Caution: The Barge is Motoring

Craziness at work and a lot going on with the family has kept me very simplistic in my workouts. Get in what you can, when you can. I'm finding success is even possible when it's not completely mapped out. In my effort to find out if I was going to sink or swim in my new pursuit to improve my water efficacy, last night — alas — a minor breakthrough.

To give you proper context, on more than one occasion during my swim class with Texas Iron I have had more than fleeting thoughts of throwing in the proverbial towel. My confidence was shaken, my resolve to continue was very low. I couldn't figure out why I didn't seem to be making any progress. I had just run a marathon, but couldn't get my breathing and stroke down well enough to keep consistent effort for more than a few lengths without throwing my stroke into chaos and sending me struggling to recover. Mind you, I never really had grandiose thoughts of becoming a strong, contender of a swimmer...I just wanted progress. I even battled 68-degree water (holy shrinkage!) at Deep Eddy pool to get some extra reps, drills and time in the pool one morning last week. And finally, there it was, staring me right in the face, small progress.

I was finding it easy to recover while continuing a solid pace. In fact, I was even keeping up with the others in my lane, which was a big confidence boost. As we wrapped up the session, the most telling part of making progress was I wanted to keep going. Talk about a pendulum shift. I'm not saying I've turned the corner on enjoying the swimming thing like I do the bike and even the run. But maybe I've turned one of many corners. At least I'm not dreading it...at least not now.