reality

i like one word titles. more dramatic. also if you use a long titles you do't have anything left to write about. if the title was, my shoulder is fried, 32 miles is forever, i have some siblings, and ohh crap you would know it all and there would be nothing left to say. i have one week left and things have been tough.
as i said in my last blog i swam for 7 hours last sunday. it started off fine and steadily got worse. i did great with nutrition, but my shoulders were feeling the last two weeks of workouts. the last hour, my left shoulder was toast. i finished the last of 70 400's and probably couldn't have done another one. i had to get my freinds Mitch and Joe to put the kayak on top of the truck as i couldn't lift my arms over my head. i loaded up on ibuprofen and iced them off and on all day, but on monday morning i still couldn't lift my arm over my head. i usually sleep on my stomach with my arms over my head. sunday night i slept with my left arm by my side. on monday it was darn near locked up. i could not have swum one length. my coach and now good freind Shelly said she would take care of it for me and got me in touch with a doctor to get some strong stuff. it worked and by monday evening i was feeling more confident. i took monday and tuesday off. on wednesday i went to the pool to do an interview for a local tv station. i ended up swimming a bit and did not feel too bad. the shoulder was what i would like to call "tentative", it didn't hurt, but i could tell that the pain was within my reach if i pushed too much. i swam an easy hour wednesday without incident. no snap in my arms but i wasn't hurting so it was positive. i swam 18 miles or so that sunday, 32 miles is going to be forever if my shoulder hurts that bad next week.
fund raising has been okay so far. i have finally seen why people have development jobs. it is a full time job. i am looking forward to haveing some time after the swim to continue what we are doing and to raise more money and awareness.
a lot of friends and family are turning out to help out with the swim. one in particular really means a lot. i grew up for all intents and purposes an only child. my dad was married prior to marrying my mom and had three kids, Susan, Bill and Craig. Craig is 10 years older than i am and Billy 2-3 older than him and Susan 2 older than Billy. we never lived in the same house and only when i was very young did we live in the same town. i cannot imagine what their world must have been like growing up. divorce is hard on every party involved. mostly on the kids. my half brothers and sister were always good to me and besides craig calling my "brat" for the first 6 years of my life, we have always had a loving and good, although distant relationship. i have always wanted more, but besides a decade between us, we all live between 1000 and 3000 miles apart. its tough. we talk from time to time and see each other every 2-3 years and it is what it is. last week my brother bill called and told me to call him when i got a shot. i talked to him thursday and he said he is going to try and make it down for the swim. he lives in kingston ontario, canada (america jr.) which is 2 hours north of syracuse, ny. i was shocked (in a good way). he may not be able to work it out, but the fact that he would come down for it meant the world to me. he wants to get in and swim with me. how awesome is that.

i can't follow that with anything clever or otherwise, this swim is bigger than me.
rocketboy

one week

i am dreaming about my swim. this means one of two things. i am excited about it, or i am stressing about it. i think it is the latter. for the first time since i started this idea i am actually confronted with the magnirude of it. 32 miles is a long way. i can't run 32 miles right now. i could ride 32 miles but it would be a lot slower than i would be used to and i would feel it the next day. that is a funny thought.
part of my concern comes from last weeks 7 hour + swim at the lake. i was tired all last week from the 57k the week before. i had trouble getting any snap back in my arms all week. i told my friend chuck at the beginning of my swim sunday that i was apprehensive about the swim that day. i got in and things went well for the first 3-4 hours. somewhere around 4 hours my shoulders started hurting. around hour 6 they were bad and by the end i did not think i could take another stroke. on monday i couldn't lift my left arm over my head and i could not have swum 25 m let alone 32 miles. i have been eating anti inflamatories for 5 days now and got in the pool a coupld of times over the past two days to loosen up. it is feeling better, but not 100%. in addition i am still tired. i will rest a lot for the next week.
did an interview for baton rouge tv wednesday. it was on last night. nice.
more to come...
rocketboy

57000m

i laugh to think about my old swimming routine. back 3 years or so ago, i was in pretty good triathlon shape. i was placing in my age group and even in top 3 in a race or two. i felt fast in the water. i swam twice a week 3500-4000m per workout. 8000 a week tops. i am almost laughing aloud at the thought of 8000m a week. to put it in perspective i swam 24000 on sunday alone, and 57000 for the week. i swim 8000m or more workouts 2-3 times a week. i was talking to shelly the other day and i said that i did not know what i was going to do with myself after the swim. i dont know if i can go back to 8000m a week. i will proabably come up with another hairbrained idea (i already have one or to cooking). i am going to let my wife and kids get some time with me, work on putting on some races and race some short stuff....maybe. and by maybe i mean it may be short.
i swam in the lake in prairieville sunday. the aforementioned 24000m workout. i felt good until the last hour. then my arms were hurting. nutrition was pretty good. i fed every hour. i never got week, so i guess this will work. i will probably go every 45 minutes or so just to be safe. i had a lot of good support from Ed, Tom, Brandon and Heather. it was nice to see people from time to time. i actually got sunburned on my face from breathing. i was out there for 6 hours so i guess you get more sun than you think. funny.
i am a pace slave. i am obsessed with keeping my pace for this thing. i know that i should not care about how fast i do it, just as long as i complete it. i know this, yet i am a clock watcher and i will push to make sure i keep up. i am obsessed with 1:30 pace for this swim. i don't know why this is so significant a number, but i keep it in the front of my mind. IF i can keep this pace i will finish in the 13hour range IF i don't swim too side to side. i would love to finish under 13 hours, but don't know if it is attainable. i certainly want to finish in less than 16 as i think that may be the upper end of my endurance. not really sure though because i've never gone swimming for 16 hours. 18 days and counting.
going to the coast to shoot a spot for their news this weekend. another marathon trip. leave baton rouge at 3 there from 5-7 eat with my parents. drive back to btr.
big week for my daugther paige's athletic career. she had a bike a thon for st. jude on friday. i told her in the morning that "it is not a competition, so just find out from the teacher who has done the most laps, and then do one more than them so you win." she is four. my wife was unstoked. it appears paige did not need to find out who did the most as she was 3 laps ahead of the rest of her group anyhow. woohoo! then on saturday she had her third soccer game. they do not keep score for these games, but my wife did and our team the Cougars, got beat 8-1. paige scored the only goal for her team. pride baby pride.

keepin the dream alive,
rocketboy

honesty

that lady would swim better if she would slow down, i wonder how long that gatorade bottle has ben there, 19,18,17,16, 4 25's easy, 1 fast, 1,2,3, breath, 17, 18, flip, "so much for my happy ending", stretch out, let your left hand extend, pick up your tempo but don't bounce, head down, am i done yet, i am going to make this swim, i wonder if my mouth will get eaten up by the salt water, hey there goes helen, i am the first one in the pool, i am th last one in the pool, i feel good today, 1:19 flipturn, 3 more hundreds, i wonder if anyone at practice wants to come swim half of this set with me, only 5600 left, i got this, no problems, i wonder if i can hold this pace, "t-t-tonight!". this is just 30 seconds of what my brain feels like each swim. i spend a lot of time by myself in the pool. mandy and shelly would swim with me from time to time, but other than that, no one on the masters team can hold the pace or distances. conversely, i cannot swim with the crawfish kids because i cant hold the pace. so i swim alone, a lot of the time i am the only one in the building. i grew up an only child so it does not bother me too much. you can't talk during it anyhow. swimming to me is not a social activity. a lot of time to think.
this past week i went to the Coast for a marathon trip. i drove into Biloxi, saw my parents then i was off to do a presentationbefore the Biloxi Rotary. it was very productive. i then jumped in my car and went to Bay St. Louis for the funeral for both of best friend from high schools parents. it was surreal. you don't expect both of someones parents to die and without getting into it, the circumstances surrounding this were bad. i then left and drove back to Biloxi to pick up my dad from a small surgical procedure he had on his back. he is fine (as fine as having a needle digging around your sciatic nerve can be, ughhh). i then drove him home to Gulfport and then back to Baton Rouge. it was during the wait in line for the funeral and in the days since that the idea of honesty has kept returning to my mind.

everyone is from somewhere. i had a slightly different upbringing in that i moved to Mississippi, the deep south, from Michigan, the upper midwest, when i was just about to turn 7. it was a bit of culture shock, i must say. yes ma'm, no ma'm, yessir, nosir, i was not familiar with any of this. but i was 7 so i adapted easily and moved on. i made pretty good friends and then after 6th grade, swithched schoold to attend St. Stanislaus College. it is an all boys school in Bay St. Louis and it was a big change. i basically had to make all new friends, and kind of start over. a lot of the kids at the school were either from the Bay and had grown up together, or were "sent" there for various reasons, ranging from getting an education to mostly discipline problems. it was a change, but really 12 year olds can adapt pretty easily too. my best friend from 7th-12th grade and then roomate for my first 1.5 years of college was Scott the guy mentioned above. he transferred to Ole Miss after his stint at LSU and we didn't keep nearly as in touch. my mom called and told me the horrible news about his family the friday it happend. i packed up tuesday and went to the Coast. i arrived at the chucrch and school i have only been to two or three times since 1989. i recall stopping by with a friend from LSU who also went there and we were passing through. i then was in Scott's wedding in May of 1995. i was now entering the same church that i graduated from high school and Scott's wedding. now i was there for a funeral. i got in line outside the church and caught up with a friend Jeff, that i hadn't seen in 5 or so years (oh year, i went to my 15th reunion). as i was speaking to him it struck me that i had not spoken to hardly any of the guys from my school. in fact none of them except Scott every year or two. this is probably quite normal. what struck me was the realiztion that i have been trying to distance myself from the Coast fro 17 years, for no real apparent reason. i mean i swore i would never go back there to live work etc. i had no interest, so little that i didn't bother keeping in touch with hardly anyone still there. this hit me as very sad and unneccesary. i mean the Coast may not be NYNY, but it is (was) really nice. Very laid back, really nice people. i still can't figure out why i never wanted ot go back there, small town mentality i guess. we all run from something. i can't quite figure out what it is yet, but hope to. my friend Scott and i spoke today (3/7) and he kinda said the same thing. it must just be what people do. it sometimes just takes you being really honest with yourself to 1. realize that you probably didn't give someone, somthing or in this case somewhere, a chance, and 2. that you can change this with a minimal effort.

one reason i have not written in awhile is because i completely changed the concept and name of my restaurant. it has also been an eye opening experience. i will expound in my next post.

24 days till the swim.
rocketboy

patience

many of you who read this probably have dealt with fund raising in some capacity. I am learning through experience that it is a full time job. A full time job that I have added to my full time jobs of owning a restaurant and having two kids. Oh, and swimming 40000 m a week. I constantly feel like I am neglecting something, either work, family, or the swim. I just try to be patient and keep on plugging. My mom had joined the fight and is really my fund raiser/do it all helper. There is nothing better in the world than your parents. They put up with all your nonsense and still help you when you bite off more than you chew. I read a book called Swimming to Antarctica by a lady named Lynne Cox. She planned swimming the Bering Strainght for 12 years and didn't have approval from the then Soviet Union until the day of. She just kept at it, had patience and it all came together. I have been working on this swim since November. I can afford a little patience.
I had some great workouts lately. I swam over 5 hours Saturday and more importantly got back in on Monday and had a strong workout. Yesterdays workout was a little slower, but solid as well. Weekly totals were 42000m. I am on back on track after being sick.
More to come....
rocketboy

1 step back and the brain freeze

It has been bound to happen. I had had 12 positive weeks in a row and was due a setback of some sort. I am sitting in bed sick and unable to train. Not the end of the world, just frustrating.

Last weekend I swam my longest workout to date, 19000 yards. I planned on swimming it outside but I had to swim it in the pool at crawfish after as a test I swam in the outdoor pool on Thursday that week. It was in a word, freezing. I put on my wetsuit and dipped into the pool. I thought to myself, this is cold, but i just need to get used to it. It is always cold to start out, but your hands and feet go numb. After a minute or so your face gets numb and you are good to go. Well at least in theory. I go in and the hands went numb, i start swimming and my face feels like a hundred frozen ice picks are jamming into my eyes. For some reason it hurts worse because of the speed at which I am swimming. If I just put my face in it is cold, but as i start swimming it is like i am haveing a brain freeze from the outside in. Flipturns are the worst as when I push off it is like someone is poking around my eyes and forehead with chunks of ice. I endure this for about 5 minutes and say to heck with it. I will swim tomorrow. So I hop out and swim 6000 on Saturday. On Sunday, Dr. Rip opened the pool for me at 5 and I started swimming. I knew that I couldn't just get in and go. For some reason, it is hard to get in and not count laps when you are in a pool. I combatted this by swimming 30X600's 10 swim 10 pull 5 swim 5 pull, for 18,000 yards. My goal was a 4.5 hour swim so I got done with the 18000 and had 23 minutes left. Talk about killing me. I floundered around for another 1000 and called it a day. Actually felt okay after so went home and watched the super bowl with friends. I could have cared less about the game, but got to hang out and relax, so it was nice.

The next week (last week) was odd. I took off Monday as i was whipped from the swim Sunday. On Tuesday, work stuff got in the way of training and I found myself getting into the pool at 6:00 p.m. I swam about 3100 and went home. I just didn't care, and I hate swimming in the evening. I know people fit stuff in whenever, but for whatever reason, I never swim well at night. I woke up Wednesday and got in 8000. It was a tough workout mentally, but i got through it and was happy. Shelly gave me some sped work on Thursday and felt better again. Yesterday, I tried to get up at 4:30 and knew it wasn't happening. I am congested and my body aches all over. No swimming again. I am taking off Sat and Sun and will swim 5 hours Monday. Should be interesting.

Felt like a pro athlete the other day, when I received a package of Endurox, Accelerade, and Accel Gels. It was actually kind of cool. I don't know why I was so stoked. I told my friend Susan I felt like a pro when I opened up the box and she said, "You didn't feel that way when you got a wetsuit?" For some reason not as much. Strange isn't it. I am still trying to figure out how to be a pro athlete at the age of 35. HAHA! Yeah right.

We are getting closer to nailing down the format of the camps for this summer. It is looking like we will be trying to offer 3-4 3 day camps free for a couple hundred kids. We just need money. I am continually frustrated with all I have on my plate. The charity and fund raising itself is a full time job, as is training and, oh yeah, my full time job. I can only do so much. I am pushing forward as best I can. If any of you reading this have experience and a little time, let me know as I need help. My email is pat@rcketburrito.com. Feel free to shoot me any ideas you have.

NOW FOR THE IMPORTANT STATS:

FAVORITE TV SHOW: The Office- There are few things in this world that make me laugh out loud. This show makes me laugh out loud weekly. If you use iTunes you can download Podcasts by Ricky Gervais, the British comedian who originated this show. That is also some funny stuff if you like dry and or British humor.

MUSIC: Usually I reccomend some sort of album or band. For the last week I have been listening to this one song over and over. Run by SNOW PATROL. They have a hit right now that I am unaware of the name. This song is from their last album Final Straw. I like it a lot.

NUTRITION: Accelerade and Endurox still. Post swim, as much pizza as I can eat. I must be losing more salt than i realize as I crave it after my workouts. I ate 5lbs of Hot Tamales last week as a part of my scientifically regulated training regime.

COFFEE: Perks, house blend, or Community Between Roast.

Ejoy your weekend,
rocketboy

the finish is the start and mental toughness

First the updates
1. Had a day of interviews on the Coast it went well. People were very excited about the swim and what it can mean for the Coast. First did a TV interview on the morning news show followed directly by a radio interview. Both went well and both pledged to help where they could.
2. Met with Drew Allen, a long time family friend who owns a Pepsi distributership on the coast. He offered to help with contacts and a sponsorship.
3. Stopped in at the Lynne Meadows Discovery Center (a kids museum) in Gulfport and met with Betsy Grant, the mother of my best friend from 9th grade. I would like their museum to see some benefit from the swim and they offered any asssistance they could give.
4. Met with Kathy Short, the wife of Dr. Short, a friend of my father. They are also helping with Coast contacts and the Mississippi State Government. A wealth of ideas and opportunities.
5. Have pretty well decided that the charitable arm of Rocketkidz will be free one or two day camps for kids that will be health and fitness based. We will look to raise enough money to put on multiple day camps in each town. If the cash is there.
6. Had a recovery week swimming which was fun as I always get some fast workouts to do.
7. Spent the weekend in New Orleans with my wife. Had an incredible time. She is an incredible woman.

As each day passes this thing grows another leg. What I am begining to realize is that what I thought was the end, the actual swim, will in fact probably be the start. I am cool with that. It is a challlenge that will push me to the edges of what I know is possible swimming, but in essence it is a cry of HEY DONT FORGET ABOUT THE COAST! The kids there need this. A one day camp with education adn fitness and fun would be a day they didn't have to think about the troubles on the Coast. Our goal is to do 4-5 one day camps in each town. Each day would be the same, but we would offer it to a different group of 100 kids each day so as to get maximum impact. We would provide a means for them to carry on throughout the year as well. I am fired up about it. It is going to be a lot of work, but very rewarding.

The actual swimming is coming along well. I will do another long swim next weekend 5hrs. It is kind of weird. Right now typing 5 hours makes me begin to think about how long it will take, but in reality, once I get in the water the time goes by pretty quickly. The hardest hour is always the second one. I guess it is because it still feels lik you are on the way out and not on the way back. Shelly and I have talked a lot about mental toughness and her concerns with me being able to not go crazy doing all this. I have thought a lot about "mental toughness" and have figured out some things.
1. I decided from the get go that I would do whatever it took to prepare correctly for this swim as to do otherwise would risk not finishing it. Having done that I almost look forward to every single workout, no matter how long it takes me. Since I look forward to it, I never give myself the opportunity to dread them. I get a little boost everyday that I finish one.
2. I have the ability to ignore what I am doing. In other words, I just don't even think that what I am doing is that hard so I just keep on doing it. It never enters my mind to stop as I just keep on rolling.
3. I was reading an article on mental toughnes by Joe Friel (relatively famous triathlon coach) and he broke mental toughness down into four components. i have forgotten all but one of them. I could align myself with the three of them I have forgotten, but the one that caught my eye was confidence. I am confident that I will finish the swim in the time frame I have set for myself. The reasons behind this confidence are simply the facts that I am completing the training I need to and see and feel tangible results. I don't know how my confidence level would be if I were say swimming a meet. Probably a bit different, but possibly still confident enought to swim a certain time in a certain event. If that time was one of the fastest, I would think that I would have confidence in winning the event. What is interesting to me is that I do not race triathlons with the same confidence. I am confident I will win every swim and that I will do well on the bike, but I never feel like I will run with confidence to finish the race. I have come off the bike winning the race and beleived in my heart that other racers will chase me down. I press on the run and eventually they do. I have also come to realize that if I trained for the run like I have trained for this swim I will gain some confidence because I will know what to expect. That is the deal. Confidence comes from knowing what you are capable of because your training will dictate the paces you can hold and what you can expect on race day. You may not win, but you will be able to go out and have a performance expectation. In addition, if you have trained at certain speeds and paces, you will know how fast you have the potential to go. Then you go and do it. Now that I have broken it down it seems simple, right? Hahahaha!

I am sitting here getting ready to play an acoustic show tonight at a local bar. One of my best friends Bill Rhodes is in town and the band he played in in college is doing a reunion show. I was supposed to have my band together for this as well, but my guys bailed on the idea. No worries, I will go at it alone! I still got the rock in me.

I was thinking of tracking different weird stats for my training, like avg. calories a day, strokes per lap, etc. but to be honest I am not a numbers tracking type of person. I think this is part of the reason I love to have a coach. I just do whatever they say and don't question it. If I had to come up with it on my own I tend to do nothing. I never keep training logs etc. So you get the stats and other interesting things I think of when I am swimming. Here are some of them:

1. I take 360-366 strokes per 400 m in open water. I tried to count to 1000 a couple of times but my mind wandered. If I carry that out I will take 3600 per hour (6 min per 400m, so I cover 10 400's per hour) and if it takes 16 hours i will take approximately 57600 for the 32 miles.
2. I will try to listen to only songs I love for the hours leading up to the race. All this does is guaranty that I will get some god-awful song stuck in my head. Here is an example. This past week I had a 3 hour workout. I usually get up 30-45 minutes earlier than I am going to go swim so I can wake up and have some coffee/eat something. I listend to a playlist of songs that only has stuff I like on it. I hit the water and Mr. Jones by the Counting Crows popped into my head and stayed for the entire time. Suffice it to say, I am not a Counting Crows fan, I don't neccesarily hate them, but all I could imagine was this dude, Adam Durst's voice wavering all over sounding so whiny and serious...ughh I wanted to ram my fingers in my eyes. I searched through my brain to see what had malfunctioned and when I had heard that song and figured out it was 3 days earlier over breakfast in New Orleans. That just ain't right.
3. I swim with my mouth open. I don't know why, I just do. I guess I slowly let air escape my lungs as I put my head in. I swim a long looking like a humpback whale straining kids pee and whatever else is in the pool straight through my mouth. I need to stop this as salt water is probably going to tear my mouth up, not to mention I am going to be filtering plankton and sewerage and whatever else is in the gulf. Anyone who has any tips let me know.
4. I realized the other day that I don't stare at the black line in the pool. Some people dread staring at the line. I somehow focus soemwhere else, or just let my eyes go out of focus and not look at anything until i am just about to slam into the wall, flipturn and go the other way.

MUSIC SELECTION FOR THE WEEK: Wired All Wrong-Nothing at All. Got this free on iTunes a month or so and it grows on me. Kind of out there.
KISS-I Was Made for Loving You. Always reminds me of "playing" KISS. I was always Paul Stanley or Ace Freely. Me and this kid Kevin Riser used to play boat paddles and rock out to KISS ALIVE II and LOVE GUN when I was 9. My parents actually took me and 4 other 9-14 year olds to a KISS concert at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum. Some stoner blew dope the whole show and poured a 32 oz beer on my dad, then a 49 year old Pavorotti fan. Classic.

FOOD FOR FUEL-Mornings 1 cliff bar and 2 cups of coffee. During Endurox mixed half strength. Post swim Endurox and whatever else I can get my hands on. Usually a burrito. This may make some mad, but since I am swimming so much I eat and drink whatever I want within reason. I have to be careful though as I could eat a bag of Hot Tamales and forgo dinner. This is counter productive.

this has been a long one.
thanks for your support and continuing to read and dontae.
rocketboy

PS Stealth training begins this week...yes that means more training for other events.