Hi, my name is Rob and I'm trying to remember how to be a competitive swimmer.

Well after focusing on running and setting PR's at Goshen and the Hartford Half, I cut back on training and decided to do enough to keep fitness through the holidays. I've been a pretty regular fixture at the pool and after watching some of my fellow teammates swim their respected alumni meets, part of me got that itch to get back in the pool and compete.  Now I've swum masters before back in 2006 and 2007, when I was coming off of swimming at Fordham, CCSU didn't have a men's program but I was still in ok swimming shape. Hell I was swimming 3 times a week with Sunoco Masters at CCSU and then at the Waterbury Y twice a week on the nights I didn't have classes. My times were pretty comparable to high school so I wasn't the quickest yet I wasn't the slowest either. Fast forward nearly 6 years of just doing tris and open water and my times have sort of slowed. I used to be able to hold 100's on 1:20 like it was my job and now it's been tough just to try to maintain 100's at 1:25 on a regular basis. Part of it has been technique, part of has been lack of training ( 3 days a week going 3k per practice is different to 5 days a week average 5k per practice.) and fellow swimmers to push me. So after searching the web to see if some of the old CT master's meets were offering entry I didn't find any, however I did see a meet in Wellesley MA. After checking to see if I needed to throw down $40 for a USMS membership ( which thankfully I don't) I ran the idea past my perpetual training partner Alexei. Well Alexei was on board and one of my high school teammates jumped on as well so on Jan 27 we'll be shipping up to Boston ( well ok Wellesley College) to try to prove that we've still got those skills that made us deadly in the pool years ago.

So in sets the adrenaline and panic. I've started ramping up my pool time and yardage. This week I've swam 4 times and my shortest swim was a 2400 yard practice on Thursday. All the others have been over 4000 yards.  I've starting analyzing my stroke and trying desperately to get my speed back up. After all in 07 I was still swimming a somewhat decent 6:08 500 Free. If I'm holding what I'm doing now I'd be lucky to go sub 6:30. So I'm hoping some drills,and beating the unmerciful crap out of myself in the pool will get me back into respectable shape. If things go well maybe I might try to convince myself to swim New England Championships in Boston, but right now I just want to see if I can get back some of my old skills.

Let the beatdown begin.
R.D.