What a week I've had, I'll start where I left off last time.
Went and collected my results from the gcses and as level I did on Tuesday, I absolutely thrilled and very relieved. Well done to everyone! Went down to Dover for a 'long' swim with very good intentions but took one look at the very rough harbour and this became a short swim! Did 8km and actually felt sea sick by the end! Was reasonably happy with that because it was literally like being in a washing machine!
Went to London with Eleanor on Wednesday where we saw Billy Elliot - absolutely amazing! Then very tired on Thursday, delayed train plus sleepover equals getting to bed at two, falling asleep at gone four. Went on a 5 mile run which was quite good, I thought my limit was maybe 2 or 3 miles at the moment but I didn't die. Also wrote a playlist of music to be played on my feed and if I get into trouble in the channel. Tried to choose motivational music and a mix of music I like including Shine - Take That, Airplanes -B.O.B, Flying Without Wings -Westlife, Remember the name -Fort Minor, a bit of Taylor Swift, Jason Derulo, Enrique, The Kinks and Good Charlotte along with inspirational favourites Eye of the Tiger and Footloose.
5km on Friday in preparation for todays 25 kilometre/6 hour qualifying swim. So here goes on the Abby Taylor - Baptie 6 hour swim experience.
Got woken up at 5am as we planned to start the swim at 7am and I have to eat 1 and a half or preferably 2 hours before a swim. Got woken up again at 5.17 by dad after falling back to sleep, already 17 minutes behind in my plans and I was still under my duvet! Got up and went downstairs, made my porridge. Its funny, if I do say so myself I am a pretty good desert cook. I can make cakes, roulade, crumble, biscuits, anything sweet but give me a microwavable tub, milk, porridge oats and I am guaranteed to mess it up. Today I somehow managed to cook it for too long and had to scrape it off the sides of the bowl. Prepared the kit, did my exercises, went back to bed for twenty minutes and we were off down to Dover. Met Paul who is tapering and had a shorter swim (therefore was subject to my curses later in my swim - nothing personal, I think you're a legend but getting out two hours before me is criminal! Was told to do 9km, feed, 9km, feed, 7km OUT! Got in and dad started the stopwatch. Lovely and calm, sun on my back, can't complain (yet.) Got into a rhythm of counting to four as I breathe every four strokes, may sound boring but it's not, it helps me keep focused. Continued this to 1km and then changed to counting to four in French followed by Spanish, Japanese, German and then using letters (a,b,c,d or w,x,y,z) and then phrases. Admittedly curses were used later in the swim. Made it to the first feed very quickly and fed on a mini jaffa cake, a jelly baby and about 300ml of warm maxim in lemon squash which is quite good for me. I find it very difficult to drink over 100ml or so in one feed but I need more than this because too higher concentration makes me feel ill. I am quite lucky in that I am 5 foot 7 and 58 kilograms so compared to my dad who is 5 foot 11 and 83 kilograms or a man who is bigger I need to drink a lot less but as today I was feeding very infrequently (most people feed every hour in a 6 hour swim) I needed to drink more than I would like. The next 9km I madea very silly mistake; boosted by my speed during the first 9 I set off very quickly after my minute long feed and consequently suffered in the latter stages. Reached the next feed aching a lot and unable to take in as much maxim. Drank some black coffee, maxim and ate a sponge finger and agreed with my dad I would feed again with 2km to go to enable me to sprint the last bit (yeah right.) Swam for five kilometres with very aching arms and shoulders getting a bit emotional. I had been swimming alone for 5 and a half hours by the end of this and I was very tired but knew the channel was going to be a lot tougher than this. Met dad in the kayak for my final feed, a piece of flapjack that I had swam for for the past 23 kilometres and told him I was going to cut off a bit. He told me what I knew he would say that I never cut corners and if I started now I would regret it. I don't think I really had any intention to, I just needed some encouragment! By 23 kilometre sprinting meant increasing my stroke rate by about 2 strokes a minute not a lot more like usual and I finished in 5 hours 59 minutes. Waited until 6 hours 2 minutes to get out (breaststroked into shore) because there was no way I was doing that again if they decided 5 hours 59 minutes wasn't close enough to 6 hours! Really pleased to finish and qualify to swim the channel; dressed, ate, went home, ate more (eggs - protein to help with muscle repair.) and now looking forward to another trip to London tomorrow to see Priscilla Queen of the Desert and take a speed boat up the channel. School and morning training next week. School means I will be even more tired as I need to keep up my intensity and do a day at school and homework so I will probably be a bit grouchy. Sorry family, friends, teachers and anyone else who has to risk talking to me! Still less than a month to go (two weeks until taper time) and then I big swim. Only a little bit excited! =D
Thanks for reading,
Abby Taylor - Baptie signing out.
xx
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