Day 54 - Time Trial Swim

Today the training...

Calls for a time trial swim to calculate my critical velocity.

What is critical velocity?

Also known as critical swim speed, critical velocity (CV) is the pace at which someone can swim and still be within their aerobic capacity.

Basically how slow do you need to go on long swims so you don't exhaust yourself.

Today is our day to test and my wife is up first.

A quick 200-meter warm-up is then followed by a 400-meter fast swim, a 2-minute break, and a 200-meter fast-paced swim.

My wife begins and crushes the first leg. She rests and starts again, only stopping when she finishes her last length.

Not going to lie, the confidence I came in with has slowly been diminishing with every lap she completes.

I knew in my mind the lengths, but seeing it in practice has me reeling.

This is going to be way harder than I expected.

I begin my swim slowly. Methodically counting strokes until I reach the end wall.

50 meters without stopping! We're at it again!

The way back doesn't go quite as well, but 40 meters, a quick stop, then a finish.

I do this for the remainder of the duration and find my heart rate has climbed in the 140s.

The 2 minute rest seems to not be long enough before I am off again.

200 more meters ends up being a brutal experience and my mind wanders into frustration.

That's not helping.

I finish and my wife encourages me. She can tell I am not happy with the event.

I end up finishing with a LT pace per 100 of 1:43.

Wow, I may have been a sloth in a different life...