#68 Thoreau Club, Concord, MA--Fit & Faster Swim Clinic

The alarm went off this morning at 6:09am to make a 6:45am Saturday morning workout. I hit the snooze and rolled over. I just needed another 30 minutes or so of sleep. Sadly, I didn't sleep as I tossed and turned feeling guilty about not going to practice. Finally I reached the point where it wasn't even feasible to try and make the workout.  I turned to social media to distract me from my guilt and I stumbled upon the Fit & Faster Swim Clinic sponsored by Swim Outlet. The Thoreau Club in Concord hosted the event.  It was a clinic focusing on distance and open water swimming taught by two Olympians Connor Jaeger and Christine Magnuson.  So I decided to sign up. The icing on the cake was that started at 1:00 (I could lay in bed longer) and it would count as a new pool-yay!

There were 25 attendees and they ranged from 8-69 years old. There were a handful of people in their 50's and for many of them distance/open water swimming was pretty new to them.  That's alright I was just there for fun and a new experience.  We started off with some dryland exercises to warm us up and then into the pool for an easy warm up.  Connor and Christine took turns instructing us on a variety of drills for pool swimming and then we moved on to open water.  There were some new drills I learned which will be fun to try out in the future.  They were both outgoing and shared anecdotes that made it interesting for all to learn. At the end we swam in heats and raced against the Olympians before a Q&A session. 

All in all, it was a fun several hours. I met some Olympians, had fun interactions with some new people and picked up a few new drills. Oh yeah and I hit pool #68 at the Thoreau Club--beautiful setting with two outdoor 25 yard pools.