Fitting It In, Hotel Pool Style

We just got back from the Reno Air Races, a fantastic experience (can you beat sitting out at the pylons while planes like Corsairs, twin-engined Hellcats, and P-51 Mustangs zoom just over your head at near 500 mph???)! While in Reno, we went running a couple of times in the very early morning before heading out to the races. The air was quite chilly and the altitude was definitely a factor (almost a mile high, wheeze, wheeze), and the strip of casinos isn't a running route I would normally pick. Without my bike, I tried to fit in my workouts as best as I could. Of course I didn't want to go five days without swimming, so you know what that means.....

The Hotel Pool (cue dramatic music).

You've probably been there before: traveling for business or with your family, wanting to squeeze in a swim workout, faced with The Hotel Pool. Maybe it's kidney shaped, or round, maybe it's only three feet deep, maybe it has a staircase that spans one end, preventing turns. It's always a challenge. This one was at least rectangular in shape (that's a bonus), and the staircase didn't reach ALL the way across, leaving me a narrow strip of wall on which to turn (I'll count that in the "plus" category too), plus it was saltwater (niiiiiiice). But it took me six, count them six strokes to get from one end to the other. This, as you might imagine, made for some very vexing lap swimming.

My motto however is Just Get the Workout In, so laps I did, probably hundreds in all (I didn't count, that would've been too depressing) and after awhile I just found my rhythm, got in the groove, and got the swim done. So instead of looking as bad as it might've with the vacation thrown into the mix, my first week of taper looked rather reasonable. I bookended the time I was gone with bike rides, so I got at least two into the week, three relatively short runs, and three forty-five minute sessions in the 12 yard hotel pool left me with a decent workout schedule for the week. That and all the airplanes I could ever hope to watch!