Moment of truth...

Another good day of integrating work and training. All I had on the training schedule was a swimming speed work session.

After yesterday's ultra slow swim session, I was a little nervous that I might have lost my swimming mojo. I was wondering if all the gains I made over the past 2 years was gone? Good swimming is about technique, like a golf swing. It's something you constantly have to work on or you can lose it.

It didn't take long into the swim that I realized I hadn't lost it and yesterday was just an off day. My swimming speed had returned. Yes! All my 100's were between 1:34 - 1:38. I also had my fastest 50 ever at 40 seconds. About 28 minutes into the swim I wanted to quit. I was telling myself that "I swam yesterday and really didn't need to swim today. I just swam today to see if I had my speed back and I do, so why keep going?"

I ended up taking a deep breath and decided to just one more set, and see how I felt after. The speed was so good, it motivated me to continue. Before I knew it, another 50 minutes had passed. I was so glad I kept going. It was my best muscle pounding swim workout ever. On one set of 50 meters, I went so hard, my chest, arm, and shoulder areas were maxed out. On the hurt scale, it was just under "almost injuring myself".

On the China front, by chance, I found out that the direct flight I'm booked on from Hong Kong to Haikou was cancelled. In it's place, they put me on a two stop, 12 hour adventure. My original direct flight from Hong Kong to Hakiou was only an hour. This one's eleven. My flight from Canada is only 15 hours.

The only reason I found out was because I was calling to see if I could change my flights. I decided I'd like to stay a little longer and sight see. I might as well, Alice and the kids are going to be in Palm Springs that week. No use me coming home and just hanging around the house for a week all by myself, when I could be sight seeing and drinking beer all by myself.

The direct flight being cancelled was actually a stroke of luck. The travel agent told me that because they cancelled it, I was able to get a full refund and with that refund I could book a flight with another airline. That would allow me to vacation in Shanghai for a few days. The best part is that it has a much shorter connection time to Haikou and the tickets are even $200 less.

The travel saga doesn't end there. John Barclay was on the same flights as me and his agent is saying he can't get a full refund and change to a new airline like me. He was on the phone with them for 4 hours today. He even called my travel agent and she let him listen in on a call with her and Cathay Pacific and Cathy Pacific confirming they will give a full refund on my ticket.

Cathy Pacific is telling John's agent that he can't get a full refund. It's not allowed by policy. It doesn't make sense, we have the same flights and tickets and I can get a refund but he can't. Sound's like a "suck and blow at the same time" policy. John'a agent is insisting that I can't get a refund either.

John then told me to go ahead and cancel my tickets, get the refund and re-book. Once that happens, he's going to use that as leverage to get his changed. It will be a "you did it for my buddy and he has the exact same tickets. Why are you not doing it for me?".

To be continued...

Speed swim - 1:18:52 / 3500 meters

Amazing video of what's possible.