Next Up - New York

Because I like to endure poor conditions.

This morning, I successfully completed the indoor pool qualifier for the Liberty Island Swim.
That's the 1.2km NYC Swim race around the Statue of Liberty (her island, specifically) on June 24th at 5:15PM.

It's the next race on my Calendar.
No races in April/May due to Tee Ball conflicts and 20in24 training.

As I recall, I registered for the swim on Christmas Day.
It's one of my dream races just begging to be crossed off my list.

The qualifying swim requirement: Complete a 1-mile pool swim in under 35 minutes.
I was supposed to do this by the end of January.
Self-imposed deadline.
Easy to ignore self.

Instead, over the weekend I decided I would swim it this morning.
The situation was perfect.
My daughter, HoneyBunny, had a field trip at 9AM or so. I took a vacation day to hang out on the trip.
I could wake up, roll up to the gym early, get in a nice warmup, wait for the lifeguard-that-voluntarily-talks-to-me to start her shift, beg her to sign the Swim Certification document, and then enjoy a nice day.

Nope.

Instead, I lumped on a few diminishing factors just because:

• Field trip canceled due to rain
• Normal work schedule, giving me about 40 minutes tops in the pool
• Let the kids do a puppet show until about 11PM the night prior
• Included waiting for all 15 Barbies in the audience to have their hair brushed
• Resulted in less than 4 hours of sleep
• Swung a heavy axe many times over the course of an hour on Sunday
• Chopped up our old neighborhood playground for disposal
• My skinny arms do not normally see that type of action, they are still hurting
• Had not swam in over a week
• I sneaked in an easy swim yesterday to wake my arms up
• Had to approach the lifeguard that never talks to me, because he's on the first shift
• "Hi, I know I'm basically a stranger, but can you put your cell phone number, email address, and signature on this form?"
• Left my water bottle in the car and did not eat anything before the gym
• Didn't pay much attention to the NYC Swim definition of a "pool mile"

But it wasn't all bad.

In my favor, I did get a haircut last night for streamlinedness, shaved for the same reason, and wore my compression running shorts versus a traditional bathing suit as I normally do.

Why running shorts? Why not the tri shorts?

Oh, they don't like, um, fit too good at the moment. Damnit.

And finally, I didn't get a warmup.

Quick chat with lifeguard, jump in pool and go.

Wearing the running shorts immediately shaved 5 seconds per lap off my time.

Regular swim trunks are way resistant.

I did cramp up and super crave food during the swim. I also had to drink a fair amount of pool water to combat dehydration. Ew.

But, needing to clock under 35 minutes, I finished the last lap at 29 minutes even. Perfect!

32 laps, 1600m in 29 minutes. Very satisfied with that considering the lack of swim lately.

Then I go to upload my results and realize I only had to swim 1500m.

I hope they don't hold that against me!