Pool/Haul

Two topics today. Shall I start with the pool or the haul? I say pool.

1) Pool. The training continues for my upcoming open water swim in the Pacific Ocean. I had scheduled to go to the pool for a swim on Friday morning before work, but I ended up sleeping through that alarm and didn’t make it (I exercised after work, though, so it wasn’t an unplanned rest day).

So I headed to the pool on Saturday morning, with a brand new pair of goggles that were a recent purchase at Sport Chalet. It was the first time I’ve been goggle shopping in years, and I was completely overwhelmed at the selection. I vaguely remember, as a kid, having about 8 brands/types of goggles to choose from at MC Sporting Goods in suburban Detroit, but Sport Chalet stocked probably close to a hundred options:

I settled on this pair of Speedo goggles, partly because they had the type of seal around the eye I was looking for, partly because they were reasonably priced ($18), and partly because I liked the orange.

These pictures, by the way, are old news if you follow me on Twitter.

Now that I’ve swum with them, I can say they’re great goggles, although I’m no longer digging the orange as much. They make the water look yellow, and there’s a connotation with yellow water that makes me a little bit… grossed out.

As for my workout, I wanted to start with a long distance swim, without stopping, as my warm-up. I need to get used to swimming without stopping, because the ocean doesn’t have walls or lane lines or anything else to hold on to (maybe I’ll befriend a helpful dolphin that will let me hold onto its dorsal fin?).

I got in the water and started swimming, trying to remember how many lengths of the pool is equal to 1.2 miles (the distance of the open-water swim). I couldn’t remember my calculations, and when I tried to recalculate in my head, I would start losing track of how many lengths I had swum. So I just swam 1,000 yards – 40 lengths. It turns out 1.2 miles equals 84.5 lengths of the pool, so I swam almost half that.

My entire workout:

• 1,000 yards free (without stopping)
• 4 x 200 (2 IM, 2 kick, 1 pull) = 800 yards
• 6 x 100 free (with my head up for the 3rd 25 of each 100) = 600 yards
• 4 x 50 free (all-out sprints) = 200 yards
• 200 yards cool-down.
• TOTAL = 2,800 yards

A good workout that took an hour, almost exactly.

2) Haul. On the way home, I stopped by Jon’s, a family-owned local supermarket that has locations throughout southern California. They have great produce prices, although, to be honest, I haven’t done much shopping in the other departments. I suspect they lure people in with amazing produce prizes, and hope they shop throughout the store, leading to increased sales and profits. And that, my friends, makes produce their loss leader – and that’s your business term of the day!

Here’s what I came home with:

From left to right, top to bottom: A hami melon (which I had never heard of before… and therefore had to try. More on this guy once I cut him open), 3 nectarines, celery, 2 orange peppers, 2 persimmons (hadn’t had one of these in a while!), lychees, strawberries, a bag of cole slaw, apricots, 3 white peaches, carrots, a mini-watermelon, cherries, bananas, grape tomatoes.

Some of the awesome Jon’s prices: 80 cents for the nectarines, $1.14 for the tomatoes, 98 cents for the orange bell peppers, $2.93 for the cherries ($1.29 per pound!). Just over $20 for everything!

I got home and spent a little time washing and prepping stuff. I didn’t go as balls-to-the-wall as I did last week, but everything is in grab-and-go condition for the week ahead.

Keep it up, David!