's small surface area to push the water back.
Last but not least, remember it is an endurance problem now.. you've experienced a 15seconds improvement in your swim time just by getting the right arm correct.. you're not able yet to maintain the hard push for the whole lap but that's the whole point.. you're trying to create a lot of resistance at the catch part so you can propel yourself forward with a hard push. Understand ? :)
Calvin
Firstly, H.A.P.P.Y. B.I.R.T.H.D.A.Y.!!!
Problem 1:
I can't tell if you've made any changes to the catch phase but you arm is still a straight arm pull at the beginning. Contrary to what all the others are doing, you need to catch with a smaller elbow angle. Yours is like 175 degrees elbow angle.. need to conform more to the barrel shape if you get what I mean.
Problem 2:
High elbow recovery not really working when you're not touching your body with the fingers.. need more practice on that one with the thumb dragging along body drill to nail it.
Problem 3:
Your streamline position is top notched but because of the straight arm catch, you can't "hug the barrel in closer to the body" and thus there is no transition to a push phase - that directly resulted in NO SURGING FORWARD.. so all things start from correcting the catch... Teck beng got a close watch on your swim.. ask him, he'll be able to help you out tremendously. :)
Wilson
Problem 1:
It seems to me that your core muscles are only strong enough to hold your body in that superman position to hug the water surface for 1.5 laps. The next 8.5 you're swimming with your buttock down. Need to work on that core strength. Friday morning gym with me if you're free.
Problem 2:
Your push phase ends slower than your body rotation. Need them to end at the same time to have the proper propulsion angle.
Problem 3:
Your arm extension after entry cannot be done fully due to inflexible shoulder. As a result, you're extending your arm forward to about 90% and then bringing your ear to the side to touch the deltoids instead of bringing the deltoid to the ear at the end of extension.
Problem 4:
The catch phase is too quick and powerful and not smoothly transiting to the hugging the barrel stage. Start slow. :)
More critically, same as KH, the left elbow is dropping when doing the catch phase. You need to make sure the left fingers are pointing almost straight down to the floor when you do the catch. When you breathe, you have to shift the attention to making the next catch right.
Jaslynn
Problem 1:
The kick should stop after the push phase but you continuously kicked throughout the whole stroke. This caused a disruption in your streamline position because the kicking was done on its own and not following the hip's coordination.
The hip should be the main engine initiating all the bodily movements.. When the hip turns to the right, the right arm pulls and the kick fires. When it's at the side already, the push phase ends and the kick also ends and the body will glide through the water.
Right now, your kick is just working like it's got a mind of its own and thus you're not moving very quickly due to a broken streamlining posture.
Problem 2:
This is not a problem but you're not yet used to keeping the hands close to the body when you recover with a high elbow. Keep practicing with the thumb dragging along the body then change to dragging ON the water surface then transit to lifting it just above the water surface. Need time to get used to it.
Problem 3:
When you breathe, you're still lifting your head very high. Were you thinking about turning behind to glance at somebody in the sky or were you thinking about Just Breathing?
Problem 4:
Maybe because you're very used to working very hard, it is very difficult to relax and do the recovery gently. You're like the female counterpart of vincent (initially our bullish swimmer who has turned into a finesse first swimmer).. Whenever you drag the elbow to the front, you thrust the hand and whole arm through the water AND FRONTWARDS REALLY HARD and that directly causes a stopping force to occur because when you just thrust in and forward, the water is being pushed forward.
Need to relax on the entry and extension.. try this visualization: when you swim VERY FAST past a school of fishes.. they should barely notice you gliding pass them. When you swim past a bunch of kids from behind them, they should barely feel you gliding past as you do your entry. It should be that quiet.
There is a lot of things to think about and to be one of the slower ones don't feel good for competitive people like you and me. In fact, I hate it to the core. But let the hatred be your strength and let me be your guide. Let us do this together and we'll make it work okay? :)
Lawrence
First, let me explain that I understand most of what is going through in your mind - probably.
Your kick is very continuous, same as jaslynn. I believe that happened because you were not able to stay on the side and kept sinking when you tried to do that. As a result you're trying to keep kicking to prevent the sinking so you can better focus on getting the catch and coordination right. Correct? Maybe I was thinking too much and you just really enjoyed kicking? :Pp
Anway, if the former is truly the case, I should have suggested you to use the pull buoy between your legs to help you concentrated on the arm pull instead. Because kicking continuously that way just disrupt the whole body position and coordination due to the messy rhythms in the legs.
Problem 1:
Your extended arm in front tend to start pulling or the catch phase very early. Keep it extended until the elbow comes back mid way then start the catch.
Problem 2:
It is a continued issue from problem 1.
When you start the catch phase too early, you also catch too quickly. As a result, the arm underneath the water was already almost ending then the previously recovering arm actually enters the water in an extended position. You'd notice that there is very little glide.. so little that it is almost jerky or just not feeling smooth in transition. It is almost like you're rushing your pull each time when you just finished one pull.
Once you keep the arm extended and wait for the elbow to recover mid way then start the catch from a slow movement then you'll be able to have a better catching up stroke.
Problem 3:
Recovery was all the way hand leading until you tried keeping your thumb close to the body. You have to religiously keep working on that because the hand tend to flare out alot when you recover.. ending with a side chop at the entry...
When you swim fast, the problems are all covered up because of the fast arm turnover.. but when you go slow, the bad stuffs start to come out.. its just like me.. it shows we haven't fully master it yet.. keep working on it! I'm working on it too! :)
Benjamin
Problem 1:
You need to work on the shoulder relaxation and also flexibility. After discussion with KH, you and him both got the same problem of "stucked" shoulder. It happen because you're recovering the elbow BACKWARDS and not towards the side (sky). That caused the humerus bone to pinch into the shoulder socket and thus the deltoid muscles are all tensed up.
To make matters worse, you're putting out a lot of torque at the push phase and your shoulder just aren't able to recover and relax immediately after the high power push. Need to train more neuromuscular control by thinking.
Problem 2:
You got the same problem as Pauline as neglecting the left arm. Especially on the catch phase. Need to put some thinking to that.
Problem 3:
Your head is still VERY HIGH when you breathe. Same as Jaslynn.
When you breathe, you're still lifting your head very high. Were you thinking about turning behind to glance at somebody in the sky or were you thinking about Just Breathing?
I'm glad you're able to get the catch right and put your power into good use.. but you need to learn to relax immediately in order to make the same amount of push again and again without accumulating too much fatigue. :)
Teck Beng
From 1min to 47seconds. Without any mean to carry your balls, seriously, you're easily the most improved person even though KH's timing shaved is more but yours are way much more consistent because both your body and mind grasped the concept of the new catch phase.
Problem 1:
This is same as KH: Your left arm tend to extend til its almost straight before you enter and thus pressing air into the water with your palm.. that resulted in the bubbles you saw in your catch and push. The lesser bubbles the better, no bubbles = best. Solution: left arm entry should be earlier, in front of forehead.
Problem 2:
Still same as KH- Left arm catch is not done correctly.
The left elbow is dropping when doing the catch phase. You need to make sure the left fingers are pointing almost straight down to the floor when you do the catch. When you breathe, you have to shift the attention to making the next catch right.
Problem 3:
The left arm entry still tend to go too deep and that brings your body and head deep as well. That resulted in a need to do a higher "lift" of head when you do your right arm pull to breathe. When you swim, glance to the left and right of goggles to make sure water surface stay consistently at just around back of head and is always moving. At the same time, make sure your buttock never sink when your head is near the surface.
Vincent
Both Fred and I looked at how you swam and we both agreed you improved A LOT from the first time you came. You're swimming very very smoothly and you're just lacking the flexibility to make you look like a truly powerful yet relaxed swimmer. A good swimmer makes a level 10 effort swim look just like a level 1 effort swim when watched from the outside.. work towards that. :) On the other hand, you're truly a very hands on person and through the discussion at dinner, I noticed you understood fully whatever I was sharing and you grasped the coordination already from seeing my dry land demo.
Issue 1:
Your left arm recovery tend to be hand leading but with much thinking you will get it back on track. Need to put more focus on that.
Issue 2:
Your pull acceleration from slow(catch) to fast(push) still need some fine tuning but you can already tell the difference between slipping the water through your hands and holding them throughout the push so this isn't much of a problem but an attention issue.
Problem 1:
Same as KH and Teck Beng- Left arm catch is not done correctly.
The left elbow is dropping when doing the catch phase. You need to make sure the left fingers are pointing almost straight down to the floor when you do the catch. When you breathe, you have to shift the attention to making the next catch right. Remember to follow through the push phase with your forearm and palm facing parallel to backwards as far back as possible. You tend to drop the elbow and use only the elbow's small surface area to push the water back.
Foong
First of all, welcome to the team! =) The girls were all excited to have another lady join them! So are the guys but lets not comment on that for now... =P
There were some major setbacks in your swim strokes.
Namely:
1) Not pressing on the chest to make the buttock float
2) Not activating the core muscles (erector spinae/glutes/hamstrings and calves) to pull the hip and legs up and hug the surface
3) Breathing is lifting head up and not turning
4) Lack of body rotation from the hips
5) Underwater arm movement is basically all not very correctly done
6) Body was not stretched out from finger tip to toes and when that was done, relaxation was not occuring.
7) Your exhalation did not start immediately after you rotate your head down into the water. This cause a build up of thoracic pressure that make the swim even more breathless than it ought to be not.
My golden advice is this: The earlier you get the problems corrected the better. The more you practice the bad strokes, the more it gets burnt into the nervous system and then the longer time you'll need to undo whatever you practiced. Frustrations and worries of details now are normal and is way lesser than when you're so used to a bad stroke and then having to change them.. I had been there and changed my strokes many times.. each time, I was frustrated to the MAX.. and it takes a LOT to get me frustrated in terms of practices.
General study states it takes 300 repetition to get a brand new movement dialed and remembered, it takes 5000 good repetitions to undo the learnt movement. From my personal experience, it takes more than that. I personally just changed a part of my stroke and I already did a good 10 thousand repetition considering I did it about 800-1000 times every night before I sleep and I still couldn't really get it changed to be automatic yet because previously I was practicing the bad technique too hard unknowingly until somebody told me.
KK
Problem 1:
The left arm entry is still too late. It entered when it was 85% extended. The ability to relax before it contacts the water helps in reducing the downwards force application and also trapping of air bubbles but this is not a permanent fix and especially visible in hard effort swim. Need to enter after passing the forehead - I.E Earlier.
Problem 2:
When swimming fast, the deltoids were not able to bail out of the hard push fast enough. It is better than average but still, it could have "softened" that much faster.. at least a good 0.5secs earlier than what is happening now. Maybe its the gym and bballing.. I'll keep working on it.
Problem 3:
When doing slow swim, not able to coordinate the lats to the arm movement. Because since it's meant to be a slow effort, can just use the arm right?
But neh.. I need to be activating the lats and doing the correct movement throughout no matter what pace it is so that the strokes are CONSISTENT.
Problem 4:
This is more of a endurance problem as I am not able to continuously swim hard effort with that kind of explosive push yet. Need to practice more.
Problem 5:
When sprinting, the transition of body roll from one side to another is still choppy, need to be more snappy and continuous.
Problem 6:
Right arm entry tend to steer too much to the center point.. should be slightly to the side where the shoulder is pointing.
Problem 7:
Left arm catch feeling is not tip top yet. Need to do more left arm iso practice and fist drills.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
In conclusion, we all need more practice to perfect this skills. As your coach, I am proud to introduce changes because with changes we all improve, without innovations we all are but just followers of the norms.
Let us not be frustrated about what is wrong right now but rejoice in the fact that we're seeing so much potential in improving our swim strokes just by tweaking what we already know. :)
Cheers
KK
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Saturday, February 19, 2011
16022011 Swim Squad
Dear Team,
It was a session of techniques and stretching... boring as hell I supposed for those looking to burn some calories from new year.. somehow, I'd prefer to look at the big picture of racing well in the near future.
Stretching was fairly straight forward. I shall leave it to the pool work each time you come. But as mentioned, the flexibility in that shoulder and pec areas are crucial in swim performance due to the fact that loosened muscles relax much more easily than tight constantly tensed up ones. And relaxing while holding a position is Key in swim success.
Technique wise, we revisited 3 fundamental concepts of swimming.
1) Keeping the hip and the legs afloat.
2) The Pull.
3) The Recovery.
KEEPING THE HIP AND LEGS AFLOAT:
To keep the hips up, we've been through MANY solutions and fortunately, they are all very simple and easy to do by themselves..
The unfortunate part is in order to swim well, you have to do every single part all at the same time as you apply force and still control your breathing rhythm... Sounds complicated? I Think So Too.
Solutions:
1) Swimming downhill
Everybody is into this because it is like you don't need to do anything and just bury your chest deeper into the water while keeping the head aligned with the body's plane and you can apparently keep your hip afloat.
The one thing that coaches are not sharing very publicly is that you have to activate at least 3 more muscle groups in isometric contraction to keep the body in a horizontal plane. (Maybe they don't know how to talk about this too since coaches are not necessarily fitness instructor/physio/osteopath who knows all about neuro-muscular activation, I don't know.).
The three muscles are your basic core muscles that allow you to stand tall and erected with a proud chest-up posture:
i) Erector Spinae
ii) Glutes
iii) Hamstrings
iv) Calves (Auto activated through the plantar flexion in the freestyle kick)
Muscle groups i, ii and iii are the basic muscle groups that swimmers of every swim stroke have to be strong at. Because when activated correctly, they help you maintain the high (relative to water surface) hip position that you obtained from swimming downhill (pressing the chest deeper) and also keeps your legs from dropping.
There are many swimmers who were trying too hard to apply the press-the-damn-chest-down method and while it kept the hip up, the head was dropping and also the legs, this position looks more like the mouth of a unhappy smiley :(.
The concept is this: if you don't consciously straighten your body and walk tall, you'll always hunch because of gravity.
As a bonus, if you're activating all those muscle groups together with the obliques and you are also rotating from your hips, then your body will most likely have very minimal lateral crunching/swaying movements in the water.
For those who can't follow me:
Reason why activating those three muscle groups work: Glutes and hamstrings are hip extensor muscles and they move the heavy buttock up towards the surface. Your erector spinae is your trunk extensor, which means it pulls your core to your head area up to the surface. Voila, the whole thing is hugging the surface!
THE PULL:
The easy part - It is just Catch (Slow) - Pull (Hug it in) - Push (Faster).
Now, to do the catch...
After recovery, with your arm extended weightlessly/effortlessly in the water, start by pitch your hand slightly downwards and bring your wrist above your hand WHILE flexing your elbow with the fingers gradually pointing towards the floor.
Imagine you're swimming over a beer barrel, your hand goes over the barrel, the wrist flexes to conform to the barrel's shape.. Let your arm continue going over the barrel but keep the wrist above the hand and finger tips pointing down and the palm and wrist in contact with the barrel at all time. As you keep going down, your elbow has to flex slightly to conform to the barrel to keep the contact on the barrel.
That is your catch position.
To do the pull...
After the catch position, imagine hugging the barrel close under your armpit and chest...
To do the push...
Once the barrel is in contact with your chest, push it backwards at a speed faster than your catch. IMAGINE: The result of that push should make the barrel ROLL BACKWARDS and not fly.
***Make sure you push it backwards and not upwards out of water.
For those who can't follow me:
Attend my swim class.
THE RECOVERY:
The recovery phase is SO important because every push should be so powerful that it'll tear the houses down with the wave you create backwards with your propulsion, don't you deserve a rest in each stroke to get ready for the next one?
Yes you do because only with this rest phase when you consciously "soften"/loosen/relax your rear delt, lats and triceps and every shoulder stabilizer muscles that you get to have a short but considerable amount of Relief from the tension created from your powerful output.
The confusing thing is the recovery doesn't occur because you did the recovery phase.. It occur only when you use your brain to tell your muscle to stop contracting and relax at the most extended elbow position (end of push phase).
Another important thing about recovery is that a properly placed arm from the recovery phase allow you to continue smoothly to the next stroke's catch phase --- This point, I shan't illustrate here because it is too visual for me to put into words.
Start of recovery of arm is when the push phase has ended. While the whole arm is still submerged in the water by your hips.
Step 1: Consciously relax the whole arm (THIS IS HARD IF YOU REALLY DID PUSH BACK HARD and you don't have a good sense of body control/awareness.)
Step 2: Flex the elbow and bring the ELBOW out of water, keep the hands close to your body (If you extend your thumb, you'd touch your body)
Step 3: Once the elbow is out of water and the fingers clear the surface, rotate your shoulder joint forward and bring your ELBOW forward. Until the elbow reaches the forehead (or ear, depending on how flexible you are), the elbow must be in front of the hands. Feel the slight stretch at the lats.
Step 4: Drop the thumb and index finger into the water surface in front of your forehead and gradually extend your arm into the water. DO NOT EXTEND BEFORE YOUR ARM ENTER.
Step 5: Fully extend the arm, including the shoulder area.
***TAKE NOTE: Elbow should be the highest point throughout the recovery. The hands should be as close to the body as possible as the shoulder rotate. Do not turn the palm outwards while recovering the elbow forward (exaggerated finger tip entry) as it will cause the deltoids to tense up.
For those who can't follow me:
Attend my swim class.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Thank you all for your patience. All of you who came for the class, you have no idea how beautifully you guys and girls swam on the last lap getting comments from the lifeguards and coach fred himself saying that your recovery looks beautiful.
Now, its time to work on the catch so that it doesn't just look beautiful, it should be GODDAMN FAST too.. :)
Cheers
KK
It was a session of techniques and stretching... boring as hell I supposed for those looking to burn some calories from new year.. somehow, I'd prefer to look at the big picture of racing well in the near future.
Stretching was fairly straight forward. I shall leave it to the pool work each time you come. But as mentioned, the flexibility in that shoulder and pec areas are crucial in swim performance due to the fact that loosened muscles relax much more easily than tight constantly tensed up ones. And relaxing while holding a position is Key in swim success.
Technique wise, we revisited 3 fundamental concepts of swimming.
1) Keeping the hip and the legs afloat.
2) The Pull.
3) The Recovery.
KEEPING THE HIP AND LEGS AFLOAT:
To keep the hips up, we've been through MANY solutions and fortunately, they are all very simple and easy to do by themselves..
The unfortunate part is in order to swim well, you have to do every single part all at the same time as you apply force and still control your breathing rhythm... Sounds complicated? I Think So Too.
Solutions:
1) Swimming downhill
Everybody is into this because it is like you don't need to do anything and just bury your chest deeper into the water while keeping the head aligned with the body's plane and you can apparently keep your hip afloat.
The one thing that coaches are not sharing very publicly is that you have to activate at least 3 more muscle groups in isometric contraction to keep the body in a horizontal plane. (Maybe they don't know how to talk about this too since coaches are not necessarily fitness instructor/physio/osteopath who knows all about neuro-muscular activation, I don't know.).
The three muscles are your basic core muscles that allow you to stand tall and erected with a proud chest-up posture:
i) Erector Spinae
ii) Glutes
iii) Hamstrings
iv) Calves (Auto activated through the plantar flexion in the freestyle kick)
Muscle groups i, ii and iii are the basic muscle groups that swimmers of every swim stroke have to be strong at. Because when activated correctly, they help you maintain the high (relative to water surface) hip position that you obtained from swimming downhill (pressing the chest deeper) and also keeps your legs from dropping.
There are many swimmers who were trying too hard to apply the press-the-damn-chest-down method and while it kept the hip up, the head was dropping and also the legs, this position looks more like the mouth of a unhappy smiley :(.
The concept is this: if you don't consciously straighten your body and walk tall, you'll always hunch because of gravity.
As a bonus, if you're activating all those muscle groups together with the obliques and you are also rotating from your hips, then your body will most likely have very minimal lateral crunching/swaying movements in the water.
For those who can't follow me:
Reason why activating those three muscle groups work: Glutes and hamstrings are hip extensor muscles and they move the heavy buttock up towards the surface. Your erector spinae is your trunk extensor, which means it pulls your core to your head area up to the surface. Voila, the whole thing is hugging the surface!
THE PULL:
The easy part - It is just Catch (Slow) - Pull (Hug it in) - Push (Faster).
Now, to do the catch...
After recovery, with your arm extended weightlessly/effortlessly in the water, start by pitch your hand slightly downwards and bring your wrist above your hand WHILE flexing your elbow with the fingers gradually pointing towards the floor.
Imagine you're swimming over a beer barrel, your hand goes over the barrel, the wrist flexes to conform to the barrel's shape.. Let your arm continue going over the barrel but keep the wrist above the hand and finger tips pointing down and the palm and wrist in contact with the barrel at all time. As you keep going down, your elbow has to flex slightly to conform to the barrel to keep the contact on the barrel.
That is your catch position.
To do the pull...
After the catch position, imagine hugging the barrel close under your armpit and chest...
To do the push...
Once the barrel is in contact with your chest, push it backwards at a speed faster than your catch. IMAGINE: The result of that push should make the barrel ROLL BACKWARDS and not fly.
***Make sure you push it backwards and not upwards out of water.
For those who can't follow me:
Attend my swim class.
THE RECOVERY:
The recovery phase is SO important because every push should be so powerful that it'll tear the houses down with the wave you create backwards with your propulsion, don't you deserve a rest in each stroke to get ready for the next one?
Yes you do because only with this rest phase when you consciously "soften"/loosen/relax your rear delt, lats and triceps and every shoulder stabilizer muscles that you get to have a short but considerable amount of Relief from the tension created from your powerful output.
The confusing thing is the recovery doesn't occur because you did the recovery phase.. It occur only when you use your brain to tell your muscle to stop contracting and relax at the most extended elbow position (end of push phase).
Another important thing about recovery is that a properly placed arm from the recovery phase allow you to continue smoothly to the next stroke's catch phase --- This point, I shan't illustrate here because it is too visual for me to put into words.
Start of recovery of arm is when the push phase has ended. While the whole arm is still submerged in the water by your hips.
Step 1: Consciously relax the whole arm (THIS IS HARD IF YOU REALLY DID PUSH BACK HARD and you don't have a good sense of body control/awareness.)
Step 2: Flex the elbow and bring the ELBOW out of water, keep the hands close to your body (If you extend your thumb, you'd touch your body)
Step 3: Once the elbow is out of water and the fingers clear the surface, rotate your shoulder joint forward and bring your ELBOW forward. Until the elbow reaches the forehead (or ear, depending on how flexible you are), the elbow must be in front of the hands. Feel the slight stretch at the lats.
Step 4: Drop the thumb and index finger into the water surface in front of your forehead and gradually extend your arm into the water. DO NOT EXTEND BEFORE YOUR ARM ENTER.
Step 5: Fully extend the arm, including the shoulder area.
***TAKE NOTE: Elbow should be the highest point throughout the recovery. The hands should be as close to the body as possible as the shoulder rotate. Do not turn the palm outwards while recovering the elbow forward (exaggerated finger tip entry) as it will cause the deltoids to tense up.
For those who can't follow me:
Attend my swim class.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Thank you all for your patience. All of you who came for the class, you have no idea how beautifully you guys and girls swam on the last lap getting comments from the lifeguards and coach fred himself saying that your recovery looks beautiful.
Now, its time to work on the catch so that it doesn't just look beautiful, it should be GODDAMN FAST too.. :)
Cheers
KK
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Singapore Biathlon 2011 - Post Race(Yukari)
First of all, thanks to coach KK, Samantha, and all the members in Team Sapphire, to wake me up from long sleep and lead me to right direction. I never imagined 6 months ago that I am here and have completed this race.
Long story before telling about the race... I had >25 years blank for swimming before coach KK invited me to join the team. I used to be a swimmer before, burned out already at the age of 18, not willing to continue after graduated high school. The training was really hard like a nightmare, in the peak period 5km or even 2 x 5km a day.
Now I started to swim again but I was no more an athlete and I easily become breathless every 50m I swim. I did not think I would be able to swim long distance anymore. In Team Sapphire, under coach KK's panorama view, I had a chance to know my bad habits in swimming. Learning correct form controlling speed slow, medium, hard was so new and difficult to me at first. Every time the training was too enjoyable to call a "training". I felt my negative feeling about swimming gradually diminished.
The race day, at the start point I got so nervous and it was too late when I noted I was dashing in the middle of crowd. All that happened was exactly as learned from coach KK. People on people, goggles kicked out, drank seawater... Then I was horrified to find the timing device on anklet getting loose. I touched one end of fastener belt... I could not tell if it's ok to keep swimming. I thought I better remove and tighten it again to prevent dropping. Loss time for a minute or so does not matter, rather than ruin the race... While doing so people hit and swam over me and I felt like sea sick... OK, that's race. Anything can happen. Never mind lah, keep going! After the first buoy, it became easier to swim. I tried to recall my comfortable rhythm to keep swimming. Good thing about sea swim is there is no wall to touch and turn! It was a long way feeling like swimming forever. After the last buoy, I started to kick stronger as I learned in the training, to prevent jelly legs. As I exit from water I heard someone call me just behind, it was Samantha! Feeling relieved to find not being alone, we dashed for the transition area. It was difficult to put on socks and shoes having cramp on toes, spread Vaseline around armpit, sip water, and then started to run.
East coast should be familiar for me with other marathon races. However with fatigue after swim, it took time until I come to the state of "feeling nothing". Lawrence called me from the other direction when I stopped and tie the timing device getting loose again. In the 2nd round I finally started to feel comfortable to run. Lawrence found me again, then came my husband. Relieved to know he got no accident so far and even running faster in his first race. Then I came back to myself to keep concentration for the rest of the race. In marathon races I usually feel pain in muscles and joints while having stamina. But this time it’s opposite, almost no pain but less stamina. My legs might be stronger after full marathon, but feel harder to run after swim. So I tried to use my whole body to carry legs forward. When the finish line comes in sight I gathered all my strength again to complete the race. Feeling so happy and excited I forgot to stop my watch until I received the finisher’s medal…
It’s such a precious experience. The race itself is individual but after the race I met team members and share the moment. I was thankful to everything. I’m much older than most of you but I believe I still can improve more and wish to prove that. In doing so, I hope that I can also encourage young promising athletes.
Yukari Takesawa (01:30:44 (swim 00:33:12 / run 00:57:32))
Monday, February 14, 2011
Singapore Biathlon 2011 - Post Race (KK)
Having barely slept for 4 days straight preparing for Vday present, I couldn't force myself to sleep early as well on the night before the race. Just bad timing. However, I always take the mental side of having not enough sleep in my stride with this phrase I remembered from a Tri-Magazine -
"Whether it's 10 hrs of sleep or 3 hrs of sleep before the race, worry not because race anxiety are norms. You'll be ready because of the training you did, when the gun goes off, it will be on."
That is not to say having more sleep wouldn't help or having lesser sleep is OK. It is just a form of mental tactic to counter the worries of not sleeping enough the night before.
Come to think of it, i'm a pretty tight person.. I haven't slept more than 4 hrs for any of my race. H.I.M included.
-----------------------
On race morning, we arrived pretty early at 6.30. Pretty early because not a lot of people are there yet. The first wave is 7.30AM and Sam, Yukari, Lawlaw and Pauline's in it! My wave is at 8 and my poor brother KH (and Gen - Sam's sister) have to accompany me (and Sam) even though their wave is at 9!
Did all the baggage check in and transition preps and accompanied Sam to warm up. She looked graceful in the swim despite not sleeping enough too. I gave her some positive words of review to boost her confidence and it was all fine.. until she came up from the last lap of warmup, she got cut from the wave-breaker rock..
zzz... All the panic start over again and all I could think of was "shit, the cut are in bad directions.. its gonna open up whenever she plant the foot on the ground and dorsi/plantar flex..."..
Decided to swallow that thought and I told her another set of comments that if it happened to me, i'd tell myself.
"Don't worry la dear.. when you start the swim, it'll not feel like it's there.. once you are into the race, you'll not feel pain because of adrenaline and race focus.. when you run, initially it'll hurt a bit but as you get into it, the pain should ease off because of the focus la. Now, get going!"
She went for another run at the sea and then after a good luck kiss, reluctantly went to the start line..
In a short while, her wave got flagged off.. I waited for the 7.45 wave's gun shot to simulate my own start in my warm up.. however, the uncle talk too much la.. so I jumped in before the gun went off.. did a couple of laps then came up for the gun start again..
*COACH KH* was there to check on my form and he went
"YOUR HIGH ELBOW.. HIGH ELBOW!!! "
So I made the necessary changes and refocused on the technique.. Coach KH gave the nod and off I went for my start after 8 laps.
Went to the start area and jumped around.. high fived around.. slapped my face.. slapped my legs to feel some pain and prevent myself from dropping into the nervous Zone-out Pause. As the uncle talk on, I focused on my game plan.
1)Sight frequently.
2)No bad strokes, leave the chionging to OSIM.. Perfect form is the idea.
3)Stay calm.
4)Visualize the course - 200m to first buoy, 650m across, 650m back. 1 big buoy --> 7 buoys left --> red then green and follow line back.
5) Exit strong and ready for huff and puff in run
3...2...1.... *BOOORRRRR*
Competitive me pushed the people beside me away and jumped into the water first. Sprinted for 50 strokes and then told myself to calm down because nobody is beside and I want to stick to the plan. Ultimately, the run is the big picture. I want a 45 mins run..
I need to calm down and focus on the strokes.. left arm's high elbow not working.... So I slowed down and just took my time from then on.. High elbow, relaxed recovery, no splash.. feel the gliding.. keep the left arm from swaying outwards. Sight frequently. BREATHE. Enjoy the swim. Disturb people's feet by tickling them and check the watch once in a while... :)
Despite going easy, when I made a left turn after 850m, my watch says its 14:30.
Right there, I made a mistake in my game plan. After my left turn, I am suppose to AVOID ALL GREEN FLAGS and go for the red one straight, THEN the green one THEN follow the line.
I went for the first green one instead and had to follow the 3 green ones in a straight line.. probably swam hundred + more meters than the race course suggested. I picked up the slack there and went for a strong 100m at the end.. looking at my watch not panting much.. 29:18.. Not too bad for a swim with 2 weeks of last minute changes to stroke I guess.. :)
Wore my socks, shoes, number belt, shades and I took abt 10 seconds of pause to wonder if I want to take a sip right there.. I took the bottle and ran instead.
Once out there on the course, I felt my legs were so heavy.. didn't warm up for the run was a bad idea. Tapering with complete rest on the run was a stupid idea.. After the first km my watch read 5:00. I told myself "stupid.. you fucked this.".. Picked up my pace and my legs started to feel loosen.. clocked 4:15+/km for the next 3+km before slowing down a little to check on my knees that buckle a little stepping on cup. My big toe with the nail off started to hurt a little more and I slowed to a 4:30-4:45/km pace for the rest of the run.
Lawrence cheered me on.. Sam cheered me on as I pass them in the run.. Caught up with Mr Take and Pauline.. gave them a cheeky tap on the shoulder "CAUGHT-CHA! hahaha.."..
It was pretty intense in the last 2kms as the faith starts to buckle together with the slightly throbbing knee ligament that i sprained 3 weeks back.. slowed down slightly as my focus fades until i remembered a phrase by Muhammad Ali.
"But the will must be stronger than the skill."
I laughed at myself and asked myself:
"Why do you race? Why are you here running for your PB?"
The answer is straightforward and brutal..
BECAUSE I WANT TO BE THE BEST IN MY TEAM.
BECAUSE SO, NOBODY IN THE TEAM CAN CLAIM TO BE FASTER THAN I AM AT THIS MOMENT. - Edmund comes to mind.
SO THAT I CAN BE THE BEST THAT I CAN BE. - Ryan comes to mind.
AND MORE THAN ANYTHING, I WANT TO BE BETTER THAN EVERYONE.
E.V.E.R.Y.O.N.E. No less. - Andy that sub 40 10km guy, came to mind.
I can. I Will.
I pumped out a 9:00 flat 2km run in the final stretch. I laughed as I finished the run..
Just like Old times baby.. Just like old times in army and OCT where everyone else hated me for being over competitive and always pushing myself beyond the limit.
----------------------------------------
The sweetest deal about this race?
The last 300m, my 10 years old student did her bestest to sprint with me for 200m before stopping into her daddy's arms. I did the happiest 100m sprint of my life.. never felt so belonged and loved before. =)
Once I pass the finish line.. I head back to find everyone else.. and most of all, Calvin.
He is my number one concern for this race. Being the first race, and never done a sprint before.. it was an understatement to say he is courages and sporty enough to join us for a 1.5km swim 10km run race. At >80kg, standing at 1.8+-m tall, but without running base, the 10km is more daunting in the heart and mind than it actually is in the run itself.
Walking back through the finish line on the grassy area, I had a slip and rotated my ankle outwards and had to limp for a few mins.. like shit la.... zzz...Real Shagged.
No choice but to walk.. 2km back and saw everyone else.. but I didn't see Calvin until I finished doing all the math of adding his possible swim timing to the wave start time and also his approximate running pace that I saw him running the previous time we had a trial.
As I saw him, his foot steps was heavy, my heart goes to him for the blisters there probably are in the wet socks from the swim. I joined him for the run for a couple of hundred meters and he told me "I'm going for my second round now only!".. and for the first time, I thought to myself 5km more.. can I do this?
I used up everything I had in the 47mins. Walking up for 2km to find him was already causing my sprained knee to throb. I decided to go to the toilet to check the statuses of my bod before joining him back.
Took off my tights and my knee was a little swollen on where the sprained ligament was.. I told myself "You can't give him up. You promised the team you will not leave anyone behind. Promises are Not meant to be broken. Not in my dictionary.".
Pulled up my tights and ran out to where I found him.. noticed I took more than 10mins of thoughts inside and I realized I won't be able to catch him if I go at a sustainable easy pace so I went the opposite direction and found him at the last 3rd km mark.
Brought him home. Sprinted with him on the side in the grassy area only stopping when I pass the roots area where I slipped just now..
When he passed the finish line..
"Mai liao.. mai liao.. hahaha..." he said.. meaning "Don't want already.." as he chuckles and walked to the medal receiving personnels..
It was another touching sight just like when I went back to find Lawrence and came back with him for the H.I.M finish.. I am super happy for him. He can no longer say he's a unfit man liao after finishing a 1.5km swim in the sea and 10km run in this amphibian race.. :D
TAKE - the amphibian race.. to be exact.. :P
-----------------------------------------
Final words.
Being able to sub 30 for 1.5km in the sea and in the pool is already a reality. sub 25mins by end of the year is my goal.
Right now, its 47mins for 10km. sub 43mins for 10km (after swim) by end of the year is my goal.
I can. and I Will.
KK
"Whether it's 10 hrs of sleep or 3 hrs of sleep before the race, worry not because race anxiety are norms. You'll be ready because of the training you did, when the gun goes off, it will be on."
That is not to say having more sleep wouldn't help or having lesser sleep is OK. It is just a form of mental tactic to counter the worries of not sleeping enough the night before.
Come to think of it, i'm a pretty tight person.. I haven't slept more than 4 hrs for any of my race. H.I.M included.
-----------------------
On race morning, we arrived pretty early at 6.30. Pretty early because not a lot of people are there yet. The first wave is 7.30AM and Sam, Yukari, Lawlaw and Pauline's in it! My wave is at 8 and my poor brother KH (and Gen - Sam's sister) have to accompany me (and Sam) even though their wave is at 9!
Did all the baggage check in and transition preps and accompanied Sam to warm up. She looked graceful in the swim despite not sleeping enough too. I gave her some positive words of review to boost her confidence and it was all fine.. until she came up from the last lap of warmup, she got cut from the wave-breaker rock..
zzz... All the panic start over again and all I could think of was "shit, the cut are in bad directions.. its gonna open up whenever she plant the foot on the ground and dorsi/plantar flex..."..
Decided to swallow that thought and I told her another set of comments that if it happened to me, i'd tell myself.
"Don't worry la dear.. when you start the swim, it'll not feel like it's there.. once you are into the race, you'll not feel pain because of adrenaline and race focus.. when you run, initially it'll hurt a bit but as you get into it, the pain should ease off because of the focus la. Now, get going!"
She went for another run at the sea and then after a good luck kiss, reluctantly went to the start line..
In a short while, her wave got flagged off.. I waited for the 7.45 wave's gun shot to simulate my own start in my warm up.. however, the uncle talk too much la.. so I jumped in before the gun went off.. did a couple of laps then came up for the gun start again..
*COACH KH* was there to check on my form and he went
"YOUR HIGH ELBOW.. HIGH ELBOW!!! "
So I made the necessary changes and refocused on the technique.. Coach KH gave the nod and off I went for my start after 8 laps.
Went to the start area and jumped around.. high fived around.. slapped my face.. slapped my legs to feel some pain and prevent myself from dropping into the nervous Zone-out Pause. As the uncle talk on, I focused on my game plan.
1)Sight frequently.
2)No bad strokes, leave the chionging to OSIM.. Perfect form is the idea.
3)Stay calm.
4)Visualize the course - 200m to first buoy, 650m across, 650m back. 1 big buoy --> 7 buoys left --> red then green and follow line back.
5) Exit strong and ready for huff and puff in run
3...2...1.... *BOOORRRRR*
Competitive me pushed the people beside me away and jumped into the water first. Sprinted for 50 strokes and then told myself to calm down because nobody is beside and I want to stick to the plan. Ultimately, the run is the big picture. I want a 45 mins run..
I need to calm down and focus on the strokes.. left arm's high elbow not working.... So I slowed down and just took my time from then on.. High elbow, relaxed recovery, no splash.. feel the gliding.. keep the left arm from swaying outwards. Sight frequently. BREATHE. Enjoy the swim. Disturb people's feet by tickling them and check the watch once in a while... :)
Despite going easy, when I made a left turn after 850m, my watch says its 14:30.
Right there, I made a mistake in my game plan. After my left turn, I am suppose to AVOID ALL GREEN FLAGS and go for the red one straight, THEN the green one THEN follow the line.
I went for the first green one instead and had to follow the 3 green ones in a straight line.. probably swam hundred + more meters than the race course suggested. I picked up the slack there and went for a strong 100m at the end.. looking at my watch not panting much.. 29:18.. Not too bad for a swim with 2 weeks of last minute changes to stroke I guess.. :)
Wore my socks, shoes, number belt, shades and I took abt 10 seconds of pause to wonder if I want to take a sip right there.. I took the bottle and ran instead.
Once out there on the course, I felt my legs were so heavy.. didn't warm up for the run was a bad idea. Tapering with complete rest on the run was a stupid idea.. After the first km my watch read 5:00. I told myself "stupid.. you fucked this.".. Picked up my pace and my legs started to feel loosen.. clocked 4:15+/km for the next 3+km before slowing down a little to check on my knees that buckle a little stepping on cup. My big toe with the nail off started to hurt a little more and I slowed to a 4:30-4:45/km pace for the rest of the run.
Lawrence cheered me on.. Sam cheered me on as I pass them in the run.. Caught up with Mr Take and Pauline.. gave them a cheeky tap on the shoulder "CAUGHT-CHA! hahaha.."..
It was pretty intense in the last 2kms as the faith starts to buckle together with the slightly throbbing knee ligament that i sprained 3 weeks back.. slowed down slightly as my focus fades until i remembered a phrase by Muhammad Ali.
"But the will must be stronger than the skill."
I laughed at myself and asked myself:
"Why do you race? Why are you here running for your PB?"
The answer is straightforward and brutal..
BECAUSE I WANT TO BE THE BEST IN MY TEAM.
BECAUSE SO, NOBODY IN THE TEAM CAN CLAIM TO BE FASTER THAN I AM AT THIS MOMENT. - Edmund comes to mind.
SO THAT I CAN BE THE BEST THAT I CAN BE. - Ryan comes to mind.
AND MORE THAN ANYTHING, I WANT TO BE BETTER THAN EVERYONE.
E.V.E.R.Y.O.N.E. No less. - Andy that sub 40 10km guy, came to mind.
I can. I Will.
I pumped out a 9:00 flat 2km run in the final stretch. I laughed as I finished the run..
Just like Old times baby.. Just like old times in army and OCT where everyone else hated me for being over competitive and always pushing myself beyond the limit.
----------------------------------------
The sweetest deal about this race?
The last 300m, my 10 years old student did her bestest to sprint with me for 200m before stopping into her daddy's arms. I did the happiest 100m sprint of my life.. never felt so belonged and loved before. =)
Once I pass the finish line.. I head back to find everyone else.. and most of all, Calvin.
He is my number one concern for this race. Being the first race, and never done a sprint before.. it was an understatement to say he is courages and sporty enough to join us for a 1.5km swim 10km run race. At >80kg, standing at 1.8+-m tall, but without running base, the 10km is more daunting in the heart and mind than it actually is in the run itself.
Walking back through the finish line on the grassy area, I had a slip and rotated my ankle outwards and had to limp for a few mins.. like shit la.... zzz...Real Shagged.
No choice but to walk.. 2km back and saw everyone else.. but I didn't see Calvin until I finished doing all the math of adding his possible swim timing to the wave start time and also his approximate running pace that I saw him running the previous time we had a trial.
As I saw him, his foot steps was heavy, my heart goes to him for the blisters there probably are in the wet socks from the swim. I joined him for the run for a couple of hundred meters and he told me "I'm going for my second round now only!".. and for the first time, I thought to myself 5km more.. can I do this?
I used up everything I had in the 47mins. Walking up for 2km to find him was already causing my sprained knee to throb. I decided to go to the toilet to check the statuses of my bod before joining him back.
Took off my tights and my knee was a little swollen on where the sprained ligament was.. I told myself "You can't give him up. You promised the team you will not leave anyone behind. Promises are Not meant to be broken. Not in my dictionary.".
Pulled up my tights and ran out to where I found him.. noticed I took more than 10mins of thoughts inside and I realized I won't be able to catch him if I go at a sustainable easy pace so I went the opposite direction and found him at the last 3rd km mark.
Brought him home. Sprinted with him on the side in the grassy area only stopping when I pass the roots area where I slipped just now..
When he passed the finish line..
"Mai liao.. mai liao.. hahaha..." he said.. meaning "Don't want already.." as he chuckles and walked to the medal receiving personnels..
It was another touching sight just like when I went back to find Lawrence and came back with him for the H.I.M finish.. I am super happy for him. He can no longer say he's a unfit man liao after finishing a 1.5km swim in the sea and 10km run in this amphibian race.. :D
TAKE - the amphibian race.. to be exact.. :P
-----------------------------------------
Final words.
Being able to sub 30 for 1.5km in the sea and in the pool is already a reality. sub 25mins by end of the year is my goal.
Right now, its 47mins for 10km. sub 43mins for 10km (after swim) by end of the year is my goal.
I can. and I Will.
KK
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Singapore Biathlon 2011 - Pre Race
Dear Team,
Below is a link of the biathlon tips I've uploaded last year when Lawrence, Sam, Mari, Ryan and Mr Gu did their first biathlon with me.
Biathlon Tips
Do give it a visit, the things I've written in it still stands and like I've said many times before, you've logged more than enough training to do well in this one and you got it right there in front of you, all you need to do is reach out for it and the medal will be yours.
Anxiety is the number one issue you'd like to resolve from now til race day. Visualize the course every night...
swim:
5km run:
10km run:
Animated Run Course
The above information are from:
Safra Biathlon 2011 Official Site
The 5km run route map isn't very helpful but do compare it with the animated route and it'll make more sense.
For the swim route, it is as per discussed during our open water swim.
I'll leave the good luck speech until tonight's post.
Cheers
KK
Below is a link of the biathlon tips I've uploaded last year when Lawrence, Sam, Mari, Ryan and Mr Gu did their first biathlon with me.
Biathlon Tips
Do give it a visit, the things I've written in it still stands and like I've said many times before, you've logged more than enough training to do well in this one and you got it right there in front of you, all you need to do is reach out for it and the medal will be yours.
Anxiety is the number one issue you'd like to resolve from now til race day. Visualize the course every night...
swim:
5km run:
10km run:
Animated Run Course
The above information are from:
Safra Biathlon 2011 Official Site
The 5km run route map isn't very helpful but do compare it with the animated route and it'll make more sense.
For the swim route, it is as per discussed during our open water swim.
I'll leave the good luck speech until tonight's post.
Cheers
KK
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Responsibilities of an athlete.
After receiving some negative feedbacks from athletes and their famil(ies)y, I decided to write up this post. Well, maybe not exactly negative but some misunderstanding and miscommunication has occurred, to add on, I also see this minor fault of only seeing our flaws.
Humans are sometimes such comparison-based creature because we tend to just look at what we couldn’t do (yet) or just compare our own performance to somebody else who clearly is just better than us at the very moment failures occurs and say “I’m so lousy.”.
Coming from a non sporty family background and an obese teenage years, I have came a long way myself to tell myself to quit and/or look down at myself just because I have one bad day/performance or have flaws and weakness to work on. If you’re optimistic and as obsessively hardworking as I can be (you need BOTH attribute at the same time), I’m pretty sure you can use the failure as a good source of motivation.
However, I’ve come across some of these athletes and decided to just discount themselves of what they are truly capable of just because they don’t know how to move on to the next step and sports are just not _That important a part of their lives that drives them to go and find out how to become better. Dwelling in one’s flaws is the fastest way to detrimental performance. And to benefit those of you who wants to know why I seem to be eternally motivated when i set my mind to do something, I’m writing this post.
First of all, I hate losing. I freaking hate being second to somebody. I realized that only when I was in army and that has cost me many friends but also brought me to great heights of physical fitness and the game of basketball. Secondly and the most important factor(s) here is that as I mature as a human being and sports person, I start to realize some responsibilities that any serious sports person who have a goal to reach should hold themselves to. And I adhere strictly to them.
- Educate those who care for you about what you are doing. Don’t just tell them “I’m going to race, that’s why I train.”…
- Recognize what you’ve done to come to where you are at this moment.
- Recognize your flaws and weakness and work on them
- Always remind yourself: “It is about This Moment.”. It is actually quite zen but it involved steel-like focus.
Point 1:
Educate those who care for you about what you are doing.
This first point applies especially significantly to those who are almost adult but not yet. To clarify first and foremost, this is not about defying your parents’ orders or neglecting your lover because of the significance of training. As an athlete, we have to realize the importance of consistency in training. Without consistency, no programme can work any result out of any talent. And in order to achieve that level consistency, we have to make sure that we inform and educate those who care, about our need and what we’re intending to achieve and that we take that race Seriously.
I understand some of us just want to have fun and training in a group makes maintaining or gaining fitness all the merrier and that much easier. However, if you’re not serious about training or improving, you probably wouldn’t be reading this blog or being part of the team. We take out 3 hours each week at least to go for swim training and listen to my constant nagging and if you tell me you’re not at the least concern about your finishing, I won’t buy that bullshit.
Informing about the race requires you to emphasize some points such as:
- Training consistency
- Goals and results
- Reason for the need of certain training sessions
- What benefits are those training giving you and how are they affecting your life positively
- What you’d expect in terms of unforeseen circumstances in scheduling
- Lastly, doing your due diligence in making sure they know way before hand about how the schedule is like and not wait til last minute
Communication about the race and training HAVE TO BE TRANSPARENT and OPEN. Compromises must be made to both sides to make sure you get the best quality of life. Life isn’t about triathlon or training, it is about maintaining a balance by helping them accept what we have to do and what we can do for them in appreciation of their understanding.
Point 2:
Recognize what you’ve done to come to where you are at this moment.
This point applies to those who constantly feel like they’re not doing as well they think they should be despite having already improved a huge amount. Lets get some things straight. Priority of sporting goals in life should be better health, followed by extra fitness to do sports that we enjoy. Unless you’re a professional racer, you really shouldn’t be so tight on yourself for results.
Most of us came from an obese or generally unfit background and worked our ass off to lose some weight and get to where we are right now swimming respectable timing for age groupers despite training just once per week. But some of us seem to always be looking at how well another athlete (often one who puts in much more time training consistently and have been doing so for a longer time than us) and then do a direct comparison and totally forget about where you’ve came from originally.
As athletes, we have to recognize that fitness has to be inculcated through time. Joe Friel recommends 3 years of base building to see potential even for talented athletes.
I felt that it is important for us to recognize what we’ve done and compare where we’ve came from originally to where we are right now. Think about this: When you race in a 8 lane 200m sprint event. Are you really racing with the others, or are you racing with time?
Look at Bolt’s run, he has trained so well and when the gun goes off, he was 10meters in front of everybody in the track. Is it going to be realistic for him to be racing with the others who’re at least 1 second slower?
To bring the example to something more down to earth, if gen runs a 22minute 3.3km and sam runs a 26minutes 3.3km.. sam shouldn’t look at gen and say “i’m sad.” because she has came from a complete non runner 2 years back to someone who is capable of running a half marathon even with her bad form that has much to improve. While on the other hand, gen has been a competitive badminton player, a sport that is footwork and agility (power) dominant. Isn’t it being a little unfair to ourselves when we compare it that way? Think about it.
Point 3:
Recognize your flaws and weakness and work on them.
Many of us, men especially, are such sore losers and egoistic bastards (I’m guilty). The difference between this type of men in sports often boils down to whether you run away from your weakness because you don’t like to do them as they feel shitty being done, or you work real hard on the weakness so it won’t feel as bad at least. - “I was going REALLY FAST… but I am always dropped in the climb.. I don’t know why.. I think I just suck at climbing.”.. sounds familiar?
For girls, too often I heard “I can’t get faster. I’m born slow.” or “I just can’t climb because I’m pear shape or just too heavy.”..
If you look at it from a neutral point of view, they’re both avoidance of a specific weakness.
Look, working on your weakness in a sport will feel difficult. No matter how you run away from them or complain about them, they will still feel awful. That’s why they are call your weakness. Unless, you learn to accept them and work on them relentlessly and learn to appreciate the LEAST amount of improvement that you can squeeze out of the difficult sessions.
I felt that it is our responsibility to give our mind and body a break from these kind of unnecessary complaints that doesn’t aid in the situation. Being heavy doesn’t mean you can’t lose weight or gain strength to increase power to weight ratio. Being slow doesn’t mean you can’t improve on your skill and mastery of the sport to become more efficient (since with efficiency comes speed). Being slower than others in climbing doesn’t mean you can’t work on your tactics such as starting the climb in front of the pack so when you drop you’d be in the middle of the pack.
It Is our responsibility to recognize our flaws and weaknesses then tailor our preparation phase of our base training to improve on them while maintaining our strengths and that way, you’ll find improvement in timing coming in multiple folds.
Point 4:
Always remind yourself: “It is about This Moment.”.
One thing I noticed from playing basketball and watching the greatest athletes compete in any sport, is that they have this steel-like focus that enable them to keep slamming the hammer at the same intensity no matter how hard it feels. How does it work out to be a responsibility of an athlete? Hear me out.
Planning an annual programme with long term and short term goals are very common. However, for us average joes, we tend to worry too much about reaching the goal than the training sessions itself. And by doing that, we’re not being responsible for the goals we set for ourselves and we’re thus directly being irresponsible to ourselves as an athlete.
One of my training principle is that whatever session you are doing, there Must be an objective and an expectation of how it will feel like in the session. Speed work sessions will feel like your lungs are bursting, Technique sessions are naturally frustrating when you’re doing corrections and climbing sessions are slow and painful whilst time trialing are generally mind boggling on how we can push past our limits in our mental barrier.
And during the session itself, we have to always train our body and mind to work together in a CLEAR AND COORDINATED FASHION. Too often, I see athletes I train come to me and ask me “what are we doing after this?” in the 3rd set of 5 sets of 200 hard swim. There is no right or wrong here, but those who take each 200m and break it down into 4x50m, and further break it down into every 25m, then every kick off and every turn around tend to gain the most out of the training because they put in their best effort in That Moment. And in race, where effort can be so hard and intolerable, it is impossible to put that focus into practice if you don’t do it in every single lap you swim/bike/run.
Allow me to share about my basketball story. I have played many games whereby I’m teamed with the weaker players and have to fight through all odds to have a chance to win… I noticed that when I play in that kind of team, my focus is at its maximum because everytime I get the ball, I’m just focused on finding my team mates and getting the ball into the hoops regardless of who is guarding me. All I care about at that moment I have the ball is how to work my best and find the best opportunity to score, point by point, until the game is set. Very often, I end up very very tired after such high level of concentration but often enough, we, the weaker team came out as the winner because we are focused on doing everything correct and not worried about the result since we’re the underdog anyway.
Some say it is the underdog mentality, I call it Focus.
-----------------------
Good things will come as long as Smart work is done as Hard as Possible.
Be ambitious but realistic.
Do your best in every moment of training, and that doesn’t means always going hard. Doing your best means if it is a long slow distance, you make sure its long enough and your form don’t deteriorates even as you tire. If it is a speed session, you make sure you come well rested and be as fast as you possibly can. If it is a time trialing session, you make sure you come mentally psyched up and not rush down from work to get into the mini – race. If it is a technique session, you make sure you go slow enough and be PATIENT AND MENTALLY AWARE of everything you do. All these are examples of Doing Your Best.
Elevate your game and fight through the training like you don’t have a choice.
Too often, we humans have too much luxury of choices and options. Many Kenyans don’t have school buses to bring them to school thus they do 5-10km runs everyday, we do it for leisure and often skip them because the weather is Gloomy. Change your mindset and see results come.
Just focus on that very moment of pain and Do It, Over and Over again, and complain lesser. Remember – When you can open your mouth and complain, you’re not that tired. In other words, if you’ve not vomited, you’ve not pushed to the limit yet, so you have to push harder or just keep going!
Cheers
KK
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Sapphire Biathlon Report and Review
Team Sapphire,
You guys are just such Awesome bunch of inspirational people. Especially those who are more "senior" in our group. You've outdone so many of us youngsters and we have indeed a lot to learn from you and one of them is to become more hardworking and less complaining! Gambatte neh!!!!
First of all, I'd like to thank everyone for making this event a success and stupid me have to "spoil" the finish at the debrief area because I went to sweep you guys... zzz... Anyway, here is your mini race information!
Before the virtual award ceremony, let's go through in text what we've gone through in training (yawnzzz) just so you appreciate what is happening.
Many of you came to me and tell me:
"This felt so much easy!"
"This is good!"
"I felt strong for _______ !!"
"This 20 laps feel so much better than last week's 750!"
The reason I give you is "Base Training" and good Building phase. Honestly, I think we can become faster in our next race. Like WAY faster than now. I've been very conservative with our training as a group in these build phase and peak phase because I don't wish to see people collapsing but knowing how you guys are dealing with the training load and reacting to the swim training gives me confidence that I can put in a little harder swim and slightly more focus on techniques.
I purposely went to the other side of the pool to do my swim because
1) I want to observe you guys swim
2) I don't want to draft and then made my swim unrealistically fast, I want to know what I can do by myself
From what I see, most of you are not grasping the concept of catching water yet. Also, other than Calvin, Yukari, Gen, Sam and Vincent who're swimming with their butt up, most of you have this tendency to drop your hip.
You should really train to "squeeze" your behind together gently when you are swimming as that causes the bottom to perk upwards towards the surface and stay there better. That is also activating what we did as the superman drill. Calvin's lack of kicking and yet keeping the butt up is a very loud demonstration of him grasping that "Superman" body position swimming concept.
People who can't catch and hold water properly:
Pauline
KH
Vincent
Sam
Wilson
Note: Swimming is a POWER + Endurance sport: If you think you are as strong as somebody faster than you with brute strength, but you're swimming slower even though you're as streamline as he/she is, chances are you are not "holding" on to the water enough.
People with dropping bottoms:
Teckbeng (gets worse as the swim goes on)
Take (Head down please~~~ no pretty woman in front so stop looking so high in front!!! =p)
People who tend to open up the leg and kick (especially when breathing):
KH
Calvin
Note: If you want to do 2beat kick, you have to make sure you're kicking "in a tunnel with small circumference".
People who are doing swim with a pause before starting next pull:
Sam
Gen
KH
Hong Jun
Person with the left hand swaying outwards when doing right arm pull:
ME.
Note: Practice more please..... F*&k the cold water la...
With all the above mentioned, I'd like to say that in my eyes as your coach, the number 1 objective of this swim training has been accomplished and that is giving all of you a great great stroke to swim confidently and comfortably with. Do not mix that up with open water confidence. The latter will need more race and swim experience.
Last but not least, like I said, I am making some changes to my own stroke and I am my own specimen for experiment. Once I mastered and refined the concept I will share with you guys what I've found that had improved my swim so much over the last 2 weeks. It has been crazy I tell you.
Now for awards-------
Female Veteran Category
1st: Yukari San
2nd: Pauline
3rd: err.... >_<...
Male Veteran Category
1st: Lawlaw
2nd: Take San
3rd: Calvin!~! (CORRECT? hahaha sorry if i got your age wrong!!!)
Female Open Category
1st: Sam
2nd: Gen
3rd: err...... =ppp
Male Open Category
1st: KK (Total: 52+ minutes)
2nd: Vincent (Total: 57~59 minutes)
3rd: Wilson
Male Under 19 Category
1st: KH/Hong Jun
2nd: err....
3rd: heh.....
On top of the above awards, below are some special mentioning...
Most Friendly Racer award: Teck Beng! (Waiting for Calvin, chit chatting with Hongjun and KH.. ZHAN!)
Most Improved Racer award: KH! (Feeling like nothing after doing the same kind of timing as previously! Goodness gracious. Can't imagine if you pushed harder! =p)
Most Streamline Swimmer award: Calvin! I was watching from the other side and I can't stop wowing at the long horizontal body you're displaying under the water!
Most "Don't know what's happening" racer: You guess who lor.. =Ppp Hongg....~~~ nvm... you guess lor~ hahaha..
Cheers
KK
ps - Hong Jun, thanks for sending me the lap by lap information. It shows quite a bit of inconsistency. I am thinking its either you shut off your mind through some of the laps and then snap out of the dreaming state and got faster a little.. I dunno, it seems that the fluctuations in timing are consistent thats why I think you're not able to focus continuously for 20 laps and outputing the same amount of force all the time... Good news is you're very strong in your endurance as evidence by your last couple of laps you were able to come up with descending set speed.. lovely. Need to work on your run!
ps ps - Vince! Your run not very consistent at the last lap. I think you need to work more on your drills and also the gym machine (sliding leg forward and backward) I taught you to work on your range of motions. I'd like to think that you're still very unsure about your technique work and thus the inconsistency instead of your endurance ability.
Good choice to hold back on your swim, else the second 3.3km would have been much worst... Jiayou and work smart!
You guys are just such Awesome bunch of inspirational people. Especially those who are more "senior" in our group. You've outdone so many of us youngsters and we have indeed a lot to learn from you and one of them is to become more hardworking and less complaining! Gambatte neh!!!!
First of all, I'd like to thank everyone for making this event a success and stupid me have to "spoil" the finish at the debrief area because I went to sweep you guys... zzz... Anyway, here is your mini race information!
Before the virtual award ceremony, let's go through in text what we've gone through in training (yawnzzz) just so you appreciate what is happening.
Many of you came to me and tell me:
"This felt so much easy!"
"This is good!"
"I felt strong for _______ !!"
"This 20 laps feel so much better than last week's 750!"
The reason I give you is "Base Training" and good Building phase. Honestly, I think we can become faster in our next race. Like WAY faster than now. I've been very conservative with our training as a group in these build phase and peak phase because I don't wish to see people collapsing but knowing how you guys are dealing with the training load and reacting to the swim training gives me confidence that I can put in a little harder swim and slightly more focus on techniques.
I purposely went to the other side of the pool to do my swim because
1) I want to observe you guys swim
2) I don't want to draft and then made my swim unrealistically fast, I want to know what I can do by myself
From what I see, most of you are not grasping the concept of catching water yet. Also, other than Calvin, Yukari, Gen, Sam and Vincent who're swimming with their butt up, most of you have this tendency to drop your hip.
You should really train to "squeeze" your behind together gently when you are swimming as that causes the bottom to perk upwards towards the surface and stay there better. That is also activating what we did as the superman drill. Calvin's lack of kicking and yet keeping the butt up is a very loud demonstration of him grasping that "Superman" body position swimming concept.
People who can't catch and hold water properly:
Pauline
KH
Vincent
Sam
Wilson
Note: Swimming is a POWER + Endurance sport: If you think you are as strong as somebody faster than you with brute strength, but you're swimming slower even though you're as streamline as he/she is, chances are you are not "holding" on to the water enough.
People with dropping bottoms:
Teckbeng (gets worse as the swim goes on)
Take (Head down please~~~ no pretty woman in front so stop looking so high in front!!! =p)
People who tend to open up the leg and kick (especially when breathing):
KH
Calvin
Note: If you want to do 2beat kick, you have to make sure you're kicking "in a tunnel with small circumference".
People who are doing swim with a pause before starting next pull:
Sam
Gen
KH
Hong Jun
Person with the left hand swaying outwards when doing right arm pull:
ME.
Note: Practice more please..... F*&k the cold water la...
With all the above mentioned, I'd like to say that in my eyes as your coach, the number 1 objective of this swim training has been accomplished and that is giving all of you a great great stroke to swim confidently and comfortably with. Do not mix that up with open water confidence. The latter will need more race and swim experience.
Last but not least, like I said, I am making some changes to my own stroke and I am my own specimen for experiment. Once I mastered and refined the concept I will share with you guys what I've found that had improved my swim so much over the last 2 weeks. It has been crazy I tell you.
Now for awards-------
Female Veteran Category
1st: Yukari San
2nd: Pauline
3rd: err.... >_<...
Male Veteran Category
1st: Lawlaw
2nd: Take San
3rd: Calvin!~! (CORRECT? hahaha sorry if i got your age wrong!!!)
Female Open Category
1st: Sam
2nd: Gen
3rd: err...... =ppp
Male Open Category
1st: KK (Total: 52+ minutes)
2nd: Vincent (Total: 57~59 minutes)
3rd: Wilson
Male Under 19 Category
1st: KH/Hong Jun
2nd: err....
3rd: heh.....
On top of the above awards, below are some special mentioning...
Most Friendly Racer award: Teck Beng! (Waiting for Calvin, chit chatting with Hongjun and KH.. ZHAN!)
Most Improved Racer award: KH! (Feeling like nothing after doing the same kind of timing as previously! Goodness gracious. Can't imagine if you pushed harder! =p)
Most Streamline Swimmer award: Calvin! I was watching from the other side and I can't stop wowing at the long horizontal body you're displaying under the water!
Most "Don't know what's happening" racer: You guess who lor.. =Ppp Hongg....~~~ nvm... you guess lor~ hahaha..
Cheers
KK
ps - Hong Jun, thanks for sending me the lap by lap information. It shows quite a bit of inconsistency. I am thinking its either you shut off your mind through some of the laps and then snap out of the dreaming state and got faster a little.. I dunno, it seems that the fluctuations in timing are consistent thats why I think you're not able to focus continuously for 20 laps and outputing the same amount of force all the time... Good news is you're very strong in your endurance as evidence by your last couple of laps you were able to come up with descending set speed.. lovely. Need to work on your run!
ps ps - Vince! Your run not very consistent at the last lap. I think you need to work more on your drills and also the gym machine (sliding leg forward and backward) I taught you to work on your range of motions. I'd like to think that you're still very unsure about your technique work and thus the inconsistency instead of your endurance ability.
Good choice to hold back on your swim, else the second 3.3km would have been much worst... Jiayou and work smart!
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Our mini Biathlon
Dear all,
Tonight's swim will be a mini biathlon for fun and also a little bit of speed.
It'll be a 20laps (1km) swim together with a 6.6km run at the very best effort that you output throughout.
The 6.6km run will be outside, around the pool's complex. Turn right when you come out of the carpark exit and go right around the complex.
Route visualization:
Carpark exit
Right turn at junction (don't cross)
Hockey field to the right
Up bridge right ahead
Down the bridge and straight for about 500m
Cross traffic light
Right turn at next junction
Straight along the LRT track (its on the left)
Back to complex continue straight and right turn at the junction
Carpark exit again and Repeat.
On second round (i.e last round), finish at the carpark exit and stop timer.
Walk back to the pool entrance as cooldown. We will meet at 8.50 at the place where we debrief and go in together to wash up (head count before re-entry).
We'll want to see the following being achieved:
1) Good warmup
2) 85-95% effort throughout the swim
3) End swim with build of kick
4) Smooth transition
5) Absolutely no cramp feeling during start of run
6) PB for the distance if possible.
Remember that at times, you'll feel like you cannot carry on. When that happens, bring back the focus to BREATHING.
Cheers
KK
Tonight's swim will be a mini biathlon for fun and also a little bit of speed.
It'll be a 20laps (1km) swim together with a 6.6km run at the very best effort that you output throughout.
The 6.6km run will be outside, around the pool's complex. Turn right when you come out of the carpark exit and go right around the complex.
Route visualization:
Carpark exit
Right turn at junction (don't cross)
Hockey field to the right
Up bridge right ahead
Down the bridge and straight for about 500m
Cross traffic light
Right turn at next junction
Straight along the LRT track (its on the left)
Back to complex continue straight and right turn at the junction
Carpark exit again and Repeat.
On second round (i.e last round), finish at the carpark exit and stop timer.
Walk back to the pool entrance as cooldown. We will meet at 8.50 at the place where we debrief and go in together to wash up (head count before re-entry).
We'll want to see the following being achieved:
1) Good warmup
2) 85-95% effort throughout the swim
3) End swim with build of kick
4) Smooth transition
5) Absolutely no cramp feeling during start of run
6) PB for the distance if possible.
Remember that at times, you'll feel like you cannot carry on. When that happens, bring back the focus to BREATHING.
Cheers
KK
26 Jan Swim
Vincent, Hong Jun, Eliza, Marianna, Calvin, Ben, Jaslynn,Take San, Yukari, Wilson, Teck Beng who came for the swim...if you completed the entire menu, that would be a 2.95Km.
I guess most came short of completing the SET TWO (750m).
Anyway, if you have timings, let me know, will post up. In the meantime, this is Wilson and Mine...We stop at the first 100m of Cool Down :)
I guess most came short of completing the SET TWO (750m).
Anyway, if you have timings, let me know, will post up. In the meantime, this is Wilson and Mine...We stop at the first 100m of Cool Down :)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)