The Mile Swim

You always have to do the mile run in PE class in elementary school, but what about the mile swim? I don't remember ever doing that (thank goodness). A mile. Its not that far, right? Well, not until you get into a pool!! (or maybe I am just a baby) Last night I went to the pool to do my swimming workout before this triathlon on Saturday. I started (after I went back to the locker room to get the ear plugs that I'd forgotten at first) swimming and felt pretty good. I kept going. I reached my 1/2 mile point (which is the distance in the sprint tri) and figured that I'd swim a few more easy laps...

I got to 40 (which in real swimmer's terms is only 20 - but I hate counting that way, it makes it seem so much longer) and thought I might as well do 48. Then why not round it up to an even 50? Then Ben showed up and I thought to myself "well a full mile is only 14 more laps, so why not do it just to prove to myself that I can?" So I did. A mile swim. Wow, I never would have guessed I'd be able to do that. Granted I wasn't swimming super fast (or even anything close to fast), though I did do a few laps of "sprints" to spice things up a bit. I'm pretty sure that's the farthest I'll be swimming for a long time ... but good to know I can actually do it :)

My ears are ok - after a mild setback this weekend. I bought new earplugs at the swim shop, and used them on Saturday. My swimming was awful that day because I had to keep stopping every few laps to readjust the earplugs. I should have stopped and gone home to get the others, but I didn't. I swam my 1/2 mile, then continued on to bike 7 mi and run 3.5 mi. After I stopped and got home, I realized that my left ear was killing me. I waited for a little while but it still hurt. I called my doctor and left a message on the answering service. It was a few hours before he called back, but luckily he did, and he called in a prescription for an antiobiotic ear drop to stave off any infection that may get in as a result of water getting in my ear. Hopefully its fine - it doesn't hurt anymore, and I threw away the crappy earplugs.

In other news, I think my iPod might have really died this time. I went to turn on my alarm clock last night on my iHome, and it wouldn't even turn on. I'm not really sure what's going on with it, but I'm really sad that it means I won't be able to use my Nike+ chip tonight when I run. I guess if worse comes to worse, it just means that I will have to get the brand new iPod Nano. Hmmmmm. Now that's something to think about. Not until after Saturday's race though.