Amy Reinink

I’d planned to spend today’s post dissecting the swim course for the Luray International Triathlon, giving you a sneak peek at what swimmers can expect on race day. But I realized something interesting as I got ready to actually write it: *I* was bored by the topic, and I’m the one swimming it tomorrow!

Instead, I want to tell you about why I was bored by the idea of basically replicating the athlete’s guide (which you can find here): At this point in my racing “career,” I’ve sorta been there, done that.

If you’re an amateur endurance athlete (if you’re reading this, I’m guessing you are), you probably know what works for you on race day. You know what to eat the day before (something pasta or pizza related), and whether you also need to be careful about your diet two days before (yes). You know how many hours you need between your pre-race breakfast and the moment the starting gun fires (two hours, so 6 a.m. tomorrow), and what you need to eat (oatmeal with blueberries, please). You know what you need to pack (my delightfully simple packing list: swimsuit and goggles).

My go-to pre-race breakfast.

By this point, you’ve either trained or you haven’t. If you haven’t trained specifically for your event, you have a good idea of whether or not your body is prepared. In my case, recovering from the Great Chesapeake Bay Swim in June and a training hiatus thanks to some unplanned travel earlier this month prevented me from training as hard as I would have liked to for this race. But I know myself and my abilities, and know I’m ready to at least try to swim quickly for 1,500 meters tomorrow.

The site of my workout tomorrow morning, which explains why I'm feeling so mellow.

That means only one thing: It’s all over but the swimming! Wish me luck!

I’m not going to tell you yet another story about yet another reluctant journalist who, as David Carr put it, “succumbed to Twitter out of professional necessity” and grew to love it despite her best intentions to continue doubting and reviling it. (If you want some of that good stuff, check out David Carr’s column on the topic). I do want to tell you about why I decided to change my Twitter handle from DCRunnergrrl to AmySReinink, and about how the change reflects my changing attitude toward Twitter.

I first started tweeting two years ago solely as a way to promote my short-lived D.C. Running Examiner page. I chose “DCRunnergrrl” as a handle without too much thought, and set out to tweet about the D.C. running community in hopes of luring more readers.

What happened next: I found this crazy, fun, virtual locker room full of amateur athletes sharing tips about training and races and horror stories about blisters and poo (runners love talking about the latter). I stopped writing for Examiner.com after a few months, but I stayed stuck to Twitter like glue, tweeting the results of my long runs leading up to the Marine Corps Marathon in 2009, and calling on my new locker-room buddies for inspiration and motivation.

Then, the traumatic (for me) Marine Corps Marathon happened, and the outpouring of support from athletes I didn’t even know was simply astounding. I started paying more attention to what else I could find on Twitter, connecting with swimmers and skiers and University of Colorado football fans (yes, we still exist), and finally to my fellow journalists and news sources. Through Twitter, I have found out about training plans for the Great Chesapeake Bay Swim, the earthquake in Japan, and everything in between, to include Free Slurpee Day. I’m still a news junkie who values traditional journalism, and I love that Twitter can point me toward stories I may not have found otherwise—not to mention toward new blogs and new friends and training partners, virtual and otherwise. (A side note: Without Twitter, I never would have found out just how fired up D.C. endurance athletes get when you bring up lane lengths at Wilson Aquatic Center).

A few weeks ago, a colleague at the DC Society of Professional Journalists asked for my Twitter handle. I hesitated before telling her “DCRunnergrrl,” cringing at how unprofessional it sounded next to a simple first-name last-name construction.

The more I thought about it, the more I felt compelled to change my Twitter handle—but for a completely different reason than how it sounds in a professional setting. DCRunnergrrl represented a writer hiding from Twitter, using it for blatant self-promotion and never correcting the record when that goal became unimportant. At @AmySReinink, I will continue to tweet a wide variety of D.C. running stuff. The name-switch reflects that I’ll tweet not just about running, but also about swimming, cooking, news-nerd stuff and life stuff. It also reflects the fact that I’m on Twitter to stay, not for work purposes, but because—well, it’s just kind of awesome.

Are you on Twitter? What led you to start tweeting, and what has surprised you most about the site? Did you put more time and thought into choosing your Twitter handle than I did? If so, how did you choose yours?

My apologies for my recent hiatus. I’m back (at least in terms of my Monday-Wednesday-Friday blog-posting schedule), and do I have a story for you!

I’m at my parents’ place in Florida right now. This means lots of hot weather and lots of older folks, with all the erratic driving and early-bird specials the latter implies. The presence of a lot of older folks also greatly increases the chances that you’ll get schooled by someone old enough to be your grandpa, which is exactly what happened to me this morning.

When I’m here during the summer, I try to catch up with a master’s club that swims in the outdoor pool near my parents’ house from 5:30 a.m. to 7 a.m. daily. I drag my butt out of bed for the pre-dawn practice because the pool temperature is 88 degrees first thing in the morning with an aerator cooling the water down, compared to 91 degrees later in the day. With air temperatures above 90, with 99 percent humidity, that makes it medically inadvisable to swim at any other time. Seriously. You can’t breathe, and wonder if it’s possible to literally cook your skin in water that warm.

So there I was this morning, already red-faced and hot after my warmup. I was splitting a lane with an older gentleman swimming with a pull buoy, and he stopped to ask if I felt OK. He told me he likes the water that warm, and I thought to myself: “Of course you do. You’re 900 years old.”

“Too bad you won’t be here tomorrow,” he told me. “We’re doing 58 100’s for the coach’s 58th birthday.”

I made a face that involved grimacing, laughing maniacally and fighting nausea all at the same time. My lane partner laughed.

“So I guess that means you’re glad you missed the 72 100’s we did for my last birthday?”

I went back to my workout impressed and inspired, focused less on the hot water and thick air and more on the awesome people around me and beautiful sunrise above me.

My iPhone photo doesn't do justice to the Florida sunrise I saw at the pool this morning—but it gives you an idea.

Today, I’m motivated by the idea that someone old enough to be my parent or grandparent is out there kicking butt, which means it’s possible for me to do the same when I’m that age. My morning dose of motivation comes as Olympic swimmer Janet Evans attempts a comeback to rival Dara Torres’, and as endurance swimmer Diana Nyad attempts to swim the Florida Straits, starting last night. Check out her training plan here.

Before the swim, 61-year-old Nyad said she hoped her swim would inspire the rest of us schlubs to continue challenging ourselves and pushing for our dreams throughout our lives. “I also want it to be a moment for thousands, and I dare say millions of people my age, who are going to look and say, ’60!'” she reportedly said.

By the way, I’m also motivated by what’s coming up this weekend: My swim leg of the Killer Honey Badgers triathlon relay team at the Luray International Triathlon!

What’s motivating you this week?

I’m going to be out of town for a few days, and will be posting irregularly until I’m back at my desk. But I wanted to pass along the workout I did before skipping town—the workout that left me confident I’m ready to push myself to swim a quick 1,500 meters as part of the Killer Honey Badgers triathlon relay team at the Luray International Triathlon upon my return.

1,500-meter time trial: 24 minutes. Obviously, I’ll be slower in a lake, without the benefit of walls to push off of every 50 meters. But this was the first time I’d tried to swim any distance quickly for quite a while, and I was pleasantly surprised at the outcome.

15X100 free on 1:45. The first time I did this set, I was scrambling to complete each rep by the end of it. But yesterday, I only got faster as the reps wore on, and still had a good 10 to 15 seconds rest after finishing each 100. *Major* confidence-booster.

What fuels speedy sets in the pool? Fresh blueberries from my beloved CSA and farm stand, of course.

I usually polish off a pint of these delicious blue flavor-bombs with a big bowl of steel-cut oats in the morning.

I also usually top that bowl of oatmeal with blueberry sauce, or blueberries heated with a tiny bit of maple syrup and cinnamon.

I eat them throughout the day, too, on top of salads and mixed into yogurt. Those dishes mysteriously disappeared before I could photograph them.

I know blueberries won’t be in season forever. Luckily, their replacements—fresh peaches and plums—are waiting in the wings …

Don’t worry—I’m not going all P90X on you.

But I have to admit that Tony Horton, the guy behind the super-expensive workout videos, is onto something. You may remember that back in April, I stumbled upon a story about Horton in Men’s Health in which he said something that really hit home for me: “The more you dread doing something, the more value it holds for you. So if you hate stretching or intervals, that’s probably because flexibility and speed are your weaknesses.”

This week, as I knock out a series of hard sprint workouts in the pool as a pre-race tune-up ahead of the Luray Triathlon, which I’ll compete in as part of the Killer Honey Badgers triathlon relay team, I’m reminded of how good it sometimes is to do something you’re really bad at. For me, that’s sprint freestyle, which I’ve been whining about for weeks, and actually doing something about for the last few days. I’ve been doing variations of the workouts you guys suggested last week, and holy moly, are they kicking my butt!

I start pretty much every workout by swimming 1,500 meters, with the first 500 at warmup pace and the last at “I am being pursued by a shark” pace. On Friday, I followed that with 15 X 100 longcourse meters on 1:45, thanks to suggestions from Katie at Run This Amazing Day and Allison at Runner in Progress.

This was pretty much the first time since high school I swam anything resembling intervals, and that’s exactly how the set felt. By the end, the perfectly reasonable 1:45 felt impossibly short, and I even had to roll right into the last 100, because I had zero time to rest after taking so long on the previous one. But when I heaved myself out of the pool, I was instantly grateful for the wake-up call to my shoulders, letting them know it’s time to get in gear again. I felt the same way earlier today, when I did a set of 250s suggested by Victoria at The District Chocoholic.

My inner monologue looked like this, from start to finish:

Pre-swim: NO! NonononoNO!

Early-swim: I’m gonna kill this swim. Look at me, going so fast after so much time!

Mid-swim: Gaaaaarrrghhh! (This may have been not-so-inner, but rather screamed into the water).

Post-swim: Awesome. I am awesome.

So this week, I’m motivated by the joy and excitement that follow the completion of a real challenge—and the feeling that I did something that really, truly made me stronger.

What’s motivating you this week?

What a shame that just as D.C. weather gets really nice, I’m stuck swimming in a climate-controlled indoor pool rather than running outside, huh?

I am ducking, to get out of the way of the things all you runners are throwing in my direction right now.

Obviously, it’s 9,000 degrees in D.C., and I am loving the crap out of the fact that I have a good reason to eschew all workouts that don’t involve immersing myself in a body (or pool) of water. And now that I’ve looked at a calendar for the weeks leading up to the Luray Triathlon, which I’ll compete in as part of the Killer Honey Badgers triathlon relay team, I’ve been able to fine-tune my training plan.

The only race on my calendar involves me jumping into this. Don't be jealous!

Basically, I’m counting on my training for and finish of the Great Chesapeake Bay Swim on June 12 as my base here. I took a few weeks to cross-train and rest my shoulders after swimming the Bay, and am hoping the swim gods look kindly upon that rest period, followed by about a month of tune-up training. I’ve got three weekends and two weeks of training left (third week is taper week)—that should be enough to wake up my arms and remind them of all that swimming I did in May and June, right?

As previously discussed, my training will consist of three 3,000-meter swims per week, with more sprints than usual built in. My go-to sets will be:

• 1,500-meter time trial
• 3X 300 free, first six strokes of every 50 sprint
• 1,800-meter pyramid set on :15 rest: 1×50 > 1×100 > 1×150 > 1×200 > 1×250 > 1×300 > 1×250 > 1×200 > 1×150 > 1×100 > 1×50
• 4×25 sprint freestyle on :45, then 4×25 no-breath freestyle

Have you trained for the swim portion of an international-distance triathlon—or any other 1,500-meter event in calm water? If so, I’d be much indebted if you’d share your favorite speedy sets—I resist sprint/interval sets with all my heart and soul, and could really use some ideas on how to make them more fun.

Photos of Lake Arrowhead, where I’ll swim 1,500 meters on Aug. 13 as part of the Killer Honey Badgers triathlon relay team, courtesy of Jenny Ruley Photography, via the Luray Triathlon website.

I came, I jogged, I conquered!

My Rockville Rotary Twilight 8K results: 46:53, or 9:26-minute-mile pace; 358/1074 women; 76/193 women in my age group

You may be wondering why I’m motivated by such seemingly lackluster race results. While a super-fast race is inspirational and motivational for all the obvious reasons (i.e., if I can do that, what *else* can I do?), I’m actually pretty pumped that with minimal running-specific training, I was able to easily, comfortably complete a 5-mile race at a perfectly respectable pace. My legs were tired the last mile—I tried to accelerate in the last stretch of the race, but my quads respectfully declined to do so—but overall, it was just a good, fun workout followed by a cool block party with a live band and free beer, leaving me with a general feeling of: “Again! Let’s do it again!”

What’s motivating you this week?

Editor’s note: The editor apologizes for her recent overuse of alliterative titles. The popular “faith not fear” mantra just seemed like a great title for today’s post, and, well, it’s Friday. Feel free to throw tomatoes in my direction for too much cuteness.

Editor’s note No. 2: The editor was a lifeguard in high school and college who has great respect for the ocean, and was not the only person swimming at Virginia Beach yesterday. Just so you don’t think the editor has completely lost her mind.

I spent the past couple days in Virginia Beach, Va., to accompany Steve on a work trip. That meant working at a lovely independent bookstore and cafe called Prince Books during the day, and hitting the beach in the late afternoon and evening.

When I showed up at the beach on Wednesday evening, the water looked calm and lovely, perfect for an easy 30-minute swim:

When I showed up at the beach yesterday morning, though, the shoreline looked like the middle of the ocean, with huge whitecaps colliding with each other before they reached shore. The red flags posted on the lifeguard stands were billowing in the stiff wind, and the riptide was rumored to be something fierce.

I ditched the idea of going for a real swim (as if I could have if I’d wanted to!), and decided to get in and splash around. Instantly, the riptide knocked me sideways. I decided to take advantage of the conditions and swim into it (riptide=even better than an infinity pool for Great Chesapeake Bay Swim training), but ditched that plan when I literally didn’t go anywhere for 10 or 15 minutes (I was swimming hard, but the tide kept me in the same place).

Finally, I gave in, and decided to try to ride one of those crazy, disorganized waves back into shore. Between the huge waves barreling into me from the front and the riptide pulling me sideways, I was getting whipped all over the place as my feet stayed stubbornly planted in the sand …

Whoa. Feet planted, knee moving every which way with force? My knee!

I spent about a minute hyperventilating in fear at the idea of ruining my newly minted ACL graft, then realized: My foot stayed in the same place, and my body got whipped around all over the place … and I was *fine.*

I’m not planning to test my luck again anytime soon, but playing in rough water proved to be an important step for me in overcoming my post-ACL-tear fears. At my physical therapy graduation on Monday, we talked about how in the end, it’s just going to come down to getting out there and *doing* stuff. Yesterday, I did just that.

Not long after that, I spotted the perfect wave to take me back into shore. I waited until it was just about to crash on me, took a deep breath and flung myself in front of it, instantly propelled forward by its force. The wave was still strong and fast as I approached the shore, and I rolled quickly to my side to avoid being body-slammed onto the beach. I ended up flat on my back in ankle-deep water, giggling in exhilaration, unfazed by the dude with the boogie board standing a few feet away.

“Looks like you had a good ride,” he said, amused.

Well … yeah!

Have you ever worked your way back to normal activity after rehabbing from an injury? What were you afraid of, and how did you overcome that fear?