Never underestimate a workout

I learned my lesson yesterday. Swim workout. I had a pretty busy day yesterday and since the pool at the University doesn't open until 1pm, I didn't make it there until 5pm. Gross. I want to be done by 8am! Anyway, up until arriving at the pool, I had only glanced at my workout. I saw that I was doing 8 200's and they were things like pulling, pulling without paddles, a couple swim HARD (Liz is a fan of the capital letters), etc. Yay!! Easy swim workout!

Then I really read the workout when I sat on the gutter of the pool. Warmup. Check. Mainset. 8 200's (various descriptions of each one) on 3:15. Che- Wait...what?!?! 3:15? I'm not an Olympic swimmer here. I am a good swimmer, but I wouldn't say a 3:15 200 swimmer. Ok, trust the coach trust the coach....

So I hope in and do my warmup. My first 200 was just swim. No HARD. No easy, just swim. So I swam, I'd say at a decent clip. I touched the wall at 2:57 and my HR felt like it was decently high. Then I looked at my next 200. PULL. I have to make this interval while pulling?! No kicking? I didn't even get to think that far ahead because I had to shove my paddles on, grab my pull buoy and push off for my next set....within 15 seconds. So I'm off. I felt like my shoulders were going to fall off because I had lifted the day before. I touch the wall and I see I have about 7 seconds until my next 200. I'm thinking Yes yes! I made it! Oh crap, here I go again!

This continued for all 8 200's, including the two HARD ones. By the end, I was so proud of myself because I had made all 8 of them, even the last one which I'm always tempted to go slower, simply because I don't have to do my cool down directly after that set finishes. But I did it. Short of gloating about myself, I really am impressed with how well I've done with swim workouts. I have a swimming background, so my training for every tri before this (including my 70.3) was "I'll just swim/float/kick around for about 45 minutes". I hardly did anything over 2500 yards. So this season will already be better!