Luke's Life: Walnut Creek

Saturday, October 3, 2026

Pacific Masters Swimming - 3^rd October 2026

A year later and about 4 lbs (a little less than 2 kg) heavier, I was back at the Pacific Masters Swimming Kerry O'Brien Short Course Meters Championships, hopeful to improve on my 2025 performance.

Despite some trouble with shoulder and elbow stiffness since my race in July, I felt I was in decent shape.

This was my first race in a tech suit. I was eager to learn if it would help me find more speed. During a couple of tests in training I found the extra compression very restrictive, especially during turns. (One study suggests the compound benefit of a tech suit plus a dome cap is about 0.27 seconds per push off the wall. [1] [2] There's very little data otherwise but all elite swimmers wear tech suits in competition, and a meaningful share of elite male swimmers choose Mizuno tech suits when they're not required to wear another brand. A bunch of Pacific Masters swimmers also wear tech suits.)

The weather was forecast to be hot: 100 F (about 37.8 C). Temperatures reached the mid 90s (about 34 C) while I was racing.

100 SCM Freestyle: 1:00.80 (splits: 28.21, 32.59) - video. (2nd of 6 in age group)
I was assigned to lane 5. Due to some on-deck architecture, lane 5 has a starting block significantly offset from center so the block is angled back into the lane...In practice, this was fine. My start felt good. My first length felt good until I lifted my head around 20 meters in. The rest felt very sloppy. My second turn was a disaster. I nearly surfaced under the lane rope and lost at least half a body length on the swimmer behind me.
Stroke count:
1: 15
2: 17
3: 17
4: 19
I finished 2.25 seconds faster than 2025, just under the predicted time from long course in July.
50 SCM Butterfly: 30.35 - video. (3rd of 4 in age group)
I hadn't focused on fly at all in 2026. I only raced it since it was immediately after the freestyle event. Some tests in training in early September suggested I hadn't gotten slower so I was pleasantly surprised to go 1.29 seconds faster than 2025.
Stroke count:
1: 9
2: 11

Equipment:

Suit: Mizuno GX-Sonic Royal Motion (MT)
Googles: Speed Vanquisher 2.0
Cap: Arena Aquaforce Wave Silicone Swim Cap

Personal notes for my next event:

I feel I'm reaching a plateau with my solo shared-lane-with-randoms training at the YMCA, so I'm looking for a masters team to swim with. I plan to trial with the YMCA team in the Presidio before the end of 2026.
I need to learn to maintain my freestyle technique under race-pressure and despite life events around and at these meets.

Results:

Possible next events:

February 6th: USF Valentine's Affair
March 21st: Short and Sweet Meet, Novato, CA
April 9th to 11th: Pacific Masters SCY Championships

Sunday, October 5, 2025

Pacific Masters Swimming - 4^th October 2025

After a break of more than 12 years, I restarted swim training in May 2025. More than 13 years after my last race meet, I (re)entered the 2025 Pacific Masters Swimming Kerry O'Brien Short Course Meters Championships in Walnut Creek, CA. I registered for only two events, and needed to guesstimate entry times based on short course yards training at the Chinatown YMCA in San Francisco. My local YMCA forbids diving so I couldn't practice dive-starts, nor properly account for them in my entry times.

In 2010 I raced at the same event and had a bad experience. I hoped for better in 2025. I'd spent the summer re-learning 21st century swimming and nutrition, and trying to put what I could into practice. I was eager to see how much that could counteract my old(er) age, and lack of training and race practice. One study shows swimmers become about 0.6% slower per year. If that applied to me, I could expect to be about 8% slower than I was in 2012. My entry times were significantly slower than that margin. Did I sandbag too much? (Two men I raced against in 2012 maintained their fast speeds for about ten more years! [1] [2]).

I competed without a club affiliation. YMCA SF has a masters team, but they don't train at my local pool. My old club, USF, is full, and has a waitlist to (re)join.

Pre-event registration suggested my age group was filled with fast swimmers.

In mid-July I tweaked behind my right knee. General hamstring and calf tightness and cramping issues held me back from late July through September.

I ate my normal breakfast around 9am, and snacked on dates and Gu Roctane before my races started around 1pm.

100 SCM Freestyle. 1:03.05 (splits: 29.20, 33.85) - video (6th of 12 in age group)
My guesstimated entry time was 1:13.00, about 19% slower than my 2009 time: 1:01.48. Improvements after race-registration in late September, meant I expected to race around 1:08.00. This meant I would need to break from my heat competitors by several seconds - I couldn't use them to pace myself unless someone else also overestimated their time.
My dive-start (my first in 13 years) sucked. I partly displaced my goggles, and didn't get any depth. My final time was about 3.2% slower than in 2009.
Stroke count:
1: 17
2: 18
3: 19
4: 20
I think I could get close to 1:02 with a better dive and without leaking goggles.
50 SCM Butterfly. 31.64 - video (3rd of 6 in age group)
I hadn't raced this event since college (or longer, so maybe since the 20th century?). My guesstimated entry time was 0:34.00 which I expected to be close to what I would race on the day.
My dive was better, and my race felt better than I expected, which means I should have pushed harder on the first 25m. :-)
Stroke count:
1: 9
2: 11

Finishing in the middle of my age group twice makes me officially Mediocre!