Mid-Channel....

Mid-Channel....

Thursday 20 August 2009

Training and water-monsters!

Sunday saw me visit the lake at Box End near Milton Keynes for the first time to get a bit of open water training in. I thought it was important to do a bit in the open water in preparation of our Channel relay next week as my training has mainly been confined to the pool. It wasn't cold at all once I had got swimming which came as a bit of a relief and I felt comfortable in the water. We were training in the water-ski park and I was freaked out by some of the obstacles! I have no idea why I get freaked out by structures in the water but I do - it is a completely illogical fear and I get it with buoys, boats, pond weed etc! I was a bit worried about it affecting how I would feel when swimming near the boat as we cross the Channel so it was important to go and face my fear in the water-ski pit. I tried to explain my fear to Adam and at first he was sympathetic, "It's naturally and sensible to fear things in the water, you could get tangled up, or scrap yourself badly....." When I explained I wasn't at all afraid of getting hurt but it was because I genuinely think they are sea monsters who might actually eat me, he went from sympathetic to actually concerned......for my mental health that is! As with all great fears I understand it is totally illogical and I have to just get on with it but they still give me the heeby-jeebies!!

Training has gone quite well this week with me managing at least a session a day with a couple of days with double sessions scheduled. I want to try and prepare my body during this preparation phase for the challenges of training twice a day when I hit the Base phase in two weeks time. I am going hiking this weekend for two days which, though not very specific, is good for building low-impact base endurance. Then next week is our Channel tide so from Monday I shall probably be forced into what could be upto a week of taper whilst we wait for the tide and our chance to swim.

We did get a call from our pilot, Paul on Monday asking if we wanted to swim on Wednesday, yep, 36hrs from when he called (!), as the weather was so good. Unfortunately most of us already had commitments so we couldn't make it so we'll swim as scheduled next week. Fingers crossed for more good weather and for the wind to drop!

I had a chance to speak to Steve Haywood (Enduroman Director) for the first time this week to ask for confirmation of my slot. Steve had been very busy with the Double Iron UK and Enduroman no. 6's successful Arch 2 Arc attempt (Well Done Dave, Congratulations!) so hadn't been able to get back to me. He did advise that June was a difficult time to swim as it is still so cold and they normally reserve that slot for relay teams. He gave me the opportunity to change my slot to a later one and, after 24hrs thinking time, I gratefully accepted. It would have been foolish to ignore his advice and he was correct in reminding me that I should only try and control the things I can not those, such as other competitors' results, that I can't. So, although I did want to do the race over my 30th birthday and despite the fact that more women my schedule their attempt in front of me, I have changed date to no. 1 swimmer on 7th August 2011. Having looked at the two women currently due to swim in front of me, both look extremely talented athletes and both are Double Iron finishers so they may well have successful attempts anyway. Either way, the challenge is hard enough and I must remind myself that just to complete it will be a huge success, first woman would just be a bonus.

Well, after a bit of an epic post I'll say 'That's all folks' for now and get ready for my hopefully sunny and relaxing weekend in the Dales.

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