A week on from my decision to really start training properly and I’ve been getting back into swimming in a lake.
I must admit I have missed swimming in the lake so much. Although a little apprehensive about the first swim, once in the water and swimming, I found it hard not to smile. Stopping after each kilometre just to float in the evening sun for a few moments to appreciate the surroundings was awesome. Sometimes, all you need is those little moments of happiness and serenity to make it all worth while. “Me time’, I call it.
I managed to do four laps of the lake, which is 4K, in 1 hour 8 minutes, which I was pleasantly pleased with. And the even more positive aspect about it was I felt I could have quite happily continued. Well…. Maybe not happily, but if I had too. It certainly wasn’t easy, in any way shape of form, but I felt good at the end of the 4K, rather than “Oh crap I think I’m going to die”. I guess what I am trying to say, is that it was a good swim. You know what I mean. Sometimes you swim, or run, or whatever your particular vice is, and you just can’t get into it. You can’t get into a rhythm and everything feels forced. Then other times you get into a magical zen rhythm and it just seems a lot easier. I think it’s mainly a mental thing. Your state of mind when you get into the water is a massive factor. That’s why I try and set out in my mind how far (in this case how many laps) I’m going to swim before I get in the water. If for example I said to myself I am going to swim 2k, when I am approaching the end of that 2k, I feel knackered, and am convinced it’s a good job I’m only doing 2k as I couldn’t do any more. However, if I set in my mind, that I am going to do 3k, I will swim passed the 2k mark without even thinking about it. My mind is mentally set that 3k is when I will become knackered and so that’s what happens. Now the problem, and the enemy to this logic is “doubt”. If you get in to swim thinking that today you would like to swim 3k, but “doubt” starts to creep into your mind as to whether you can swim that far, you’ll fail. Or at the very least will find it as hard as pushing s**t up a gravel hill with a folk by the time you near the end of the 3k. Because mentally, you weren’t properly prepared.
It is massively a mental game, and the trouble is, that until you manage to swim 3k, 4K, 20k or whatever your target is, you will not know that you can do it, and thus will always have doubt in the back of your mind as to if it is possible. In this instance, you must suppress those doubts as much as possible or engineer the mental game in your favour. For example, last year when I swam the Dart 10k, I purposefully parked my car at the finish, rather than the start. So mentally, all I was doing was swimming back to my car. There would be no point giving up half way, as I was going to have to go to the finish anyway to get my car, so I may as well tough it out and swim it! That was my way of creating mental insurance that I would complete it. Read about it here. This coming week I think I will try and do 5 laps(5k) of the lake. I mean “I Will Do 5 laps”, assuming I don’t get stuck on the worlds biggest car park that it the M25. Until next time…. Swim Happy.