When Will I Warm Up?

Yesterday we went to Super Wal-Mart to go grocery shopping, but I thought that maybe I should look for a brighter swim cap. In the sporting goods section, there was a very small selection, but what they did have was all Ironman brand. I ended up buying a new red cap with a grey M-dot for only a dollar, so I think those Wal-Mart roll backs were very helpful.

This morning I did pretty much the same workout as yesterday, except for a longer period of time. When I put my feet in the water, I immediately regretted my decision to swim. Even though putting on my wetsuit makes me work up a bit of a sweat, I certainly wasn't hot enough to justify the cold water temperature.

I walked out into the lake for a few minutes and my feet were numb. I was hoping that they would warm up once I started swimming. I kept walking and once the water started leaking in by the zipper, I was really unhappy. The water was like little daggers in my skin. I figured at that point it was time to put my head under. Wow! Was that ever cold!

I don't know what happened, but the water was much colder today than yesterday. My face was freezing. My arms were freezing. My toes were cold. Pretty much anything not covered by wetsuit was really cold.

I decided that I would swim for a longer period of time today. I planned on swimming for 30 minutes, so when I hit 15 minutes, I stopped for just a few seconds to make sure I knew exactly where I was and orient myself so I would be able to figure out the distance later on.

Then I turned around and headed back. I had swum north today instead of south like yesterday. That meant that the first part of the swim was with the current and the way back was against it. Although it wasn't much to look at, it turns out that any waves are something to fight against and I knew it would take me longer to swim back. I was actually happy to see that it wasn't a lot longer on the way back, just an extra minute and a half. I also knew I wasn't swimming very fast, but I just wanted to get in the cold water and have a nice relaxing swim.

I got out of the water and did a transition. I timed myself for the last couple stokes, jumped out of the water, goggles off, started running up the beach and unzipping my wetsuit. I got it completely off in 23 seconds. I thought that was fairly good, but I'm sure that people can do it much faster than me.

I then went for a run up the beach, the same direction I had been swimming. The best way I can figure out the distance I swam is to run there since I seem to have about an average 10 minute mile, I'm just using that as a guide. These distances clearly aren't that exact, but I think they are a rough estimate.

I reached the spot that I swam to in 4:20, so I believe that should translate to 0.42 miles each way for the swim. I exteded today's run to be 20 minutes long. I didn't even begin to feel warm in my arms and feet again until I had turned around and had been running for about 13 minutes. I was actually surprised it took that long.

I've heard that the water at Westchester is normally pretty warm, but with the cool summer we've had so far, I hope that it is still warm this year too. I'm thinking that tomorrow might be a pure running day, but we'll see how I feel in the morning. I do hate to give up the open water swimming practice.

Swimming:
0.84 miles in 31:27 minutes (36:00 pace)
Calories: 326
Maximum HR: 159
Average HR: 153

Running:
2.0 miles in 20 minutes (10 minute pace)
Calories: 261
Maximum HR: 179
Average HR: 174