"Seaweave" - Dr. Gelato

Facebook Status: Pretending I was a mermaid trapped in a fisherman's net did nothing to change the gross out that was swimming and getting tangled in someone's detached weave.

(Best response to this status?  "Seaweave" -Dr. Gelato.  Niiiiiiiiiice.)

I have sort of a love/hate relationship with the pool.

I naively thought, having honed my body into the prime running machine you see before you, that I was completely ready to dominate the lap lanes. And I was mostly kind of right.  I ended up dominating the end of the lap lane.  As I held on for dear life, gasping for breath, praying that time would magically speed up and I would find myself at the end of an hour long swim workout, rather than 57 seconds into the beginning, I realized triathlon might be more work than I counted on.

I've always been a swimmer in that I've never been part of any organized team but I don't drown when I'm in the water.  (For you, Amy V.) But, in a moment of humility, I thought it would be wise to acquire hone a proper swimming technique before committing to go the distance of 500 yards in open water.

I talked to the aquatic director at my gym who encouraged me to sign up for "the new triathlon class on Thursday nights" because it dealt with "beginner triathletes" looking to "learn proper stroke technique."  Perfect!

He's a big fat liar.

I showed up ten minutes early (because that's how I roll) which is exactly how much time you need to give yourself a panic attack after learning that class Mr. Aquatic Director steered you towards is called "Elite Training for the Competitive Swimmer."  Ten minutes is a long time to ruminate on your trumpted up skill set that is nowhere near ready to tackle "elite training."


I thought I was totally prepared for this class.  I bought a real bathing suit.  It was a horrendously unflattering one piece by TYR, which is a fancy way to say it was more money than I wanted to spend.  I also bought my first ever pair of goggles, chosen because they were the prettiest.  (All you real swimmers out there can feel free to giggle.)

Our instructors could not have been older than 21.  Soren and Jeanette told us to get the in water and do a "quick 200 freestyle" to warm up.  That was the first time I raised my hand.

Kelly: What's "200"?
Soren: Four laps.
Kelly: Like, four times there and back?
Soren: Yes.
Kelly:  What's "freestyle"?  Is it this one?  (Pantomimes windmilling at the air in front of me.)
Soren:  Kind of.

I thought, cool.  I can do this.  Having already done the math, my triathlon distance was ten "there and backs" so doing four in the warm up was no big deal.

I got there.  And back had to wait for me to catch find pray for my breath to return and my heart rate to get out of the "pretty sure you're about to have a heart attack" range.

After many halting "there and backs" of assessment, Jeanette and Soren diagnosed me with one simple problem.  I was swimming too fast.  This was probably the best problem I could have had, as it made me even more like a Navy Seal, if Navy Seals ever had any problems. Which they don't.  The solution for swimming too fast is to do eleventy billion laps behind Soren who is going at a pace I would generously call Bed-Ridden Geriatric.  I focused on not sinking and not getting too close to Soren, who didn't know me and couldn't trust that I wasn't getting fresh.  (I totally wasn't.  If you were wondering.)


It turns out that the first three weeks of triathlon training are dedicated to swimming sloooooooowly behind Soren.  Or maybe that's just for me.  Turns out this is actually effective, as I am now slower than your Grandma.  Look out, Triathlon.