Guerilla Missions

On Wednesdays, I kept sneaking (or being assigned) into the faster lane, until I finally became a regular. However, I was still held out of that lane on Mondays and Fridays. Now, I've begun the process of becoming part of that lane on the other days. I feel kind of like Jane Goodall (so maybe the title should be Gorilla Missions). I hang out on the edge (or the back), until I'm accepted as one of the tribe. So it was today.

After more open-water practice and sprints (these are still not fun), once back in our lanes, we were to do some drafting work, swimming 2x2. My regular lane had seven people today, and our neighbours had five, so to even things out, somebody had to move up. And that somebody was me (you would have thought my lanemates were trying to get rid of me or something). I'd like to say I hung in pretty well. I wasn't killing myself to do any of the work, except for the sprinting, where by definition I should be killing myself. Hopefully with a few more days like this, I'll be moved permanently. It was different from when I'm leading the lane, and dictate pace. "Hard" before was 90% effort, since any more would open too large a gap. Today. "hard" was 95% effort, so even with less yardage, I'm feeling pleasantly worked over. This is how I'll get faster.

We were invited to bring wetsuits today. I didn't, but probably will next week. But I am amazed by the speed increases that people derive from them. Folks from two lanes slower than me were outsprinting me during the OW practice. With the floatation and slipperiness (and drafting other swimmers), I might get a 10-20 second/100m benefit from the suit. That will put me in the 1:40-1:50 range, which will be back FOP or front MOP. And then I can get to the sports I'm actually not bad at. Twenty-three days until we find out if the total package is there.

Swim: w/u - 550m free, OW practice
4x50m mass start sprint/50m ez recovery (no recovery on 4th)
500 drafting 2x2
100 ez non-free
300 forward echelon, 1'
300 backward echelon, 1'
100 ez non-free
300 forward echelon, 1'
c/d - 100 ez non-free
Total: 2600m

Tomorrow's the first race of the spring. It's a 10k run, in the evening. Right now my plan is to do about 40km on the bike in the morning. It would be easy pace, mainly just time outside and aerobar practice. But I'm wondering if maybe I should just rest and get ready for the run. There will be about 8 hours from when I get off the bike to the gun going off, so easily 2-3 meals. Anybody have any thoughts? Votes for or against, with explanations are welcome, from anybody who happens upon the blog (even people who found this post by searching for "Soldier of Fortune" in Google. Sorry about the confusion.)

After work, I will:
Run: 3 miles @ 7.2 mph