9 November 2021
Lately, I've been trying to apply cognitive reframing to certain areas of my life, to see if a simple shift in my perspective, my outlook, my expectations could make for more overall positivity in my life.
As I got all het up sweating through my 3 x 300 test set at my local LA Fitness this morning, I decided to reframe my attitude around LA Fitness's "hot tub" approach to pool temperatures. Here's where I ended up:
Normally, I prefer pools to be heated or cooled to "competition temperature," ideally in the 78-80 degree Fahrenheit range. This is the historic source of my frustration with hot pools: why don't pool managers know this simple truth?
However, I loved living in Arizona for 21 years and would routinely and quite truthfully tell people that Arizona's summers were my favorite season there. I liked the heat; I moved for the heat.
As further evidence for my love of heat, I used to specifically go to hot yoga classes ... all the better when I could roll up to one when it was already 115+ F outside!
So, all I need to do is to reframe my perspective of hot pools: to see them as yet another place where I can indulge my love of the heat!
The mindshift change helped by the end of the workout, but I'm still going to blame my lack of progress on the hot pool versus the deep & cool pool I swam in about a month ago for this set of 3 x 300 on 4:00:
My best performance ever on this was back in December of 2016, when I went 3:08+, 3:09, 3:08+
2016-01-04 - 3:16, 3:15, 3:14
2018-11-23 - 3:25, 3:22+, 3:19+
2019-08-01 - 3:34, 3:33, 3:30
2019-12-02 - 3:27, 3:29, 3:25
2020-02-03 - 3:18, 3:17, 3:19
2020-08-02 - 3:22, 3:26, 3:25
2020-09-17 - 3:24, 3:25, 3:24
2021-08-29 - 3:20, 3:19+, 3:20
2021-10-03 - 3:16, 3:16+, 3:16
2021-11-09 - 3:16, 3:16+++++, 3:18
I had done my standard 1,750 yard long warmup to begin with, then followed up with 7 x 50 active recovery after the 300s before attempting a timed 400 kick as I also start training for the MEMO 400 Kick for time virtual event. I was a very slow 6:22 today ... which means I have a long way to go to match the 5:37 I put up last year.