So today I took my first swimming lesson - ever - down at the Y. I got into Adult Beginners 2. Basically, I can swim pretty well - but not prettily. I don’t know my strokes, and my form is probably atrocious. So its time for lessons. I figure that the cross-training will do me good, and maybe if I get decent I can look into some triathalons down the road.

Anyway, I get there and find out that there are four other people taking the class. Oh, and that our instructor isn’t there and our pool lane got claimed by a chunky water aerobics class as a result. So we end up being taught by Ed, a great older guy, and having lesson one in the kiddie pool. Not that big a deal, since we swam a grand total of about 50 meters today. Apparently the instructor, pool, and amount of swimming should all be different on Thursday.

We started out by learning how to kick - relax the legs, bend from the hips, straighten the knee, and point the toes. Next, some stroke pointers - arms up, farther than I would have thought, then down with the forearm still at a 45 degree angle at the elbow, slicing into the water, then stretching out straight, which turns the body, then back straight and firm, at which point the other one starts doing its thing. Finally we got some breathing pointers. Its nice to actually learn how to do this properly. It will be even nicer to figure out how much of this I retain come Thursday evening.

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