Success

"Success is simply a matter of luck. Ask any failure." (Anonymous)

Defining success is like the 1964 Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart comment on pornography: "I know it when I see it." Everyone has a different take on what success is, or can be, or should be, and hopefully, you know it when you see it and it doesn't take a 2 X 4 across your forehead to acknowledge it.

Success in training, or racing, comes in different shapes and sizes and colors. I've learned, again through Terry's Ultimate Hard Way, that I must define and create my own version of success. I can't base it on programs, other people's triumphs, books, or schedules. I have to come up with my own. I can use the other things for points of reference, but at the end of the day, I have to find my own way above the plateaus, at my own speed and own time.

I've been swimming various drills and intervals and sets now for--let's see, 7 months now. I started out as a pretty solid 3 minute 100 yard swimmer--which is pretty solidly slow, as swimming goes. In my three tris, I've actually gone a bit faster than that, but that is pure race day zoomies. On short 25 yard sprints I can grunt out a 30 second pace, but I can't hold that pace for more than 50 yards before I collapse and drown.

I kept on swimming the drills the last 7 months, and never really saw an improvement in my swim times. Sometimes, that got discouraging. I finally decided that I was just born to be a slow swimmer (but a steady one, okay?).

Friday night, I swam a 3 X 500 set and was shocked that I did the first 500 in 14.01 minutes. I actually thought my watch had malfunctioned. The second 500, I did in 14:10. This was LESS than my usual 3 minute per 100 pace, and I wasn't racing those 500's (I wasn't slouching through them either, but there was no sprinting involved). I was so excited. I HAD GOTTEN FASTER. Something worked! (Thanks Coach Claire!).

Now, this doesn't mean I will always be faster, but it does mean that I have broken a personal barrier and I have succeeded in one of my goals--getting faster on the swim. Not much faster, I'll grant you, but I may not be done yet either. Stay tuned.

In addition, I managed to run a full 5.4 miles last night and added in one minute fartleks (see my post on that if you don't know what it is) per each quarter mile--throughout the entire 60 minutes without flagging too badly. My body is getting more efficient at running. I can see success there too. It's slow, and it's taken a lonnnggg time, but it's there. I hope I'm not done with it.

I think we are so used to instant gratification in today's world--punch a button, get a meal, hit a switch, the house gets cool--that we forget that some things take time and determination and plain old slogging through days and weeks of work before a glimmer of success shows up. We no longer have to wait through months of frost and spring rains to enjoy fresh vegetables on our table; we no longer have to nuture and grow a calf before we can have our burger at dinner. But when it comes to physical strength and endurance, the rules haven't changed all that much over the eons. Work and sweat hard for a long, long, LONG time (especially if you are an older and less fit athlete--then you can add three more longs to that), and then you will see the benefits--eventually.

Patience is a virtue that I got shorted on at birth, but this stuff is teaching me the value of it.

Yowza. It's 105 degrees today and I'm planning a little bike jaunt. I keep reminding myself that this terrible heat wave is temporary, and in--oh two months or so--the weather will be simply delightful. Raining, but delightful.