Pre Race.

27 June 2011 was when I started training with Coach Cheng Qiang.

3 months later...

24 September 2011 is this Saturday and it is the Biggest Open Water Swim Race for me. It mean so much to me:

1) An assessment to what I have done over the past 3 months
2) A day I test myself to the limit
3) A swim that allows me to see where exactly am I in a field of strong competitors
4) A chance to get my PB.
5) An opportunity to do my Coach and my Team proud.
6) Last but not least, a time to enjoy myself and finally swim without thinking, just let the body do what it was trained to do.

I am writing this because the race almost meant to much to me. I am taking this opportunity to relieve myself from the pressure that the meaning of this race is secretly putting on me. I find it especially heavy a burden to balance the expectation of my own performance versus the imaginary expectations of all the other people in my life.

Coach Cheng Qiang has voluntarily and sincerely coached me for free no matter how much or what I try to repay him with. I kept the thoughts in my heart and in each and every single session of training when I felt that I am so tired that I can't give as much as I want to, I often push to give as much as I could.

Going through the 3 months of intensive training, I've learnt what you want to do may not be what you could, but what you could do, may not necessarily equate to what you initially wanted too. In other words, never discount yourself just because you felt that you come from a minor class of athlete.

I've always been very conscious of myself, in the sense that I am too big to be an endurance athlete, I am too curvy to be a streamline swimmer, I am too bulky to just swim bike run fast. But I realized this year, that in the past couple of years of racing, I have been discounting myself just because I FELT that I am inferior genetically.

It is one thing to preach what is right as a coach, but it is another to truly believe and practice it on yourself. I find it especially hard to let down my pride to prove myself wrong so I can learn it afresh and make things work as it should. This year, I took a big step and asked my inner self to go screw itself and I will decide the what the limit of my body should be. It has proved to be very fruitful thus far.

I have always gave my best and the fact I puked 2 weeks back during our training session on a wednesday has strengthened my mentality on what I could take and how much I could shut off my mind's screaming and let the body do the job in the water. That is an invaluable asset in giving an ALL-OUT RACE EFFORT.

My timing is honestly very slow compared to the rest of the top field swimmers, but I'd like to see exactly how far away am I from them? One sore spot of mine has always been that I started late, I am knowledgeable cos of the extra thirst that came from the delayed development, but I am also lagging so far behind in terms of racing experience and base mileage in every sport.

I believe I earn all the respect for my coaching and racing over the relentless attitudes in years of studying and practices that people see that is still ongoing and will always be. However, I just lack the glorifying achievements in my resume that will support the amount of goodness I assume I have from the hard work I put in to improve myself as a person, as a coach and a trustworthy friend of all. I want so much to climb to the top and it takes time. I am setting myself 3 years to build the base and I want race competitively at the elite level after this 3 years of practice and training.

I want and needs to earn time and to do that, I have to stop discounting myself, let go of my expectations - Real and Imaginary - and NIKE (Just Do It!).

With that, I end my entry, together with my worries on how I will perform versus the field. I will do my best, for that is what matters the most, just like I've been doing every single session of practice..

I will constantly push myself no matter how bad I feel.
I am BULLET PROOF.
I am The Shark in the school of Fishes.
I am The Champion, in Sam's heart, in Coach's interest in me, in KH's motivation, and in my World.

So, KK, How Bad do you want it?
SO . FREAKING . BAD .

I.W.W,
Coach KK

Shelly's Swim

Please see the below review on your swim. It was a quick glance from you swimming beside as I was doing my own.. so please pardon if it is a little vague. Besides, there are a lot of things that I need to show in the pool in order for you to understand.

So, here we go, FREESTYLE REVIEW.

Good points:
- Streamlining is OKAY, not optimal, but OKAY.
- Roughly gets the general idea of "freestyle swim" thus you could clip a board on and pull on and on
- Capability to turn and breathe with less than disruptive body position
- Core strength to maintain hip stability while body twist from side to side is notable as you pull through the water in a snaky manner
- Stamina is not too bad.

Note: Core = Shoulder, Chest, Back, Abs, Lower Back, Buttock, Hamstrings and Thigh and Calves. Not just the abs.

Ugly points:
-Head position was too much forward, like breast stroke. Need to look diagonally forward, in a proud, chest up posture.
- Body was "snaking", thus not optimal streamline position. Unsure of which muscle parts to activate to keep the body straight and long.
- Pull was REAL short, it ends before the palm even reaches the stomach
- Besides pull being short, the pitching of palm was not in the correct "attack" angles. No signs of sculling knowledge.
- There was no Catch, no Pull, no Push, just one straight pull through
- Kick was not from the hips
- Body rotation was very dominant on the breathing side, i.e when breathing, the twist of body was very hard and thus causing the body to twist, adding to the "snaking"
- Breathing rhythm was not right, there was not rhythm of "hold breathe, relax, breathe out quick, inhale quick, return head position..."
- Arm Recovery was rushed forward because of the short pull, top it up with the rapid breathing patterns with no tries to relax, the swim was a struggle and tensed up affair right from the first 3 strokes you take.

Reason for the not so optimal swim:
- Lack of understanding that swim is really all about reducing drag to the ABSOLUTE MINIMAL, before increasing propulsion power.
- Lack of awareness on how body "looks like" when you're swimming.
- Basically just going through the motions, moving the arms and legs and body on its own, without knowing the specific purpose on what each movement is supposed to do to help you swim better
- Due to the above points, you do not know when to relax, when to breathe, when to exert force and when to STAY STILL and hold position.

Before we meet again, I need you to find somebody, maybe your boyfriend, to video your swim from the deck and let you see what you are doing and compare against this list of items I listed. Try to understand and then we will work on your freestyle soon.

Note: Efficient Swimming = Holding a rigid streamline posture relaxed-ly to allow optimal transfer of power from the limbs to constant forward velocity.
Keywords are: Rigid, Streamline, Relax, Constant Forward Velocity.

Cheers
KK