Can You Hackett? Yes we can!

The Can You Hackett challenge was an attempt to introduce some new faces to the aerobic swims. There are a series of swims over distances of 400m, 800m, 1500m, and duration type swims over 1/2 hour, 3/4 hour and one hour.

There is a national competition where by each swim earns point for the club. Many years ago Claremont won the National Aerobic Trophy (more than once I believe).

There were six 1500m swims done on Sat 11 Oct by Claremont members. In addition to these 1500s, there were an hour swim and a half hour swim too.

The afternoon started off with 2 members new to aerobics, Nicky Lester, Chris May doing 1500s, and veteran Chris Roberts commencing his 1 hour swim. Nicky swam the fastest 1500 of the day at 23:37, and Chris M was the first of the 24 min swimmers clocking a 24:39. Nicky and Chris M swam with good even pace.

A good 1500 is all about being able to manage a consistent pace over all 15 100s. The temptation is to go too hard in the first 400 while you’re still fresh, and then die in the 800-1200 section. However, its fair to say that recent training programs have only really focused on shorter distances, so expecting people to swim an even paced 1500 is a tall order. It is a skill that can be learnt, and it’s a matter of practice and being timed to see where the pace goes wrong. Endurance training will certainly make swimming a 1500 easier.

Next in the water was me, Richard Hughes, and despite desperately trying to take it easy in the first 400 by breathing ever 4 strokes, and not trying to kick, my first 400 was 7:03, and then my 800 was 14:19, so the second 400 was 26s slower than the first at 7:26, and the worst was still to come with my 800-1200 at 7:45. And I can tell you I felt shattered in the second half of the swimmer. Its easy to preach even pace, but very difficult to do. I ended swimming a 28:07, which over 1 min faster than a 1500 I did last year that I had done some training for. So there were some positives, despite dieing in the second half of the swim.

Chris Roberts finished his hour, and had covered 3485m. That was a good training session for his up coming Ironman triathlon in Dec. There is just the matter of a 180km ride followed by a marathon! Chris managed to swim consistent 100s on 1:45 for most of his hour. With the Ironman in mind, its important to swim a steady swim, so you don’t burn too much energy in the first hour - the swim can’t make your race, but if you get it wrong and go too hard, it can be the start of problems later in the bike or run.

Gary Bradley was the next to jump in and do a1500. Gary swam his 400s in 6:31, 6:42, 6:44, and clocked a final time of 24:53. Paul Hanssen was next up on the 1500 hit out list, and was using this as a training swim, as well as the opportunity to get a time to use as a fitness benchmark. Paul swam a 29:15, and was the only swimmer to have a 800-1200 faster than the previous 400-800 - which is a great achievement. Well done Paul.

The final 1500 (somewhat reluctant) swimmer of the day was Michael Hurley, and he swam within 2-3 seconds of Gary’s 100 splits. Quite spooky ! Michael should be well pleased with his swim, as he is known as splash and dash swimmer, and very prone to going out too hard and then paying the price. Michael sprinted his last 100m to pip Gary by clocking a 24:50.

Not to be out done I decided to do a second swim: a half hour breaststroke. I’m no breaststroke gun, so it was going to be both a mental and a physical challenge. Once I had started I had 29 mins to think : “Why did I decide to do this ?” and at the end of the 30 minutes I still had no idea, apart from “It seemed like a good idea at the time !, OR a 1500 will take way longer than 30 mins !” The most exciting thing to happen in the swim was when a duck landed in my lane, and left a little duck message before flying off - thanks duckie ! I managed to cover 1130m in my 30 mins.

Many thanks to Elena Nesci who was timekeeper for a big chunk of the afternoon, and chose not to swim. She and Gary Bradley tidied up the big cage, and Elena brought a tin of paint to give the inside lid a touch up. It now looks like the Sistine chapel roof !

Thanks to all those who turned up for the Can you Hackett ? challenge and congratulations on your swims. And who knows, we might even have another aerobic challenge in November.

Richard Hughes

Training