Lessons

Halfway through my first swimming lesson yesterday I couldn't help but wonder who had first had the brilliant idea to breathe out your armpit? Apparently that's how you're supposed to do it -- keep your head down and chin to your chest and then turn and follow your arm as it comes back and out of the water. I admit, it works better than my method, which was to lift my entire head out of the water and take massive gulps of air, drawing the attention of every other swimmer in the pool. But still, it's strange. There were lots of other things I learned about swimming -- bend your arm at the elbow, not the wrist; hold your breath for the first stroke and then blow out on the second; reach your arm back and forward as far as possible every stroke; and kick from the hips, not the knees -- but don't kick too much or your legs will be worn out before you get to the other parts of the triathlon. It was a lot to try and put together in one hour, but I could have gone swimming forever on my own and never considered breathing out of my armpit.

I went for a short run Monday and my IT band felt ok, but I joined a local running group for a holiday light run on Thursday -- supposed to be five miles at a conversational pace that was really 6 plus miles at what is my interval pace -- and the knee hurt a lot by the end; I sure was happy to get to the dinner and drinks part of the outing. Back to rehabbing the leg I guess. But it was fun -- we gave South Philly something to talk about as fourteen of us went running the streets wearing jingle bells. I'm not sure I'll go running with the group again -- despite my "I'm a runner proclamation," these ladies were Runners with a capital R, the kind that don't wear fancy GPS watches because they like running so much they don't need the positive reinforcement of knowing their exact minute per mile pace; the kind who say they can't run with their cell phone because it's too clunky; the kind who looked at me like I was crazy when I mentioned the three-day-a-week marathon training plan I followed. But it was fun to see the holiday lights and a bit of Philly that I don't usually explore on my own.

Still didn't get that much exercise this week, but I'm trying to stay positive -- the swim lesson was an important step and the group run was an important mental health break even if my recovery was put back a bit. It's all about the balance. Well, that and the cold -- training in the winter is hard!