Swimming

I get into the pool for free at least a couple of times a week due to my work as a carer. My client does the aqua aerobics class regularly and I have taken lately to walking and swimming while he’s occupied. I do this in the lanes next to the classes so I can keep an eye on his. Some carers stay right next to the clients for almost everything but I find this causes my client to become too dependent on me. Also I find it easier to keep a watch outside of the class. Anyway, I do keep busy while he’s busy, either with him or nearby.

Initially I was mostly just doing lots of aqua walking and that was good. But in more recent weeks I’ve started swimming, or what I consider my close approximation of swimming. I don’t use the proper strokes all the time but I am kind of close. I never learned to swim properly so really need to take a class to learn proper breathing and the proper strokes but I am reasonably competent at moving the water now. Just a bit slow.

The swimming sort of evolved from some movements I was doing in the water with my arms and added the feet along with it. Seems they turned into actual swimming even though I was doing most of the movement in the walking lane. I’ve been working on building up some stamina while swimming and have gotten a lot faster on some of the strokes. I hadn’t been timing my swims but tonight I started seeing how long it took me to swim the length of the pool (25m). The first time I checked I was over a minute but when I put more effort in I would get faster and I had several laps where I managed to get there in about 45 seconds. I was kind of impressed with my progress. I couldn’t sustain this for too long. I might start out going at a good pace but could sustain it for the full 25 m. I guess I started to flag around the last third so I’d end up taking over a minute in the end. Still it feels good to make some progress. My aim isn’t to become particularly fast but enough to feel like I’m not in the way of other swimmers.

My Apple watch updated its system recently and the activity app changed a few things so that it now is able to distinguish strokes while swimming. It doesn’t recognise my butterfly but it does get the other ones right most of the time. Plus it records how fast I got and how long I rest and all sort of interesting information Who knew this watch would be so cool. I don’t regret the purchase at all. :)