I’m 5 weeks into my butterfly adventure and I have to say that things are going rather well. I’ve progressed from being able to do not a single stroke to 4x25m of full fly over that period of time.

With my other adventures I’ve always had an end goal and that has really helped me to keep motivated. For this adventure I’ve set myself 2 goals:

1. To swim 25m full fly in a race by the end of October.
2. To swim 25m of fly fast enough to qualify for a Swim England award by the end of the year (but October would be good too!). That means swimming the distance anywhere between 23 and 25 seconds. The good news is that my swim coach, David Graham, thinks this is completely possible. I completely trust him, so I think it’s completely possible too 🙂 .

With 8 weeks to go until the end of October, I’m thrilled to announce race details! I’ll be racing against Samantha Russell-Morelli at 11am on Tuesday 29 October at my local leisure centre.

Sam has come out of retirement especially for this event 😱. Here’s her athlete profile:

1. She swam competitively in New Zealand between the ages of 11 and 17.
2. During this period she  held several regional records for freestyle, butterfly and individual medley.
3. When she was 16 she placed 3rd for the Women’s Open 100m Individual Medley (that’s out of everyone in NZ) and 8th in the Women’s Open 200m Fly.
4. She’s currently a Brazilian jiu-jitsu blue belt and a CrossFit athlete.

So …. I’ve got 8 weeks to get my act together! At this stage, if I were you, I wouldn’t be placing any bets on me winning. If I could swim a PB, though, I’d be pleased. A sub-25 second 25m would be brilliant!

Right, then. I’m just going outside and may be some time 😉 . (By the way, if you’re new to my blog, you can find more out about my #OldDogNewTricks project here.)

JT 🙂