First Swim Meet!

I did my first swim meet this past weekend… the Masters State Championships at Phoenix Swim Club (December 10-11).

I was a nervous wreck the morning before my meet…

1. I didn’t know how to dive – I watched Michael Phelps videos to learn how to dive off the block.  I think this made me even more nervous.

2. It was something new –  It was the first swim meet I had ever done… and I only knew one other triathlete doing this with me.

3. Swimming isn’t my strength –  One of my main goals this offseason is to improve my swim.  I don’t want to come out of the water in triathlons middle of the pack anymore.  I’ve made it a point to go to  Masters 4-5x a week.

Swim meet: I walked into Phoenix Swim Club and I felt so out of place. No triathlon people. No M-dot calf tattoos. No long porta-potty lines before the race.  Instead, people were writing all of their events on their bodies. I decided to copy them to pretend like I was a swimmer. Thank goodness I saw my triathlete friend, Jen Martin, by herself thinking the same thing.  What the heck are we doing here??

I practiced a few dives… it was much easier than I thought. I knew my form wasn’t perfect, but at least I wouldn’t look like a complete fool.

I put on my teammate’s  swim parka to look like a swimmer:

My first event was the 1500M free. I stepped up on the block, got set, and the gun went off.

I didn’t false start, my goggles didn’t fall off, I didn’t slip, and I didn’t bellyflop… SUCCESS.

We had swim counters.  On lap 15, I saw this:

I raced a girl. She beat me.

I finished in 22:25.29… under my goal time of 23:00!

Once I got the first event out of the way, I realized it wasn’t so bad. The meet felt very low key and all the swimmers were really helpful and friendly.  There were some of ex-collegiate swimmers and some Olympic hopefuls there. It was impressive to watch how fast they moved in the water.

My events:

Saturday: