Hackett still has it

Being a long distance swimmer in swimming myself I looked up to probably the best 800m FR and 1500m FR swimmer of all time Grant Hackett of Australia. He went undefeated in the 1500m FR from 1996 until the 2007 at the World Championships. This article shows how he's swimming faster than ever now leading up to the Olympics and will make for some fast swimming in another couple weeks.

Grant Hackett Crushes 800 Free World Record Over Short Course:

Grant Hackett downed his seven-year-old world record in the men's 800 freestyle over short course meters at the Victorian Championships.
Hackett ripped off a time of 7:23.42 to eclipse is previous record of 7:25.28 set in Perth, Australia on Aug. 3, 2001.

Here is a comparison of the splits: 2008: 25.39, 52.92 (27.53), 1:20.76 (27.84), 1:48.55 (27.79), 2:16.47 (27.92), 2:44.62 (28.15), 3:12.83 (28.21), 3:41.02 (28.19), 4:08.99 (27.97), 4:37.22 (28.23), 5:05.43 (28.12), 5:33.75 (28.32), 6:01.92 (28.17), 6:30.09 (28.17), 6:57.29 (27.20), 7:23.42 (26.13)
2001: 25.05, 52.68 (27.63), 1:20.67 (27.99), 1:48.78 (28.11), 2:16.92 (28.14), 2:45.19 (28.27), 3:13.46 (28.27), 3:41.84 (28.38), 4:09.95 (28.11), 4:38.33 (28.38), 5:06.65 (28.32), 5:35.01 (28.36), 6:03.02 (28.01), 6:30.91 (27.89), 6:58.56 (27.65), 7:25.28 (26.72) Hackett also topped the men's 400 free in a near-world record time of 3:35.16. He owns the standing global record of 3:34.58 set in 2002 in Sydney.

Those splits are unreal!! He's slowest 100m split is like 56seconds! I was never a sprinter by any means but my fastest 100m FR ever was a 56 and that was only one of them not 8 in a row....

Going down hard!

Yesterday the plan was to go out for my bike ride and get my workout in and then when I got back I was going to go out with Lea for her bike ride because she doesn't like going out on the highway yet by herself. So my bike ride went awesome, I was doing some short time trials at all out effort and I was feeling so excited because I've never felt this good and this fast on my bike. I got back home and picked Lea up and we started out and about 10minutes in if that I was watching her and how she was riding and I stopped paying attention to the road in front of me for a second and next thing I know I'm flying through the air. There was a little chunk of pavement missing and I much of hit that and lost control. My bike went flying out from under me and I landed hard on my right hip. I landed in the gravel and I knew right away that it was going to be hell cleaning it up. I only got one little cut on my hands, guess I didn't get them out in front me fast enough to brake my fall. I got a good one on my for arm but the majority of the damage is on my leg. It starts about halfway up my calf and runs all the way up to my hip. the whole section of my leg got cut and scrapped pretty bad but the worst of it is definitely my hip. My hip swelled up pretty good, looked like it was sticking out about an inch at least. Last night I think once the shock wore off I could start to feel the pain throughout my hip and not just where it was cut. When I got home I sat on the side of bath tub wondering how I was going to clean this. I refused to go to the hospital and let them scrub it. I'm a baby when it comes to stuff like that! I pass out when I get needle... So I just took a wash cloth and ran it under cold water and would place it on one part of my body, let the burning go down a bit then try and wash and scrub away as much of the dirty as I could. While I was doing this Lea went up to the drug store just up the street to see if they had anything that I could use to clean it with but wouldn't sting. she gets back and the first thing she tells me is the pharmacist is a biker also and the first thing he ask was is my bike ok?! Who cares if I'm alright...just worry about the bike. Any yes for everyone who is wondering I think the bike will be alright. Or is that a bad thing because if it was broken well then that would be horrible because then I would have to get a new one. Wasn't that your excuse Drew?! Anyways I'm still alive and will hopefully mend quickly.
I was reading the blog of James Loaring a Pro triathlete from southern Ontario who has been racing on the world cup circuit for a few years now and came across his race report for Muskoka and this is what he had to say about the beginning of the race..."The gun finally went off and immediately it was a very fast opening pace that reminded me of an ITU race (thanks to Buddy Green who is a sub-16 minute 1500m swimmer). " I had a little chuckle after I read this because it definitely was a fast pace that I set and those two guys who were able to hang on to my feet and draft me for the whole 2000m swim right until the end were I pulled ahead a bit can thank later.
So not much else is new, still painting and getting a few things done around the house. We're looking forward to having a few friends and family over on Sunday for the BBQ. Maybe tonight I can get Lea to take a picture of my battle wounds and I can put a pic up of the damage. Hopefully I'll be back training very soon, I'm thinking Monday and for the weekend I'll get some good rest and I'll do some tubing instead of swimming.

"Thank you to the people who said I couldn't, you have been what has defined me, never give up, and never back down."

Correction

The BBQ that we're having at our place is on Sunday not Saturday. At least I caught that now and not at the end of the week!

2008 Island Swim

I had a good weekend for training. Saturday I had to work from 10-2 so I headed out early on my bike and got in 90km of solid riding. While I was at work Lea went over to the Market Square to help my sister out because she is running the Blueberry festival and after I was done I met them over there and had a few sweets. After that was a short 2km swim in the pool because the next day was the Island Swim. It's a great local swimming event that brings out a lot of people every year. I've won it now five or six times in a row. It was calling for rain and thunderstorms all day on Sunday but as soon as we got to the beach it cleared up and the sun came out. I had a good swim which was encouraging after my last swim in Timmins. My 1.6km time around the island was 18:22, about 10seconds faster than last year. Lea had a good swim also in about 27minutes and had a bit sprint to the finish with Jack. After that Lea and I headed home with a stop at the Home Hardware to pick up some plants and vegetables to plant in our garden. Lea had to go back to the pool to work so I went out for a good 13km run that felt really good.
We are planning on having a some people over next weekend on Saturday for a BBQ and kind of a little house warming party. Hopefully we'll have all the painting done by then downstairs. So I hope everyone can make and we can have a fun night. 275 Seventh Ave. in Lively. People can start coming over around 3ish or whenever they can make it. We'll have lots of food but if you think you can make it give me a shout or send me and e-mail.
This week I just got a lot more training planned. I'm not racing for a few weeks so this will give me a chance to get in a lot of hard training with little rest before my next race.

"Thank you to all the people who said I couldn't, you have been what has defined me, never give up, and never back down".

The Big Move

So this weekend was our big move into our new house! I'm happy to say that everything went fairly smoothly. We had lots of help and a huge thank you to Lea's parents who came up from London that worked non stop all weekend. Also a big thank you to Sig, Molly, Marcus, Drew and Jose. Drew came out even though I told him not to because he was leaving the next day for Ironman Lake Placid. He'd down there now getting ready and I'll probably be glued to the computer on Sunday when he races. Good luck Drew!!
So the move went really good, we ended up doing three trips with the U-Haul and that got pretty much everything out of the apartment. We've been busy doing all kinds of little things already to the house. I've raked and cut the lawn, cut down a tree that was dead and put in some solar lights around the deck. Each night we've had a really nice BBQ and then a fire with the wood from the tree. The new appliances from Sears look great and we've already started to prime the walls down stairs to paint. Other than that everything else has just been little changes like changing some light bulbs, wall plugs, air vents...things like that. So far everything is good and once we get everything put away and the finish painting down stairs we are planning on having a bunch of friends over for a big BBQ and show everyone what we've done.
Training this weekend though was another story....Saturday I did absolutely no training. I was going to go out for a little run but I was just too tried from moving for two days so Saturday was a day off. Sunday I got out for a 1.5hour ride in the AM and then 40minute run with a stop at the lake where I jumped in and just did a quick little swim. This week I'm back at the training full speed ahead. Tomorrow I have an appointment for some orthotics. The doc said I pronate when I walk/run and that may be the cause of my pain in my foot although it has been much better and almost non existent lately. Sunday Lea and I will be doing the Island Swim here in Sudbury. Always a fun event that I've done so many times now I've lost count. I'll blog later in the week with how the training is going and I'm sure there will be many new things happening with the house that I'll be able to report on and maybe I'll get some pics to that I can post.

"Thank you to the people who said I couldn't, you have been what has defined me, never give up, and never back down."

This week has been going really good as far as training goes. I've been getting in some solid hours which is good because tomorrow we are moving so I'm pretty sure my weekend will be pretty busy but I'm going to try and get up early and get my workouts in before we start for the day.
Monday was just kind of a day off after the race on Sunday with only a 40minute spin on the bike. Tuesday though I got in a good 4.5 hours of training that I was really happy with eventhough I difinetely didn't bring enough food for the day to go along with that much training so I was feeling pretty weak after I was done. I did a 2hour ride in the AM, then a 1.5hour swim at lunch, then a brick workout later in the afternoon where I went 20minute run-20minute bike-20minute run. Wednesday I did a 15km run from home down the highway then an hour swim in the pool once I got to work. Today was I did a 65km bike with some tempo work and hopefully later today after we go to the laywer to sign all the papers for the house I'll do a swim in the lake. I've been feeling good and strong all week since my race. My foot has been much better, I only feel it every once and awhile so hopefully that means that it's healing.
Tomorrow Lea's parents are getting here from London for the weekend to help with the move and I know a few other friends will be helping out which is really nice because there just seems to be so much stuff! Anyways I better get back to work, actually more like start working but we wont tell anyone that and we are supper excited about moving into the house tomorrow so I'll let everyone know how that goes once we get our stuff in and things get settled a bit.

"Thank you to the people who said I couldn't, you have been what has defined me, never give up, and never back down".