Guelph Lake 1

Guelph Lake 1, June 19th and 20th, 2010. I have officially signed up for my first ever swim/cycle event! Should be a blast. Nice that I can still compete this summer when I can not run. Hopefully by the end of the summer I will be able to run then enter a short race to test out the legs. I have also reserved a group camp site at Guelph Lake for the weekend starting Friday night til Sunday afternoon. Short walk to the transition area and all Koalas are invited to come out and camp and/or stop in visit or hang out. Really looking forward to this event and weekend!

Good news bad news

My life the last few years has been all about contradiction. All about the opposing end of different spectrum's. It seems that whenever I get into that middle part of the spectrum I am thrust out of it pushed back to the end. No make that ends. Like I am divided. It isn't as bad as it all sounds nor is it as good. That is the beauty of all of this, the beauty of life. So many positive things are happening like the KW Fighting Koalas and at the same time so many other aspects of my life are, shall we say, not going as great. Maturity has taught me to try, and I mean try, to see the positives in situations. What happened and what do I need to learn from this as opposed to why did this happen to me! If I can learn one new thing each and every day, if I can learn from the stuff that happens in my life, then I am richer at the end of the day. Not in a material sense but in knowledge and wisdom, in life.
Last fall I was helping out by putting some boxes into a car trunk. I guess I felt a little rushed and put the box into the trunk at the same time I banged my knee unto the bumper, hyper extending my knee which in turn turned into a tear in my meniscus. I still kept running after the initial injury because I never really thought about it. Then it started to hurt and I knew I did something to my knee but for the life of me could not remember what I did to hurt it. It is now the end of April and I found out today what we, the Dr, suspected all along. I have a tear in my right knee meniscus. Now here comes the good news bad news part. The good news is that the tear is not a flap type of tear, one that would need to be cut out. The bad news is that it is a tear, more of a slit type tear and will probably need to be stapled closed to help heal. Best case scenario, scoped, stapled, healed and within a short time frame, good to go. Worse case, 2 to 3 weeks on crutches while it heals. Therefore I am cautiously optimistic!
Now, the club this past week. Tuesday night run, good turn out. Wednesday night bike, not so good. Tuesday and Thursday swims, good coaching with the members that came out! Myself, I had a very good swim session today. And, our team looks to be gaining another member early next week. Stay posted for that update.

Day behind blogger

I should of posted this yesterday when it was fresher in my mind but here goes. I know how a day later the memories can get a little skewed but I will try my best. I was scheduled for three different practices to coach yesterday and one got cancelled last minute, so it was only two. I myself did not practice, just coached. First up was to the pool for a one on one which turned out to by two members! So all good, they swam in the same lane and I could watch them both. One member is a junior aged male and basically starting from scratch in the pool. Good thing is his age where if I keep working with him beyond this year he can make huge improvements in his swimming. He already has improved in the run placing 2nd in his age group last Sunday for a half marathon! And I know he has been working hard on the bike on Wednesday night and his other practices. Going to be interesting to see how good he can get this summer and beyond.
The other member that came out for swimming has pretty good form and more or less asked for me to crank it up! I love that. You want me to help you become faster, faster you shall train. Simple. But she is ready to start doing this and gets it, ya know? When I explain things to her she instantly understands. So now she knows she needs to swim her 50's at a certain pace, her 100's at a certain pace, etc. Not just jump in the water and swim whatever now, because her swim fitness is dictating that we ramp it up. Now, Im not going to go too crazy on her, yet. But we will push the envelop a little more each time and see how she responds. I think she will respond nicely.
Then it was quickly to the gas station and home to grab some food then to the run practice! And it was kind of chilly with a cold north wind blowing in. Nice to see more members coming out to run. As I can not run right now I am getting some help from another athlete who is looking to help out more and more with coaching. I think I caught her off guard last night by asking what workout we were going to do...lol. But I came prepared for them. Wanted to first keep them moving as much as possible and not cool down. Today I have come up with some really cool ideas for this run practice for the near future, oh yaaaa!
So tonight is our Koalas bike practice and email sent out to advise everyone coming to dress warm. Gloves, bike pants, layers and bike jacket, booties if you have them, to stay warm. I plan to shorten the time of the practice by about 15mins, then I called for a social afterwards. Cool practice indeed.
Cheers!
Swim fast, bike hard and run like the wind!!

This past weekend and the week ahead.

This past weekend saw the KW Fighting Koalas at the pool on Saturday. The turn out was excellent and everyone was working hard to improve. Our newest members came out for their first Koalas swim session and did a great job of learning the drills and listening to their coach, that's me, on how to improve in the water. The first drill that they did was kicking on their side for 10 kicks and then switch sides for another 10 kicks. I did not think it would be that hard for them but a lot did struggle with it, especially head placement and breathing into the water. But the more we worked on it the better they got with it, which will translate into better swimming for them. One of my members had a huge improvement from one week to this this week. Last week on his stroke he was pulling way across his centre line to his opposite hip! I pointed it out to him, he worked on it this past week, and this week what a huge improvement! Nice smooth strokes and pulling to his proper hip/thigh area, very nice! For a coach it is great to see these improvements in my athletes from week to week.
I missed out on some training myself on Sunday due to lack of sleep. I did not sleep very well at all and was very fatigued the rest of the day. Add in some errands that needed to be done and no way could I get any type of workout in. But today I am off to the pool shortly and then get out for a bike ride. The rest of the week looks like it is shaping up to be a good week of training and Koalas practices. Looking forward to a solid week for the KW Fighting Koalas!