Here are some pictures from my travels over the last few months. I have hundreds from many different locations but these are a few neat ones.
As an athlete it is always hard to stay in the groove while traveling so I came up with some interesting ways to keep in shape. Some are shown in the pictures below.





   

  

   

Hey all!
Wow its been awhile. A lot of negative news in the past few months on the inspiration for this site. I have to say "I'm over it" though. I'm still inspired even though his sponsors are not so much.
Well in the past couple of months I have been all over the place from Florida to Costa Rica and everywhere in between. I will post some especially cool photos from my experiences.
Also some more set backs in terms of health. I may have had a strain of Swine Flu that had me confined to my bed for a couple weeks. I've also been dealing with some severe back pain issues.
Nevertheless through all of this I have managed to keep as active as possible. I try to climb a mountain every Sunday and run, bike and swim throughout the week.
As an intermediate goal I have decide to train for some triathlons and marathons. Today I started logging run times. My 5km time this evening was 21:02.
The swim distance I will be focusing on is 1500m and a competitive time is 20-25 minutes.
For biking the distance I will train for is 40km and a competitive time for this is 60 minutes.
Lastly the running distance is 10km and a competitive time is 43 minutes.

My current times for each of these is as follows:
swim - 35 minutes(1500m)
bike - 84 minutes(40km)
run - 49 minutes(10km)

So as always I have my work cut out for me. I will try to keep this site as updated as possible.

Hello again!
I just wanted to let you know that I am still working towards my goal and it will take a lot more than some bad luck and physical setbacks to keep me from pursuing my dream.
In recent news Michael Phelps was supposed to be making an appearance at a work shop here in my home town but seams to have dropped out of the roster. Very disappointed. So disappointed in fact that I talked to the newspaper. As a result Phelps and I share our first media article check out this link... http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Alberta/2009/02/21/8474606-sun.html

As far as updates go, I have been making slow but steady progress in the pool. I had to take another week off recently due to a serious back injury that had me suspended to my bed and unable to do anything. I will be seeking some help from a physiotherapist shortly to make sure there are no repeat injuries.
I am just getting into a routine again and will update you again shortly.

I hope no ones given up on me, I have been down and out for some time now. I have just spent the last month out of the country re-setting myself. It was good to get away from life's pressures for a bit and give my body and mind a break. This was the first time that I have significantly over trained. I will try to not make the same mistake again. I received some good pointers from viewers and will put some of this advice into practice.

More soon

I know it has been awhile since my last post. It appears my physical trials are not over yet. I started going for some nice easy swims a couple weeks ago and made sure to space out my training sessions so that my body has adequate time to recover. Distance has still been developing very slow but at least I am not plagued with all of the other side effects of overtraining. I was just easing back into a consistent training schedule and then I sliced my hand open at work. It will take a few days to heal as it is pretty deep and is located between the thumb and index finger. I am experimenting with krazy glue to keep it shut instead of going for stitches. I'm not a fan of needles and doctors so I usually avoid them like the plague.
Anyway I hope it doesn't keep me out of the pool for too much longer. Once I am able to return I will be taking another video to analyze any improvement in my technique since the beginning.
Thanks to everyone for the support they have given during this past while.

It seems bad things come in 3's. I am still taking it slow waiting for my body to recover from the over training. Just over a week ago as a result of being in a weakened physical state I got the flu. This lasted for a week and I wasn't able to do much of anything. On Tuesday of this week I went in for a Tetanus shot and I guess my body is reacting poorly to it because it feels like I just got hit by a freight train. All of my muscles ache especially the shoulder.
Through all of this I have only manage to fit in some light exercise and a few gentle swims. I am taking the time to focus on technique. It may end up working slightly in my favor, because everything is so sore and tired I really try to limit the energy it takes to travel through the water.
My swims are generally around 1500m of basic freestyle and kicking. Other then that I sleep and I eat with occasional recreation activities.
I apologize for my journey being so slow and boring right now. It will get better soon.

I have the flu. so I feel terrible.

It sure is a shame that bodies are so fragile. All I want to do is swim 100miles a day and force myself to be the best but my body is putting up quite a resistance to that plan.
I took yesterday off completely other than work. I slept from 4pm until 7pm ate a pizza then slept until 7am the next day.

Today I worked, as a result of a long work day my diet suffered. I only ate cereal, sandwich, protein bar, banana, and 3 pieces of pizza. I will try and make up for it all with a big dinner.

I also forced myself to go to the pool even though I cant seem to venture far from the bathroom. I swam about 1500m and then got really dizzy so i called it quits and did a couple weight room exercises.

Hopefully I get rested up this weekend so I can resume some quality training sessions.

Oh, My resting heart rate has dropped from 90bpm to about 55bpm, at least thats a little better.

I recently received a comment on the entry about my increased heart rate and some problems that i was facing as a result. The individual sent me a very good article that I wanted to share with everyone. It is about over training and the physical and phsycological effects it has on the body. It seems to me from reading the article that this is what is happening.
 Here is the link http://www.rice.edu/~jenky/sports/overtraining.html

Thank you for sending this bit of info to me, I hope others can benefit from it as well.

More and more I am beginning to think my body doesn't get along too well with swimming. This past weekend was a holiday weekend and I spent a lot of time running on the treadmill to make sure the Thanksgiving calories didn't stick around too long. Other than a few aches and pains now and again, my dryland training as been going rather well. Maybe I should try for a running event! lol. For the weekend I decided not to swim for 2 days, which is a first, and instead do other types of training to try and heal some body parts. I've been getting this pinching in my left shoulder during my recovery on freestyle and also I pulled something in my ankle from stretching them too much. So anyway I thought a good rest was in order.
On Monday however I started the day off with a gentle swim focusing on my breathing and flip turns. Then I played a round of golf. Later that day I headed to the gym for some weight training followed by another swim. This second session I did 50m free sprints. The best time I managed was 36 seconds. I was forced to leave the pool earlier than I wanted due to a strong urge to vomit. I was basically dry heaving all the way home. 
I actually gets better.
Yesterday I started the day off with a swim again. I used the hand paddles for about an hour to work on some pulling technique and power. Most of the times I swim I try and use the lane beside someone faster then me so I am always chasing them down. After some carbs and a protein shake I hit the gym for some more weight training. I only managed to fit in some core exercises before I had to go work. I also had Masters swimming last night so I didn't want to be too tired for that. 
For last nights session we did the following:

200m free
150m kick
150m backstroke

3x75m (alternating breaststroke kick, pull and swim)
3x75m breastroke

6x50m (alternating backstroke, breastroke) on 1:30
2x150m free pull
2x150m free

8x50m kick(alternating)

This last bit is where I had a bit of excitement again. On the 6th set I was doing the dolphin kick and all of a sudden my left leg completely cramped up in the middle of the pool. luckily I had a flutter board because as I tried to use my other leg to keep me up it also cramped. So there I was in the middle of the pool with 2 massive cramps in my quads hanging on to the lane divider. I took a few minutes for anyone to figure out what I was doing and finally someone helped me bend my knees so I could stretch it out. I then pulled myself along the lane divider to the wall and dragged myself out of the water. I have to say that was probably the most painful full leg cramp I have ever had. After about 10min of stretching I was able to limp over to the water fountain and then to the showers. My one leg didn't feel right again until this morning.
So mental note: Take water bottle to the pool and eat more bananas.

Well on the plus side at least I'm pushing myself to the point of sickness or severe cramping. I think too much of the time people tend to only train within their comfort zone. I say that's a waste of time!!

Well it doesn't seem like I'm having much luck lately. I went for a run the other day for a combination of reasons, one was to work out some frustration with life in general and the other obviously because its good for cardio. Anyway I initially set out to run 10kms but as I was nearing the mark I felt I could do another 5. As it turns out the treadmill didn't agree with that and shut itself off right at 10kms. I was propelled into the console and twisted my ankle and my shoulder in the process. Luckily this was at 11pm and only a couple other people were in the gym, so I wasn't as embarrassed as I could've been.
Yesterday morning I went for a quick 1000m swim in the morning, nothing too intense because I had Masters in the afternoon.
In yesterday's session we did the following:
warm up
100m free
100m kick
100m pull
100m free

12x25m - alternating scull, kick, free

25m free
75m kick
150m pull
100m free
150m pull
100m kick
50m free

we spent 15-20mins working on flip turns. I caught my toes on the edge of the divider during a turn and lost some skin.

2x25m practicing flipping every 5 strokes
2x50m free with flip turns
100m easy free

So still not a very long swim but the distance is building.
I feel like my pull is getting stronger and more efficient, unfortunately my ankle is messed up from the treadmill so my kicking is at a stand still.
I think I'll go drown myself in a protein shake.

Finally! I started with the University Masters Swim club last night. Due to the construction at the University pool the start date for the club kept getting pushed back. More good news, my heart rate has been slowly returning to normal. It is still pounding away but not nearly as fast. With the amount of cardio I have been doing it still surprises me.
My first experience with Masters swimming was a little rocky. I messed up on the start time and showed up half an hour late. Then while swimming I developed this painful pinch in my shoulder. I also kept running into everyone. I guess I'm not used to swimming with that many people per lane.
Other than that I felt pretty comfortable with the drills and the distances.

8x25m free
50m choice
8x25m kicking (alternating kicks)
100m free
4x75m arms (using pullbouy)
6x50 free
100m back

I'm not sure what they did for the first half hour but it was a pretty laid back first session.
Afterward I lingered in the pool for a few more laps so I could get some 1on1 training with my backstroke. I plan on utilizing every minute of coaching I can get.

I have to apologize for the infrequent updates lately. For the past week I have been struggling with some health issues. I think they are due in part to stress. To summarize it all my resting heart rate is usually in the low to mid 40s(bpm). For the last 2 weeks actually it has not dipped below 80 beats/min even when I am sleeping!!!. I know, it's not good. So if anyone has any suggestions, drop me a line. I have been to a cardiologist and the doctor and have some medication to treat anxiety/stress. So far I'm not getting much improvement.
A couple days ago, and I don't recommend this, I attempted to "wear" my heart out so I could get a decent night sleep for once. So after going for my swim I headed to the gym. My plan was to elevate my heart rate as high as possible and sustain that rate for as long as I could until I came close to collapsing. I started on the stair master - level 16 for 30mins, then I moved to the treadmill and ran 5miles at a pace of 7mph. Doing this kept my heart rate in the range of 165-190bpm. FYI it didn't work. That night my heart felt like it was bouncing 2inches out of my chest at a rate of 86bmp.

So that was my exciting weekend, trying to slow my heart down to normal with no success.

Today I actually put together a program that I modeled after one I found on See Joe Run, See Joe Swim.
It went as follows:

100m free
100m kicking
100m free
200m kicking
100m free
100m kicking
100m back
2x50m free (fast pace)
100m kicking
25m free half slow then half fast
25m free half fast then half slow
3x50m free (fast pace)
100m kicking
4x50m free (fast pace)
200m free (easy pace)

I am currently swimming 50m in a time of 40 seconds while doing these drills. I still feel I am wearing down near the end of the 100m drills but it is still much improved. I also modified my breathing to take a breath every 4-5 strokes and a lot of the time I will only take one breath per 25m so I can get my lungs into better shape.

Please let me know if anyone has any helpful info on this resting heart rate conundrum, it's killin me.

I attended my first ever training clinic on Saturday morning. It was good to finally get some instruction. As presumed I have a lot of work to do. The main focuses of the drills were aimed at correcting my most basic technical shortcomings.

1) Kicking shallow and near the surface of the water. The goal was to have my heels just barely break the surface of the water with each kick. Now there are two factors which I believe hindered my ability to do this up until now. First was the fact that I am still wearing those ridiculous surfing shorts and they have a tendency to drag me to the bottom. I thought they would be good initially because they would create more work for me but I think they just ruin any chance of proper technique. Secondly was my head position. I was unaware that the forward tilt of my head was also causing my legs to sink. So I did some lengths and focused on trying to keep my head straight and my nose pointing at the bottom of the pool. I could feel my legs pop to the surface every time I make this adjustment.

2) High Elbow. My next problem was that my arm generally stays flat during the recovery. We worked on keeping the elbow high and dragging the fingers through the water until the re-entry point. I guess you use larger muscles when keeping the high elbow allowing you to repeat more times before tiring. We eventually did this drill so slowly that the dragging of the fingers almost made you go backwards. My theory behind the drill is that to fully focus on what muscle groups are responsible for what movement you have to exaggerate the movement. It was easy to tell what muscles I was using because of the intense burning feeling.

3) Re-entry. I don't know what its officially called but I 'll call it re-entry. I'm sure you can guess, it's the point where your hand re-enters the water just ahead of your head. My problem with this is that I keep reaching with my left hand past the central axis of my body. By doing this "over reach" I waste a lot of time, energy and efficiency, not to mention it makes me swim in a very slight zig zag. So to cure, we focused on reaching straight ahead.

All of these adjustments felt strange at first but it was easy to see an improvement in overall efficiency. By efficiency I mean the speed to effort ratio.

The training session if I remember correctly was comprised of the following: 

- 200m free
- 150m kicking in streamlined position
- 200m kicking with flutter board
- 50m free (head up)
- 50m free (looking at toes)
- 100m free (focus on straight head position)
- 200m free (dragging fingers on recovery)
- 100m free (extra slow drag while using a pullbouy)
- 150m free (focus on high elbows and straight re-entry)

not a high mileage swim but very good fundamentals.

Today I swam twice.
The first session was only an hour and I focused on what I learned on Saturday.
Swam about 1200m free plus some kicking drills and warm up and cool down with breaststroke.

The second session was a little more interesting.
I only made it 1 1/2 hrs due to some weird physical reaction.
After warming up with 200m free I decided to embark on a kicking drill that lasted about 500-600m. The point was to completely hammer on the legs. I did each 25m in 35 seconds. Ouch! (for me at least)
After that I completed 400m  at a gentle pace to work on regaining feeling in my legs as well as breathing, head position etc.
Once I was feeling recovered I decided to do 5x50m at a relatively fast pace.
What I thought to be a decent pace for me at this stage is 40 seconds per 50m.
As it turns out my legs weren't much help anymore so my upper body had to bear the extra burden.
It felt like I was struggling at almost top speed and still barely making the 40 second mark.
On my 5th 50m lap I decided to make it my last as I'm pretty sure I started hallucinating furry pink dragons in the pool. I stumbled to the washroom and sat in the shower until I wasn't so dizzy.
"Awesome"! thats all I have to say about that.

I was at the pool yesterday performing some kicking drills when I decided to act on some advice I had been given. Instead of doing my full out sprints over 25m I felt my body was ready to double the distance. Boy am I glad I had my training partner with me. The amount of lactic acid my legs produced in that short 50m was enough to make me consider amputation as an easier way to cope with the pain. We performed this 50 meters of pain 4 times. The first 2 times using flippers and the second two without. I have used the flippers twice now and the reason for this is I have found they are a great tool to help my legs find an efficient rhythm/motion through the water. I think because they allow you to feel the resistance of the water and the changes in speed you can then mimic the motions without them. Anyway, since I started using them I have knocked another few seconds off of my first 25m(without flippers of course) and I made it 50m in 1:05. It was a very labored 50m seeing as the first 25m took 26 seconds and the last 25m took an agonizing 39 seconds. After that it took a few free. laps for my legs to fully recover.
Incidentally I have been reading some articles on what happens when the body produces lactic acid or lactate. It simply occurs as a by-product of the anaerobic energy pathway, a process which provides energy to muscles by partially breaking down glucose without the need for oxygen. When the demand for energy is higher than the bodies ability to supply it, Lactate is produced which is used as another source of fuel. One article states that lactate threshold training can be beneficial as it trains the body to create additional proteins that help absorb and convert lactic acid to energy. By training to increase your lactate threshold you also improve your high intensity endurance. 

One of my goals is to never go a session where I am not pushing myself to that threshold, to the point my muscles are screaming for me to stop. Each time I push my body to that limit, I know I will be rewarded as my body's natural ability to recover and repair itself takes over so the next training session my physical limitations will be raised up another notch.

On another note, in case I have not yet mentioned, I am currently attending the University of Calgary where I enrolled just this year as a mature student(24). My decision to train towards achieving the aspirations I have in this sport came shortly after being accepted into the University. While attending a recent function I was lucky enough to hear the head of the Dinos athletic team talk about the sports programs at the UofC. As it turns out they have one of the top swim programs in the country(second to UBC i think). This was definitely encouraging to hear. Now if only they had an operational pool!!. Apparently they have a top of the line swimming facility but you just can't use them because they have been under repairs since April or something. They are supposedly opening the doors October 5, and I really hope this is accurate, as I have already registered in their Masters swim program and it starts that same day. 

Lately I have been trying to take a better account on everything I do in and out of the pool. This has always served me as a reliable way to gauge improvement. For instance, today I swam 1000m in my morning session. In this session I improved on the distance I swam before resting from 300m to 400m. I also improved on my kicking drill while holding a flutter board, going from 34sec per 25m to 28sec per 25m. I took my strokes per 25m from 16 down to 12.  At this stage, without proper coaching, all I have to rely on is reducing these times. It gives me measurable progress.
One of the problems I'm running into however, is how quickly I lose my breath. Now because I'm new at this, I don't really know how long it takes to become accustomed to the breathing patterns but my breathing becomes labourous after 50m. I suppose as long as my distances continue to increase my breathing will improve.

The one thing I think I will change about my current training model is to steer away from training to specific distances. Currently I perform a drill wall to wall. By this I mean if I am doing a high intensity sprint or kicking drill I will finish when I reach a designated increment of length (25, 50, 100m). The problem I see with this is that when I reach the wall I have not neccessarily completely exhausted the muscles being trained. By training to the max each time, your body becomes accustomed to dealing with the lactic acid that is produced and in turn your body becomes more efficient at rebuilding and recovering. Plus the way I look at it you have the added practice of an extra turn.
So for the next couple of weeks I will not limit my high intensity drills to the wall but instead power through the wall to try and squeeze every last bit of energy out. The true test will be if and how fast the times fall.

I was reading a really interesting article the other day on high volume vs. high intensity. It describes the findings of some well known scientists and researchers who have done studies of competitive swimmers over the course of a few years. The argument was whether or not high volume-low intensity training is beneficial to swimmers who participate in races of 400m or less. They compared it to sprinting vs. marathon runners. A sprinter will train for a 100m race by conducting extremely high intensity drills and power lifting. This type of exercise develops the explosive power and quick twitch muscles required to propel them down the track in as few seconds as possible. Evidence of the different training styles can be seen just by looking at the difference in muscular proportions.


After 4 yrs of researching a group of competive swimmers the scientists concluded that the excessive distances that the swimmers swam in training did not actually have a positive effect on their times. If anyone wants the original report I can email it to you, its rather long.

Here are some clips from the gym. Focus is on leg strength.

Lately I've been working on developing my legs into propellers. From what I've gathered, the Kick is just as important as the pull from your arms. So I have developed a training routine that focuses on producing sheer lower body power.
My plan to build the most powerful legs takes place in the gym as well as in the pool.
I always start with a generous warm up period on a low impact machine (bicycle, stairmaster, elliptical machine).
I then spend 10-20minutes stretching with a primary focus on my ankles.
Most of my leg exercises focus on explosive movements. I use these exercises to recreate the power aspect of the kicking motion. I then use isometric excercises to train the quick twitch muscles to increase speed. 
For my pool excercises I use the flippers to train my legs on efficient kicking.
After focusing on moving my legs to gain the furthest distance per kick I spend a large part of the session doing sprints while holding a flutter board.
I will sprint for 25m in under 30 seconds then 25m at a slow pace working on efficiency. I usually repeat this for a 1/2 hour or more depending on how long it takes for my legs to cramp.
I will work on getting some footage of these training sessions to give you a better picture.

Heres a picture taken at the 50m pool the other day.

For those of you who are interested in doing some underwater stroke analysis - The camera I am using for my underwater video is an Olympus Stylus. It is shock proof and water proof up to 10m. I am very satisfied with it so far as it gives some pretty clear underwater footage. You can find it at Best Buy for $350.
I have a friend that helps out with the recording and editing of the videos.

I went for a swim for the first time in a 50 meter pool today. I stood at the end and almost needed to find some binoculars to see the other side. I've become quite accustomed to the 25m pool where I know it only takes 10-11 strokes end to end.
I decided to focus on technique and not so much speed so I could get used to swimming the longer distance. I swam 1000m and managed to get some more footage to try and pin point more weak spots in my stroke.
I still find it the hardest thing to coordinate my kick and arm stroke. 
I have been doing copious amounts of leg exercises in the pool and also in the gym usually to the point that walking to the car becomes a perilous mission.

Can anyone tell me how long it takes them to go 25 or 50 meters using only your legs??