Swim expo asia 2014 Race Report

Had been looking forward to this event ever since I had joined ny swim class, sort of like taking this as a graduation swim.

Signed up for all 5 events, which was a combination of 3.8k, 1.9k, 1.5k, 750m and 400m open water swims. All to be completed back to back.

The prep swim done a couple of weeks ago gave me much confidence that this will be a walk in the park. Especially after seemingly having ironed out the possible issues of swimming in a wetsuit, where the #1 enemy is chafing

My preparation for race day, as usual, a McD Fish Fillet meal in the morning with iced milo to wash it down, while I drive to the race venue. Thunderstorms roared and heavy rain and wind caused a 1.5hrs delay to the start of the first 3.8km swim.

By the time it was clear to race, the sea became more choppy. I stuck with my wetsuit and tempo trainer, and went at a pace of 1.20 sec per stroke.

Bad mistake.

Confluence of a series of factors caused me to abandon the 3.8km when I was into the 5th (out of 6) laps. First 3 laps of 600m went fairly ok, but the choppy waves really started taking its toil on me on the 4th lap as I started to feel seasick. The feeling of wanting to throw up did not subside as I continued swimming at a slower pace, ignoring the tempo that I had set on the trainer. The tempo was probably set a bit too fast, so my breathing and heart rate was on the high side on lap #4. The constricting wetsuit made the nausea feeling worse as I couldn't control my heart rate and breathing even after coming to a standstill on my swim (though the waves made sure it was an uncomfortable pause in my swim).

Sensing that it will be futile to continue with my swim, I decided to abandon the race and signaled for the lifeguards to pull me out of the water. 1st thing after getting onto the boat is to unzip my wetsuit, and I immediately felt much better. Though I did throw up my breakfast in the toilet 20 mins after getting on shore.

Managed to complete the remaining 4 events without much issues (without the wetsuit), though the seasickness got to me for the 1.9km and 1.5km swim as I threw up again after these 2 events.



This is the first time that I have a DNF in any form of race.
It is a milestone decision, but I believe I made the right call.
Getting to know my limitations better and not stretching all the way till physical failure, will pave a safer and longer lasting path for my future sporting endeavours.
I'm still proud that I still managed to soldier on despite puking after each swim for the 1st three events.

Still managed to pick up some new knowledge from this swim.

1) Never try new stuff in a race - taking this mantra further, it should be "never try a mixture of too many new stuff in a race"
Just learnt to use the tempo trainer not too long ago. Shouldn't have deployed it on a wetsuit swim without fully getting used to the wetsuit
Hyper ventilating in the wetsuit. Even though I didn't really hyper ventilate this time, but being unable to slow down the breathing to suppress my urge to puke when seasick, it can be reasonably superposed to imply that will have a similar effect if I really hyperventilate.

2) Managing the choppy waves.
Dave Cameroon mentioned about slicing through the waves instead of trying to ride the waves. It worked pretty well except for the other part, that I still need to breathe.
Slicing thru the waves works on the side when I wasn't breathing, but on the side when breathing is required, I had to ride higher on the wave to catch my breath (and sight), which equals to riding the wave.
I had to ride higher or I risk taking in seawater (which I took too much during the swim that is also the cause of the nausea).
My coach mentioned that we should breathe less in choppy waves.
After experimenting in the 750m and 400m when I did a sequence of 2 stroke, sight, 4 strokes, 2 strokes, 4 strokes. It worked.

3) Tempo trainer.
Getting too aggressive on the tempo without fully understanding the wetsuit effect is another big No No.
Putting the tempo trainer in the swim cap and having it press against my temples for more than 1 hour causes extra pain. Another big No No

Skip the tempo trainer for the next race. Just use it purely for training.
Race on feel instead.

Conclusion:
I'm fully convinced that my stamina & technique is definitely able to last me through the entire 8.35km challenge. Just that I'm not well prepared enough and poor prep decisions costed me the 3.8km swim. Not completing a race is not something to fret about, but completing a race without learning anything will be a disaster. I had learnt much from this race, which will better help me handle my future races, especially a 3.8km swim for Full Ironman, even if it will be in choppy conditions. DNF here is better than DNF or struggling through a Full IM race.

Looking forward to the next race - StanChart 42km.
Very little time to train now...

A wut? incident happened at the pool today

Had a wut? moment at the swimming pool today.
(WTF wouldn't be appropriate to describe it)

Hadn't done any workout the whole of last week due to biz travel, and only managed to do a short run on Sunday morning, so I needed a quick session at the pool for a small workout and a refresher on what I had learnt during the 6km swim 2 weeks ago.

Was playing around with the new tempo trainer that I had bought.
It works by beeping at defined time intervals, so that I can synchronize my strokes to a fixed timing.
Another way to look at it is that it is sort of like a speed control device since my swim speed will be pretty much limited by how fast the tempo is set.

The pool was pretty crowded, so I had to do a bit of dodging while I swam, and slowly increase the speed of the tempo to test for my breaking point, so I stopped at the end of every lap to tune the tempo trainer.

During one of my laps I realized that there was a lot of splashing on my left, and a swimmer just frantically overtook me at a very high stroke rate.
Minding my own business, I just continued to the tempo that I had set and ignored the swimmer.

At one of my breaks when I stopped to adjust my tempo trainer, the same swimmer talked to me.
He was an old man, probably about 60 years old, telling me "Continue swimming and don't stop. Train your stamina! If you stop at the end of every lap your stamina will not improve"

I was like "WUT?"

And the old man went on to tell me that he trains a lot on his stamina, and does 30 laps continuously before ending with a butterfly lap as a gauge of his stamina, and how his strokes were slow and steady, and asked me if I'm training for any specific event, and said that I should swim non-stop to build on my stamina. And also told me to stick to my lane and not dodge other swimmers so that I can stake my claim on the lane. (Hello, I'm the late comer who is joining others that were already using the lane. It is just basic courtesy that I should dodge them if collision is imminent. If it was someone joining my lane, then its a different story)

At first I thought he was going to get technical, so I just told him that I'm on a tempo trainer (pointed to my tempo trainer) and am working on my Stroke per length then he immediately went "Huh? I don't understand"

Tried explaining the details to him but he couldn't understand anything.
Told him that I just did a 6km swim 2 weeks ago and I'm preparing for a 8km swim this weekend, and had clocked a few ironmans, so I have specific training goals.
Then he just went quiet.

I hate to come off as snobbish fart in telling him my endurance training stuff, but this was really too WUT?

I saw him barely overtake me on one of my laps with extremely high stroke rate and lots of water thrashing, while I'm following a strict cadence rate with minimal splashes. It was akin to overtaking me on his 100m sprint while I'm doing a 10km run.

If his technique was good, I'd have noticed it before he approached me.

Generally I don't offer unsolicited training advice to strangers unless they approach and ask me nicely.
But to offer unsolicited training advice when one does not even know his stuff well, is just plain rude.


Saw this youtube video a couple of days ago, and realize that I'm guilty of unknowingly spewing some of the crap stuff that triathletes say, especially those doing ironman and 70.3
To those whom are in the sport, the lingo seems normal.
But to those who have no idea what is Ironman/Triathlon, it definitely comes off as snobbish.

Gotta to watch my manners next time when I talk about the sport to non-Tri folks

33 years old soon

Turning 33 tomorrow.
Time really flies.

It seemed like only yesterday when I was just a small boy playing with toy soldiers at home, or the secondary school kid whom was totally devoted to NPCC, or the young recruit whom was trying very hard to excel in BMT.

It had always seemed that the transition from one phase to the other phase had always taken some time to get used, but none had made more permanent lasting changes to me than becoming a father.

Taking on the responsibility of taking care of my parents, spouse and children.
Mark of getting mature.

Nonetheless, it always feels good to reminisce about the past.
That explains why I'm extremely attached to old chinese songs that remind me of the good old days when I was much younger.
 Listening to this will always magically transport me back to the carefree days.

And damned, 林志颖 is much older than me, 7 years to be exact, but he still looks like he is 21 years old today, whereas I'm looking like I'm 38 years old when I'm only 33.

Fantastic Holiday @ Bali

Just returned from a 4D3N holiday at Bali with Ryan, Dear and MIL.
It was a fantastic holiday especially for Ryan. He was super happy throughout the entire trip (except during the flight back home)

Thinking back of my previous trip to Bali, which was done about 5 years ago, for my wedding shoot, when Dear and I still had the time to go for white water rafting and surfing, this time it was more subdued and relaxed, with a focus to go much slower than what we did years ago.

I guess MIL was the 2nd most happy person for this trip (after Ryan boy). She was so fascinated and happy with all the foodstuff and clothings that she could buy from the local markets at extreme low prices. It was after a while then I started to understand that nice & expensive stuff is not what makes her happy. It is the joy of getting extreme value for money (read: ULTRA CHEAP buys aka SUPER BIG DISCOUNTS) that makes her happy. My mum does the same too. Probably our mothers' generation are too used to scrimping and saving for their whole life, that is why they derive so much joy from amazingly low priced discovery. So I just played along and kept emphasizing to her on how cheap the food is at the restaurants that we ate at, compared to the price that we will pay for the same thing back in SG.
$4.70 for a chicken Ravioli, $10 for a Risotto, $10 for a huge chilli crab with fries, $9 for a medium sized red snapper, $2 for gelato, etc.

Obviously the small boy is the happiest one in the group. From the moment he stepped into the villa, he just kept running around, in and out of each room, laughing all the time. And he continued doing that for all 4 days that we stayed there. He was very cooperative and well behaved (except during meal time) for the entire trip.

Best part of the trip for me was when I left Dear and MIL at the foot massage centre for a 1 hour massage, and I brought Ryan together with me back to Legian beach for a walk. After carrying him on the hip seat for most part of the day (and he didn't complain much), I thought it will be nice for him to be able to walk on the sandy beach after seeing other older kids running around freely where he wasn't allowed to. So after telling him that he had to hold on to my hand after I placed him on the ground, he got extremely excited and elated, and started to pull me along to run on the beach.

It was a genuine moment of bliss.

We ran and ran and ran, and Ryan just pulled me along, looking back at me at times and giving me his most sunshine, boyish and happy smile. Ryan melted daddy's heart just like that.


Although I did not get to do any of the water sports stuff which I'd have loved to do on Bali's famed beaches, the run with Ryan was rewarding enough for me for this entire trip.

Of course Dear will have enjoyed the trip much as well. It is a long awaited break away from work, and an even longer wait to return to the much anticipated Ultimo Italian restaurant that we dined at 5 years ago. The only downside is that we walked a little too much for her. Carrying a heavy tummy ain't easy.

Next holiday: Cebu Philippines in July/Aug 2015.

Freestyle Mastery Discovery Level 1 pool classes completed

Finally completed all the pool sessions for Level 1 today.
It has been a good 2 months of classes and I had definitely learnt a lot about efficient freestyle swimming.
Will just need to do more self practice in the pool and I'll probably be able to clock <40 70.3="" cebu.="" for="" in="" leg="" mins="" p="" swim="" the="">
Signed up for a few workshops on swimming and cycling by two gurus invited to Singapore.
Hopefully I'll be able to benefit much from these upcoming sessions to make my future training sessions more effective.


My old mentality of mashing my way through will probably cost me more time and mileage in the lead up to my goal of completing a full Ironman. Getting quality help along the way is always welcome.

It is always good to be able to train smart, gain more.

~~~

Just weighed myself moments ago and came to realize that I had lost about 2kg over the last few months. Hadn't been taking my weight regularly so it came as a pleasant surprise. I had been stuck at 70kg for a couple of years and low carb diets/trainings didn't really make any substantial weight loss.
Probably the regular swims helped a lot.

~~~

Finally going for a short getaway holiday (that has nothing to do with ironman) with Ryan & Dear in another 9 hours.
It has been a long awaited break for dear, and it should be fun for Ryan as well.
He is getting more and more interactive and fun nowadays; really a joy to be with.
Happy holidays!

ICT is over, back to office for the daily grind

Finally concluded the 2 weeks high key ICT yesterday.
Somehow time passed rather quickly.
Kinda enjoyed this ICT though.
Getting all the free time to chat with people outside of my usual circle and industry is always refreshing.

Back to work today and looking forward to the long awaited holiday break to Bali next week!


This will be my next challenge.
To complete 5 events in 1 day, a total of 8.35km swim
Technically speaking, after learning the TI technique, swimming any distance shouldn't be a difficult task if timing isn't a consideration.
At around 50% effort, I'll expect to finish the 3.8km in about 1.5hours. (assuming that I'll be able to avoid swimming offcourse)

Hadn't been running regularly for quite some time, partly due to the haze, and partly because I wanted to spend more time with Ryan and Dear on weekend mornings.
So I was pleasantly surprised with my regular distance run last night.
Went at a much faster pace than my last run, though I wasn't planning go fast. Not exactly a good thing if I had been training regularly, but it was a nice reminder that my legs could still hold up after such a long break. The extremely frequent swims in recent days probably helped a fair bit in keeping up the heart rate and endurance levels.

Will need to do more controlled runs in the next 2 months to prepare for StanChart

Swimming milestone achieved!!

It had always been a long standing milestone that I had been trying to achieve ever since I had started working on my swim for Triathlons.

I still remember the time when I used to pant heavily even after finishing 1 lap of freestyle in the pool, to being able to complete the 750m swim for my first Tri at Port Dickson in 2011.

After that it was a continued effort of self improvement through self study on a diet of YouTube videos and Triathlon books, which I managed to improve significantly till a plateau of around 2.10min/100m at an all out effort which is not sustainable for long distance swims.

After attending the TI swim classes, I had found significant improvements in streamlining my body position in the water for the swims, which made it a lot easier to swim with less efforts, but it only allowed me to achieve roughly the same speed as what I used to clock with the "power-your-way-through" swim technique.

Through lots of experimentation and YouTube videos on how the TI Masters swim, and trying to replicate their technique, I finally managed to make a breakthrough today on my swim, and finally clocked slightly below 2min/100m for numerous laps without overly exerting myself. Finally a major milestone has been breached!

This just confirms my belief that TI is really helping me to make significant improvements in my swim.

I'll need to continue to improve my technique further, to make the 2min/100m pace become an easy effort for me, then I'll subsequently target to break 1.45min/100m.

Once I get my swim techniques polished enough by end of 2014, I'll start to work on my bike techniques and endurance come 2015. Hopefully I'll be able to clock below 6.30hr for my next 70.3 challenge, so that it will give me a good foundation and confidence to tackle the Full Iron in 2016

Back for ICT high key

Originally thought that I could use the 2 weeks of ICT to get some proper rest, as it was a perfectly legitimate reason to get away from work and not respond to emails or calls, and probably spend a bit of time to do some physical training.


This ICT for me is basically stepping away from managing businesses for channel partners for a while and step into managing 20+ adults.

Well, issues kept me busy and I got more busy instead of getting the the rest I wanted
However, the upside of this job is that the more time I spend in the camp, the more time I spend talking to my men, and the good old stuff of NS comes seeping back in.

What do you do to kill time in camp?
Talk to each other to find out more about what they do for a living.
Many times we get insights into different industries or lives which we will never be able to see from our own daily lives. It is always interesting to see how diverse the outside world can be.
Part of my work involves getting to know my men better to foresee and nip issues in the bud before they manifest into potentially big/bad problems, so it is work + fun mixed into one.

It has been interesting so far.
I had came across a professional security body guard, an optical shop owner, an animation profession. I'll probably take classes from the body guard for self defense next year when some of my current classes end.
Probably will get to learn more about the rest of the platoon over the remaining 1 week.

Making the best out of my time!