GregInTheWater
GLASGOW OPEN WATER SWIMMING COACH
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The middle of November has arrived. The Jacaranda trees have been in bloom for a month or so due to the early start of the summer. Huge bushfires have raged for weeks outside the city destroying hundreds of homes, making their presence felt with the pall of their smoke. That means it must be time for the start of the open water swimming season again in Sydney. After the hottest September… Read More
It is now the end of May, which means it is time to report on my adventures for the twelve months ended 31 May 2013. This corresponds to the custom that the open water season in Australia finishes on 31 May each year. So what have I achieved during this period? I completed a total of 19 swim races, four in New York city, and 15 in Sydney, covering a distance… Read More
The month of November seems to come round quicker each year. As the jacarandas blossom throughout the city, thoughts of ocean swimmers turn to the opening of the season. Once again the Cockatoo Island swim in Balmain marks the start of the year of swimming in the open water in Sydney. It only seemed like yesterday when I completed the last of my four swims in New York City. Those swims had… Read More
That’s right. The Statue of Liberty in New York. The one that was a gift from France to the USA to celebrate 100 years of US Independence and opened in 1886. The one that is there to welcome immigrants from the Old World as they sail into New York Harbour on their way to Ellis Island: “Keep ancient lands your storied pomp” cries she With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your… Read More
After my trip to New York, I headed back to the squad to keep up the training. I was still in the second fastest lane, but I was slowly moving up the swimming order within the lane. I was finding that I was making more of the time repeats in the lane. That told me I was getting stronger and faster in the water. I had managed to swim over fifty km… Read More
The 2011 season was over (note the season runs from 1 June till 30 May). In that period I had swum in six swims for a total distance of 13.4 km. Each event was at least two km, and I never did two races on the one day. The boffins at oceanswims.com do a tally of everyone in Australia who enters these swims. For that season there were 43,461 swimmers who competed… Read More
I had come to realise that if I was to be more confident in the ocean swim environment I had to be fitter, and also get more comfortable swimming in the ocean. So I decided to change my training pool to the Andrew Boy Charlton Pool in Sydney. The only problem was this pool was closed during winter, and was a thirty minute walk from where I lived. Thus I continued swimming… Read More
After my return from Europe I needed to find a new training pool. I went to the North Sydney pool about a 10 minute walk from where I was living. This pool has the record of being the pool that has had the most number of world records set in it. It was the pool where the Australian titles were held in during the 1950s and 1960s when people like Dawn Fraser,… Read More
GregInTheWater 