More Swimming – from Zero to One Mile

A couple of weeks ago I tried to start a swimming training program which would take you from “zero to one mile”. After all my swimming lessons this year, I still can’t swim further than about two lengths continuously with having to stop, so this sounded ideal. I set off to the pool all excited, rushed in, and failed miserably. I had a terrible swim, I felt panicked and out of breath and hated every minute.

I posted in the Facebook group for this training plan and received lots of advice and encouragement from the lovely swimmers. It mainly revolved around relaxing, not trying too hard, and not holding my breath. Buoyed up I headed back to the pool to try again – and couldn’t park anywhere.
I was beginning to think this swimming thing was jinxed, but headed back to the pool yet again to give it one last try. I managed to park (I went earlier!), paid and headed in. This time I put no pressure on myself about how far I’d try and swim, or how many lengths I’d try and do without stopping. I got into the ‘slow’ lane (which already had 2 people swimming slow breast stroke) and calmly started.

I tried to do 4 lengths before stopping, and if I felt tired or panicky I switched to a length of breast stroke before changing back to front crawl. I kept it really slow and tried to stay relaxed, really focusing on my breathing and steadily breathing out rather than holding my breath. I’d bought a little cheap lap counter, and was amazed when the laps were adding up.
After about half an hour, I’d swim 32 lengths – 800 metres – which I reckon is half a mile! I was delighted! I sent much love and many thanks to the swimmers in the Facebook group, and felt enthused to try again.

Sadly, after this breakthrough, events conspired against me and although I made it back to one swimming lesson (where we did tumble turns. TUMBLE TURNS! HA HA HA AH AHA!!!) I’ve hardly been swimming since. Serendipitously I then was asked if I’d like to attend a new style of swimming lesson which was starting up at a gym in nearby Bath. Of course I said yes, but what happened doesn’t deserve to be tacked on the end of this post. Read on to find out more. Spoiler alert – it involves a bright pink swimming hat…

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