Darkness

It was dark this morning, as dark as it is now. Fall is fast flowing towards winter and that means still fewer hours of light. Turning back our clocks this weekend will help but it will be a temporary fix.

The darkness makes it a tough time of the year to be motivated to train. This morning for me was no exception. The alarm sounded and while my new Garmin swim watch is far gentler than my previous Polar watch, it did what it was supposed to do and roused me from a deep sleep.

Unlike Simon Whitfield, I needed to count to more than 10 before I eased myself from beneath the covers.

Half asleep I dressed and turned on the kettle to have a cup of tea to sip on as I made my way to Brennan Park. It's about a 10 minute drive. No traffic!

I was in the water by 6:10 and it was a no nonsense pre weekend meet session from Coach Roseline. Fast and slow 25s, 50s, 100s and 200s. Andrew, Marko and I worked methodically.

Among the most recent tweaks to my freestyle has been hand placement and pull, thanks to Roseline as well as Yi-khy, our resident 1500m Olympian.

I was trying to explain what to do to Margreet Dietz, who's back in the water preparing for Ironman Canada, and opted to look at Youtube for some video examples.

I first went to Sheila Taormina - http://www.sheilat.com - simply because she's an awesome swimmer. Several years ago I had looked at whether we could get her to visit us in Squamish for a weekend training camp - or to see if she might happen to be in Seattle or Vancouver anytime soon, but alas, it wasn't meant to be.

But we could, and can, watch a good range of videos she's posted to Youtube. Today we looked at a catch-up drill. Previously I've looked at how to use

Recently via a pro triathlete I know in Australia, Lisa Marangon, we've been tapping Effortless Swimming for advice.

And I came across a video of one of Australia's swimming legends, Ian Thorpe.

Swimming is the most technical of a triathlete's three disciples and one that draws input from all who watch. I've found for me to improve I need to swim a lot, swim distance and tweak my stroke continuously. It's a never ending lane!