3rd week down in Dover Sun 25th May

Well sadly I was only able to go down for the Sunday as I was working on Saturday and Monday. As I was absent the day before I was given extra laps and I had to do 8 laps, a total swim of 10 km with a feed break after 2 hours, my first taste of the Famous maxim, it was served up with a dash of apple juice and there were no ill effects felt for the rest of the swim.My final swim time was about 2 hours and 40 minutes.

All in all it was a good swim, did not have any stiffness and my shoulders felt fine, had a bit of a sore wrist but that seems to be getting better.

Fortuneately I had my long suffering wife down as my driver and boy was I glad as I crashed out in the car on the way back, stopping to visit a few friends and the man of the house is a triathlete so I joined him for his swimming training so just to end the days training I swam another 3km with some triathletes. That was my warm down for the day.

I will now be out of action for a weekand or so thanks kindly to work which is funding this escapade so can't grumble too much. The sad thing is I would love to be out training but may have to do gym work instead but I don not really like that.

Will hopefully be back in Dover mid June and I hope to sneak off to Heron Lake for a few sneaky Km in the lake.

Sunday Dover training

Went to Dover on Sunday and when I left London, the weather was great so I tried to convince my wife that it would be a good trip down, this was to no avail as she opted to stay at home and i think that it was a wise decision as the weather in Dover was very windy, the waves were a lot bigger than the weekend before and the Tide was in.

As I am Glad to report, swimming in cold water does not bother me and neither does the salt, considering it is kept out of my mouth and lungs and Stomach. I did However get a few pretty big mouthfulls leaving me dry wretching in the water, not fun!!! The other thing that I experienced was my cap nearly disappeared a couple of times by riding up my head so I had to stop and rearrange it in the harbour and with waves, this is interesting accomplishment. I did it anyway as I did not want to feel the wrath of the General if I appeared out of the water without my cap. I must admit I do hate the things but I am told they are essential.

One thing that I did learn was, how IMPORTANT IT IS TO TRAIN IN THE CONDITIONS THAT YOU MAY END UP SWIMMING IN. It was a tough session and I think we swam about 6 km. I swam a similar distance the day before in a lake and it was so easy compared to swiming in rough seas.

Heron Lake training

Just got back from 4km in Heron lake and it was great apart from all the triathletes passing weird looks at me and my brother swimming in just our costumes. Some of them could have been swimming the arctic the way they were dressed.

This week was a bad week training wise as I did not have time to put into my pool work and took it as an off week but still managed to put in just over 10km swimming. Well, will get back into it this week.Depending on how I am feeling tomorrow, I might head for Dover again to see what the general has to dish out, I am aware that it will only be one swim so I suspect it will be long one.

First training in Dover

This last weekend I ventured down To Dover and arrived at the beach on Saturday for my first tentative training under the watchful eyes of the General and company.
I was issued with a cap and sent on my way with some other Newcomers, not having the faintest idea how I would react to the cold or the salt water.
Prior to wading into the sea I watched most people applying grease and or suncream to various parts of their body, I opted to go greaseless and see how it all went.
After the initial wade into the sea, various parts of my anatomy disappearing wherever they disappeared too as I made contact with the 11-12 degree water, I ventured in the direction of one of the harbour walls. Surprisingly, after about 3 minutes I had settled into my stroke and was zigzagging my way in the general direction of a harbour wall. I think the zigzagging added about another 300m to my swim as my direction was REALLY terrible

The second swim of the day was about 4Km and I managed that in 56 minutes feeling surprisingly comfortable, my direction had improved and I only had about 5 mouthfulls of the tantalizing Dover harbour water.

By the end of Saturday I was feeling positively refreshed, no chaffing had occured to any parts of my anatomy and we headed for town to buy some clothes apropriate to being in the sun.

Sunday

Kick off at 10 am and the General sent us on a 6 km swim and I got into my rythym very quickly and there was another Budding solo Swimmer that paced with me so we swan the 6km together and I even managed to walk out without falling over.

All in all a Really great weekend, Met some really great people, the atmosphere is extremely supportive and The Generals Bark is a lot worse than her bite.

I look forward to the next installment.