My buddies from over at LiveSwim.net were out at SPMA Champs in Mission Viejo all weekend livestreaming the meet. They’ve made the races available online for you to watch on demand which I think is pretty cool!
You can go watch your races here!
I plugged in a few of my races below, as usual I’m the large bald man in the B70…
200 Fly
50 Free vs. Brad from my team
200 Breast
400 Medley Relay (Brad, Ahelee, Me, Jinxi)
Results for the meet are available here
at the pool way too early
We wrapped up the SPMA Champs today and even though you could see a lot of empty blocks thanks to a mix of mother’s day and 3rd day meet fatigue, there was still some fast swimming going on at the pool. The weather wasn’t quite as nice as yesterday, less sun and more wind today, but still way better than anything we had early on in the season (like the Rose Bowl rain storm meet). I got to the pool a little before the 1650 got started… I didn’t necessarily mean to get there that early, but the upside is I got to grab a lane all to myself in the warm up pool for a pretty long time. Normally I don’t do big warm ups at meets, but seeing as I had all that water to myself I stayed in for a pretty long time.
My first event of the day was the 400 Medley Relay. We actually had a pretty strong relay put together. Brad was our lead off backstroker, Ahelee took breaststroke, I swam fly and Jinxi swam the freestyle anchor leg. Everybody had good swims and it was a lot of fun to get a relay in with my friends. Plus it’s good practice for Atlanta in a couple of weeks!!! For my part of the race I wasn’t feeling 100% but I could tell I was moving at a pretty decent pace. According to the results I came in at a 59.1, I really think I’ve got it in me to swim a low 58 or even a high 57 in Atlanta at Nationals if I just hold it together! I might have dipped under 59 if I would have worked my finish a little different. I hit an awkward point where it was glide in or that a short stroke to finish. In a solo race I would have glided in, but in a relay I took the stroke. I was worried if I took an extended glide in I might draw Jinxi off the block a little early so I threw that last choppy stroke in so it was obvious when and how I was going to finish. The team finished in 4:15 and I think everyone was really happy with that. I’ve got some pictures of the relay below and a video of the whole race at the bottom!
Brad's backstroke start
Ahelee launching into the breaststroke
me finishing the 100 fly
Jinxi hitting the wall to end the race!
The relay was good warm up for my main event of the day, the 200 breaststroke. My ongoing breaststroke feud with my friend Sarah B. had one distance uncovered and today was my chance to lay down a hot time in the 200. My major goal today was to defeat her 200 time to give me a clean sweep of the breaststroke events. I needed to be at a 2:38 or better, my previous best (and only time) was around a 2:43. The plan going in was to squeeze every last yard out of my pull downs and not smoke myself out in the first 100. I think I achieved both of those, but maybe I should have pushed a little harder early on. I split it like this: 34, 40, 43, 40. I wasn’t near tired enough at the end to have done it right, and I was 1 second shy of where I needed to be. I came in at a 2:39! Oh well, I guess I can let her have one :p Now I just need to get through Nationals without her overtaking my 50 and 100 times and I get to be the interim 28 Year Old Twitter-er SCY Breaststroke Champion… it’s a pretty prestigious title if not a little specific.
At this point I kind of wanted to just hop in the car and drive home. I only had the 50 free left and I was feeling the weight of the weekend in my shoulders. One of my teammates was seeded into the lane right next to me for it so I decided to stay just so we could race each other. I felt good off the start but way heavy in my arms. At the 25 I was doing pretty well, but Ahelee thinks I pushed a little too deep off the turn. Me and Brad held pretty close together through the whole thing but he got me by about 2 tenths of a second. I might have some video of this one later. I guess it was pretty interesting to watch because we were neck and neck but swim totally differently. I take big, long strokes and Brad has a much quicker turn over.
After the 50 I warmed down a bit and packed up my stuff to get out of there. I said by to everybody and realized the next time I see most of them is at Nationals. A lot of my friends are going out this year so I’m pretty stoked for it. The one thing I wasn’t stoked for was my drive home… I got out of there around 3:30 and didn’t get home until 9. Granted I made a stop in the middle, but it was only half an hour. Hooray traffic! Anyways, as it becomes available I’ll post some video from my friends over at LiveSwim.net, and anything else that might come my way.
200 fly, picture taken by Steve
Today was day 2 of the SPMA Champs in Mission Viejo and day 1 for me. It was a really nice day at the pool… warm and sunny with lots of swimmers on deck. It was fun for me to be back at a SoCal meet as well, it feels like forever since I’ve swam something in SPMA. I got to the pool a little after the 500 had gotten underway and found my CVMM teammates on the far end of the pool. We got the tents set up and I got my chance to catch up with everybody.
My first swim of the day was the 200 fly and as usual I was dreading it. Since my schedule for today was pretty light I figured I had to do this thing. I landed in heat 3 out of 4 right next to my friend Jim from up north. He was seeded a second faster than me so my major goal was to keep up with him. My secondary goal was to swim a into the teens from my previous 2:22.
I'm in the middle, Jim is to the left of me
I started off pretty fast, about a 1:03, I didn’t mean to (the plan was 1:05) but it felt ok. During the first 100 I saw Jim on all the turns because I was a little bit ahead, after that I never saw him again because he was right on top of me. I started hating life around the 125 marker. I held together really well even though I was hurting on the inside. The people watching my race said you couldn’t really see any struggle in my stroke until the last 25. I couldn’t tell if I was hurting so bad because I was going fast or because I haven’t been swimming enough fly in workouts. Once I hit the wall I got my answer… fast :) I swam a 2:15 which is a 7 second drop from my time in Wisconsin. I managed to stay just a little bit ahead of Jim, but I doubt I beat him by more than a second. After my swim my brain was thumping and I think I saw a few stars… I don’t think my body appreciates the 200 fly. Upside is I don’t think I’ll be in danger of doing another one until September or October.
A little while later there was the presentation of the SPMA Coach of the Year. There were some really good coaches nominated, but ultimately it was Coach Chad from Rose Bowl who won. I’m stoked for Chad, I really like him. He has a good group of swimmers and he’s a super nice guy. Also I totally called it last year… he was my guess for Coach of the Year back in April of 2009.
Coach Chad after high five-ing all his swimmers
I had a while afterwards before my next event so I spent a bunch of time on deck and in the bleachers talking to people. I met the coach from SOBA and talked to him for around 20 minutes talking about his program and his philosophy on coaching. I really like how he thinks, next time I’m down south I want to try and drop in with his team and check them out in action. I got to talk to my buddy Errol for a while as well, it had been a while since I’d seen him in person.
My last 2 races were just 50′s and honestly they kind of sucked. The 200 fly is a bit of a day ender for me and I felt that bad boy in all the rest of my swims. My 50 breast was a high 31 which is about a second above my current best time. My 50 fly was a high 27 which really sucks for me. Oh well. It’s good race practice which is all I was looking for this weekend.
Ahelee in the warm up pool
Once I was done with the meet I split for my hotel to get checked in and then I turned around and made my way back to Mission for the meet social. I hung out mainly with a bunch of Nadadores and talked about today’s races, tomorrow’s events and plans for nationals. I spent a bunch of time talking with Maureen who I think is around 86, and swam every event today except the 2fly. She’s a funny lady… I hope to someday be that old, and be swimming! A little later on my coach Ahelee and Cokie from the Marin Pirates showed up and we had dinner out on the patio at the place the social was going on. It overlooked Lake Mission Viejo and was a really good time.
Tomorrow I’ve got the 100 fly on a relay, the 200 breast, and the 50 free. Hoping for some good swims. Oh and just a reminder, LiveSwim.net are out there live streaming the event here. Go check out the site during the day tomorrow!
