Support my friend, Doug McConnell's Catalina Swim

Please consider supporting Doug's swim! I'll be crewing this time and here is Doug's detail.

After another year of training and standing on the threshhold of another world-class swimming challenge, the butterflies in my stomach make me philosophical, nervous, hopeful and grateful.  We have done what we can, and we have controlled what can be controlled.  Such a big part of a challenge like this, though, is being prepared to confront things that are unknown and uncontrollable, and to deal with them physically and mentally.  For example, I know that this swim is 21 miles and will require about 30,000 strokes.  I know that there will be times that it will be frightening, particularly at night.  I know that, if September 27^th is a day that the Channel will let someone across, I can swim that far.  I can be that guy. 

Most of all, I know that, as the teammate in the Speedo, the A Long Swim team is the best team in the world to be on.  Beyond that, sometimes I feel like I don’t know too much at all. 

As Nelson Mandela said, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.  It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.” 

Fear.  Inadequacy.  Powerful beyond measure.  Darkness to light.  Now is the time to get our heads on straight, dig deep and swim far.

See you on the beach.  After all, this is California, dude. 

Following Along on the Internet

If you have an interest in following along with the Catalina swim, we will have the same technology we had last year during the English Channel swim, whereby a GPS marker will be sent every ten minutes.  There aren’t too many things that can make open water swimming into a spectator sport, but this GPS technology helps.  As my sister, Ellen, has said, “Waiting for the next little marker to come up is even more exciting than waiting for the next Chilean miner to come out of the ground!” 

To follow it on your computer, click in to the following link and keep your fingers crossed that we set it up correctly:

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0m7nzx7EIcQ87KF9zC4GUv0tYqLDKF8kR

Donations

Fundraising has been very gratifying this year.  A Long Swim is again supporting the Les Turner ALS Foundation, and the donations have been nothing short of humbling.  There is a very prominent donation button on www.ALongSwim.com, or checks can be mailed to the good folks at:

A Long Swim

c/o Les Turner ALS Foundation

5550 W. Touhy Ave, Suite 302

Skokie, IL  60077

What would you pay to keep from getting sick as you get older? How about a daily walk or other exercise? A new study suggests that’s exactly the right investment. In the study, people who were the most fit at midlife lived longer and spent less time being sick than middle-aged folks who weren’t fit.

I am actually a better swimmer today than when I was 20, says Don, now 50.
I find the mental ability to overcome barriers can easily let me keep swimming further.
In recent years Don has trained millions of yards, most in cold open water below 70f with no wetsuit.

Probably the most difficult aspect of training as we get older is cross training to balance fitness and muscle response to prevent injury.

  

There are many benefits to staying physically active and exercising daily. Exercise

• strengthens the heart and lungs
• makes blood vessels more flexible and responsive, improving circulation
• controls blood pressure and cholesterol
• helps muscles burn sugar
• reduces stress
• decreases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, some cancers, and other chronic conditions
• preserves memory and prolongs life

Another important effect of exercise, one that doesn’t get enough attention, is that it improves fitness. Fitness is a measure of how well your heart, blood vessels, blood, and lungs work together to supply muscles with oxygen during sustained exercise. It also estimates how efficiently the muscles use the oxygen. Fitness also reflects your exercise capacity.

The most accurate fitness gauge requires complicated machinery and sensors to measure the maximum oxygen consumed during exercise. This is called VO2max. It can also be done using the kind of treadmill test that cardiologists commonly use to check for heart disease.

Fitness translates to better health later on

To explore the effect of fitness on health status in old age, researchers with the Cooper Institute in Dallas looked at information that had been gathered from more than 18,600 men and women who were part of another long-term health study. When the study began, their median age was 49. Fitness levels were measured using a type of treadmill test. Once a volunteer reached age 65, the researchers tracked his or her health with Medicare claims information.

Those who were the most fit at midlife were less likely over the course of the 26-year study to have died of coronary artery disease, Alzheimer’s, heart failure, diabetes and other chronic conditions, the researchers reported in Archives of Internal Medicine. Just over 2,400 people died during the study. In the last five years of their lives, the people who had been most fit at midlife spent about 50% less time with four or more chronic diseases than the least fit group and 34% more time with no or one chronic disease.

Find your fitness

How do you improve your fitness? Increase the amount and the intensity of exercise over time.

Exercise capacity is usually measured in metabolic equivalents (METs). One MET is the amount of oxygen used when sitting still or sleeping. Nonathletic, healthy, middle-aged men and women have peak exercise capacities in the range of 8 to 10 METs. Marathon runners can have values as high as 18 to 24.

But you don’t need an expensive exercise stress test to determine your fitness. Many fitness centers have exercise machines that show METs. Some home treadmills and elliptical trainers also show METs.

If you don’t have access to such a machine, or don’t like exercising on one, you can measure your current fitness with a simple walking test. All it takes is a one-mile track or level terrain that you know is one mile long. You’ll also need a stopwatch or watch with a second hand, paper, and a pen or pencil.

First, get yourself warmed up by walking briskly for a few minutes. Record the time and start walking as fast as you can. Push yourself, but don’t overdo it. When you cross the one-mile mark, record the time again. Calculate how many minutes it took to finish the mile.

	Time in minutes to walk one mile
Fitness level	50-year-old woman	50-year-old man
Excellent	under 14:42	under 13:24
Good	14:42 to 15:36	13:24 to 14:24
Average	15:37 to 17:00	14:25 to 15:12
Fair	17:01 to 18:06	15:13 to 16:30
Poor	more than 18:06	more than 16:30

Don’t be concerned about how low your METs are now or how slow you walked. What’s important is to improve them. You can do this with regular exercise that challenges your body. That means working hard enough to speed up your heartbeat and breathing.

The intensity of exercise and the amount of time spent exercising that are needed to improve fitness differ from person to person. The goal is to increase your METs or decrease the number of minutes it takes you walk one mile. Don’t rush it. Improving fitness starts within weeks but will continue for months.

Reprinted from: 

Howard LeWine, M.D., Chief Medical Editor
Internet Publishing, Harvard Health Publications

US Masters Nationals 25k, swimming with some of the nations best Open Water swimmers

Swimming with the many of the nations best open water and in many cases that other concrete jungle with lanes, walls and lines (aka, a pool) masters swimmers is always a treat each June. I am so blessed to be able to hang with such great and selfless folks, friendly and yet when that gun goes off competitor's to the end. Vic Rian, Jim Barber, Marcia Cleveland to name a few. These folks and other's between them probably have and hold more than a few national records, perhaps some world and many age titles to their credit not to mention such huge accomplishments like the English Channel, Swim around Manhattan island (MIMS), Catalina channel, and so on. I also have the honor to swim almost daily with my training partner Doug McConnell, who in his own rite is way up the ladder in accomplishments. 

The other critical leg to any endeavour like climbing Mount Everest, is team work. This time I was treated to having my long time close friend and college roommate, Charlie Hiltunen, come along for the day and kayak alongside my long workout.

Long time friend, Charlie Hiltunen, kayaked for 61/2 hours supporting my crazy dream. I think he had it harder than me, 85f air temp and humidity. Not sure who had the harder day.

At this point in my training for the English Channel, swimming a 25k (15 miles) is akin to a long workout and this was exactly how I approached the weekend. I and Doug didn't slow down training this week to rest or "taper" as this week like so many before it was another 45,000 yards, this time the bulk coming in 'A Long Swim' as my partners blog so aptly describes. 

We arrived a bit before 6am on a warm morning, water temperature this year was a wonderful 75f (last year for the 10k Nationals it was 90f) so I was looking forward to a nice 'dip'. Storms in the area inundated us and delayed the start for two hours. So I laid down on the floor and draped my swim suit across my eyes and took a snooze. I woke up one or twice to chat with old Goshen friends Leslie Barks and Mark Ahonen which was a wonderful surprise to see after so many years and learn of their interests in the sport as well. They both are members of the host team and themselves run marathons and do tri-athlons. Anyway, They made the official call that the distance would be shorted to a 20k. However for those folks that made it to 20k within 6 hours they could continue on to the original 25k distance. 

About 30 minutes before the restart woke up a bit groggy, got changed and greased up. with a swim this long the chaffing even in fresh water is a bit unpleasant. I was feeling very relaxed and casual, an attitude I was fine with given my view of this was more training. So off we went and the day progressed. My feeding stops were similar to my attitude, a bit more casual than usual. So we chugged on, and on, and on. The sun finally came out late int he day along with some strong breeze and boat chop on lap 4. I enjoyed this since this added some distraction to the otherwise mundane left arm, right, left, right, L, R, L, R...You get the picture. Well as things went I pulled across the 20k finish line around 6 1/2 hours so my day was finished at the official distance due to the storm delay, I was a bit bummed as I was just moving long nicely in 'forever mode'. 

I ended up 5th in the nation this day in my age group and to be honest I did have a bit of that 'comptetitive remorse' for taking it so relaxed. But I'm fine with that and really more to the point, my right shoulder which had developed a pulled muscle/nerve issues at Tampa bay was clearly back where it should be. So I was comforted by knowing that going forward the next two months were full throttle.

This past week was a light week in training mileage 20k total to recovery these old bones. Today (Saturday) we were back in Lake Michigan in 57f cold water (love it!) and crystal clear water with group of 'Usual Suspects' - Doug, Marcia, Chris, Laura. 

So here we are today, just under 60 days to the the next step in the 'One Stroke at a Time' journey. I am fired up and continue to learn from all the divergent paths taken thus far, set backs, success's and other personal challenges that I have shared to date. 

I can feel the mental focus sharpening and physically stronger than I could have imagined 3 years ago. My Journey of self discovery continues to amaze me, the wonderful family, great training partners and friends that have helped me along the way is what is really important. Thanks Everyone!

Get Busy Living or Get Busy Dying! I choose to Live!

Putting in the Mileage -2 1/2 months until Dover & US Nationals 25k

I continue following the training plan and this week logged 45,000 yards, in the past seven days have been in lakes more now than the pool. This will continue to be the plan from here on out. Switching to much longer weekend swims 5k (3.1 miles) minimum and heading to 10-15k range over the next few weeks.

In two weekends the US Masters Nationals for the 25k (15.5 mile) distance are being held in Indianapolis so this will be a good strong workout day for me. This is the same lake (Morse) I have been now for a number of swims so it comfortable and well known. But 70 very talented national caliber people are entered and it will be crowded until things stretch out. Since my goal is Dover and the English Channel this will simply be a 6-7 hour workout for me. Charlie Hiltunen, one of my long time friends will be kayaking and providing support for safety and food stops this day so the kayak will be full of food and we'll both need lots of sun screen.  

USMS 25 K Photo's

Memorial Weekend Training swims

A weekend of solid training was had in Morse Reservoir, Noblesville, IN site of the up coming USMS National 25k race. Friday - 5k, sat 10k, sun 5k = total 20k. More of these longer swims to come now counting by hours rather than yards and miles. 

My hosts getting ready for the mornings swim

Here is a picture below at 7am just before taking off for a 10k (6.2 mile) training swim. Now you can begin to understand why OW swimming has such appeal, calm, quite, beautiful. Water was 66-68f  and the sun just peeking over the trees made for a relaxing and wonderful weekend. I was leaving from the dock of the race director, Dick Sidner and was lucky to be swimming with an exceptional group of OW swimmers Jim Barber (English Channel among others) and Victoria Rain (Catalina Channel among others) and others. 

Wow, they are fast! I just motored along in my usual way as the constant 'turtle' in the race approach works for me. I swam consistently at 1 hr 15-20 min. per 5k pace. I was at a bit of a loss for nutrition supplied energy however, I did not bring on this trip my Maxim carbo loader so regular gatorade and Gu energy packs were the meal of the day. I was pleased with the results regardless as my base training allowed me to keep going comfortably but noticed afterwards on Sunday I was a bit more tired than usual, so the lack of re-fueling probably came home roost in the muscles.