Rutgers Swim Meet

First off: It’s official, Genine has found her inner Dory and she’s putting the pressure on. (Of course that’s not her point of view at all.) I say this because on Sunday afternoon Maija timed Esther, Genine and I for a 1500m time trial. Esther on her first day back after weeks of recovering from an injury finished in 26:20 (I think). I finished in 28:40 and Genine finished in 32:xx. As you can see she’s right there and she said she was just swimming easy... What can I say. Genine is awesome.

Now let's go back to Saturday:
Saturday was a fun day. Todd and I started the day out with our 6AM Hills Run. We had mapped out a new course and because my hip is still somewhat tweaked (Piriformis too tight), had an easier hill day than normal. (no hill sprints). We aren’t getting a break with the cold, it seems any time we get together to run it’s under 25 degrees. I try to remind myself that 25 is easier than 95.

After running I hopped into the pool where Esther was already swimming. The highlight of our workouts typically involves some “all out” pull buoy intervals. No exception today. We did some 50s’ and 25’s and in true Esther fashion, she reduced the recovery interval after the first couple and then added more repetitions to the set. Ha Ha!

After our swim we headed over to the Rutgers pool to watch Maija compete in the Masters Swimming Meet. Her morning event was the 1500m. She had some friends in the lanes next to her so there was some friendly competition. Santa…. I mean Maija did great, she beat her seed time and was pleased with the result. The other perk was I got to play around with the camera and take a ton of pictures. (Note: don’t leave your camera in a cold car, then go into a hot humid event and expect to use your lenses any time soon)


After her 1500m, she and Esther had the video stroke analysis done for $10. Me? I learned to always have my swim bag packed and ready to go at all times. I figured I’d just have it done after the evening events but he ran out of time… ah well.

Maija and Esther

Genine worked in the morning. Then went for a swim at the pool. Immediately followed that up with a run as soon as she got home. Then we headed back over to Rutgers to watch/photograph Maija’s 2 evening events.

I guess after watching all these different swimmers, the one thing I took away from it all is this. Time in the weight room isn’t going to improve your swimming nearly as much as swimming with great position and technique. Obviously having both is awesome but reducing resistance has to be first.