Both sets of results amazed me. I felt it was a bad idea to carry out the tests after the exercise because I was slightly tired from exercising, which meant that I probably did not perform to the best I could of done prior to exercise. I was happy that my grip meter results improved, this is probably due to the press-ups and rowing machine, which put much strain on my arms. By looking at the averages I improved my left arm by 1. 3kj and my right arm by 0. 5kj. I am proud that my left arm improved more, as this is my weaker arm.
I wasn’t surprised that some of my swimming times were longer than before, as I before that I was tired when taking the tests although I had a 10minute break. My length of butterfly decreased by 1. 44seconds and both arms with the pull-buoy decreased by 0. 17seoconds – which is hardly anything. I am still surprised that butterfly is slower than one length. I was also surprised at the results of my left and right arms with the pull-buoy. They both improved – left arm by 1. 78seconds and my right arm by 0. 91seconds. I was surprised that my left arm was faster than my right arm as it is weaker.
By monitoring my progress at this stage of my training programme I can decide whether what I am doing is ok. I have decided that my exercises are good as I am improving slightly and as my next swimming session increases intensity it will hopefully improve me further. Session 4 – Indoor exercises I used this session and it was the same as session two except I added extra rest time between using the rowing machine and doing press-ups. Here are my results: Rowing Machine: Press-ups: These results made more sense than my previous results from sessions two.
This is because I did more repetitions in the first minute than the second minute, as I became more tired. For the rowing machine, in the first minute I improved by 4repetitions and in the second minute I improved by 3repetitions. For the press-ups I improved by 14repetitions in the first minute and decreased by 2repetitions in the second minute. I feel in this session I made the most progress and as I had a bigger break between the rowing machine and press-ups, I felt more refreshed and as I used the simpler press-ups, which I stated before, I felt more able to do more in the time I had.
This also made is safer for me as I wasn’t putting too much strain on my arms as I felt I was before. I probably found this session most effective out of all the sessions so far and I felt more confident whilst doing it. My results made me feel happier too as I improved by quite a bit. Session 5 – Final tests, final swimming session I found this session not to be as effective as the others because it was during a half term and I had to use different facilities to what I was using in previous weeks. But, I still tried to train as I had done before.
I went with my friend who helped time my laps and watched my swimming session. I did not have as effective a warm-up as usual and this did affect me the next day because my arms ached a lot more compared to previous weeks. This was also due to the fact that I had increased the intensity of my exercises to four lengths – double what I had done before. I also did not have as much time to do the session. Before I started my session I had to make sure the swimming pool was of the same length as the school swimming pool so I could keep the training as similar as possible.
I didn’t find this session as difficult as I expected. I was able to keep the resting times of 20seconds, which I had decreased from before, and I found it more enjoyable being able to swim for longer. I was very pleased with this session and I feel pleased with the overall standard of my training programme. I then retook my swimming tests. I could not take the final grip meter test, as I did not have one available to use, so I had to do that a week later.