Tues 28th Nov - Привет ...I trained with champions...

I was very privileged to have the opportunity to train with the team at St Pertersburg for 2 weeks in November. The team at St Petersburg are the current world champions having just won the CMAS world cup trophy. A big thank you to my Coach (Igor) and the team at St. Petersburg for being so patient with me.

This was a very hard 2 weeks with 2 sessions 6 days per week. I am now much fitter and my technique and confidence have improved considerably. The biggest thing for me to learn was to be more flexible in the water and to tuck my head in. Lots of exercises both in the gym and in the water to improve flexibility, strength and endurance. So much I could write here that I don’t know where to start – I filled a small note book in the 2 weeks I was there.
Each day started at 8.00 am with jogging, flexibility and gym excercises for 30 mins and then to the pool for 1 ½ - 2 hours. Back to my lodgings for lunch and a snooze to be back to the pool for 4pm-6pm.

If you buy me a Vodka I will tell you all about it.

Some photos from my trip can be seen here. Photo to the right is Igor.
http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/simon.kidd@btinternet.com/album?.dir=/1b72re2

Fri 3 Nov .... до свидания

Well last time in the pool today before going off to Russia for some more training. So I doubt if I will post anything for the next couple of weeks. Might go in for a short session over the weekend.

Been a good week and to finish with a new PB for the 50m (23s) and 200m(1:58) surface - with the training fin. If I had used my competition fin these should have been about 22s and 1:54. If I can get another second off each 50m then I will be the fastest in the country for these. Put some good runs in this week - feeling very comfortable on the ankles again now, although the Left one has lost some range of movement. Totals for the week: 28,100m

• EN1 Basic Endurance: 15900
• EN2 Threshold endurance: 3000
• EN3 Overload endurance 1000
• SP1 Lactate tolerance: 1000
• SP2 Lactate Production: 1600
• SP3 Power: 2000
• RP: Race pace: 1000
• Recovery: 2600

This is an interesting point on the training plan since next week is supposed to ease off in volume and concentrate on power and lactate production - but I expect I will be doing plenty of that whilst in St. Petersburg.