I may not be awesome at swimming, but I learned a whole lot tonight about how to swim a freestyle stroke. My friend Alex taught me and she is an amazing teacher. In just an hour and a half I learned what I had been doing wrong (oh and clearly, we both look dorky in this photo. Swimming isn't necessarily a pretty sport when you're not swimming).
I met Alex several years ago when I was working at Sur la Table as a culinary assistant. Her friend Melanie was the manager of the store and Alex came over one night after class as we were cleaning up and I introduced her to some of my friends and we just kind of became friendly from then on out. I don't see her that often, but when I do it's always a delight. She's way into triathlons and so I thought I'd ask her to help me with this goal. She watched me swim and was able to point out some of the things that are a challenge for me:
1. keeping my head down when I turn to breathe. I always want to lift it up first.
2. I have a problem keeping my whole body at a high level in the water. My body seems to want me to drown.
3. I need to take deeper breaths when I do breathe.
Anyway, I was surprised at how much fun it was once I got the hang of it. I definitely need to go out again. What I need is a free indoor pool so I can make a habit of it and get some exercise when it's too cold to take my bike out. Or I could join a gym. Sigh.