Cool Crisp Water Ready for Early Morning Swimmers
At my swim workouttoday in the wee early hours of the morning, we did one of my favorite sets: 8 x 75s (odds were free, back, free and evens were IM Roll Thru). I love workouts where there is variety, with all the strokes and the evens are different than the odds, etc.. The IM Roll Thru is what really inspired me to write this post. With this type of set, you start by swimming Fly Back Breast, then the next 75 is Back Breast Free, then Breast Free Fly, then Free Fly Back. At that point, you have completed the full roll thru.
I should explain, for non-swimmer types, that the IM stands for Individual Medley where you swim one lap of each stroke: Butterfly, Backstroke, Breastroke, and Freestyle. With the IM Roll Thru, by changing up the strokes and the order with each new swim, you stay engaged, your brain has to stay alert to be on top of the set, and its just SO much more fun than a distance Freestyle set. Distance Freestyle has always been such as snoozer for me. In the 6am hour, I have a difficult time counting past 4.
Luckily, we will typically never do more than a 300 yards at a time, except for a 400 yard warmup, which is fairly haphazard anyway, with people still arriving in their barely awake state.
Trying to make each week like an IM Roll Thru
All Moms with young children know that one week can seem really similar to the next week, and the week following that one feels similar as well and so on. I have found that if I have something on the calendar that I can look forward to that is different than what I did last week, I am in such a better mood, I’m a happier Mom, and everyone wins in my household. 🙂 Date nights, walking tours, girl’s night out, getaways, family trips to a special park we haven’t visited in a while and a trip to the beach for the day all come to mind as something to look forward to that doesn’t happen every week. Now, that we are getting closer to summer, adding variety to each week will be somewhat easier, since our time is more wide open. My three little ones are all on a summer swim team, so we have swim meets each week, movie night, trip to the waterpark, buddy night, pancake breakfast day, and more.
A little Me Time is Important Too
A few months ago, I was really tired of the whole routine of being a chauffeur and a sherpa for my kids, so I declared to my friends that every Tuesday night, after Mountain Man came home from work, I would leave the house at 7pm and come back at 9:00pm when the kids were asleep in bed. Well, that plan lasted one week. Mountain Man came home late the next week, then was out of town the next, and you get the picture. The scheduled “me time” was just not going to work, so I learned my lesson to be flexible. I still think going out at 7pm, in the precarious time before bedtime, and not coming back until 9pm, after the hubby has guaranteed all is quiet on the homefront, is something every Mom deserves at least once or twice a month. Don’t you agree?
Summing Up
So, in a nutshell, I want my life to be more like an IM Roll Thru, rather than a Distance Freestyle Set. In order to achieve this goal, I will continue to try to add in fun outings and special getaways with friends and family into our routine schedules to keep everyone in my family balanced, and in great moods all the time. 🙂 Wish me Luck! Will keep you posted with our different expeditions during these next few summer months that are coming up here very soon.
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