Fitness Goals Update- February

To put this post in context, see my Fitness Goals 2016 post here and my update for January here. For the second month in a row, February was all about swimming for me. 

Here are my swimming stats for February:

...and for running:

From my list of goals for 2016, I have achieved the following but won't cross them off because I hope to improve more
- return to running after injury (still recovering but did my first run last week)
- swim or run at least 3 times a week (exceeded this by far) 
- improve personal best times for swimming

Here's what else happened for the month:
-participated in another four swim club nights (eight in a row now)
-continued with 5.30am swimming training for each Friday of the month
-participated in first 50m butterfly race since resuming swimming
-continued working towards the million metres award with Masters Australia. I've completed 10% of the total distance required so far. 
-participated in two inter club carnivals between RSL swimming clubs. 
-raced in an ocean pool for the first time
-completed my first run after being sidelined with injury for three months. My ankle is still not completely back to normal but I started slowly getting back into running last week.

Here is my most unexpected achievement for the month:
- I won the 50m freestyle open championship race at the Western Metropolitan RSL Swimming Carnival. I brought home this amazing trophy for my club. To be fair, it was a small carnival without much competition and I'm still a couple of seconds off where I want to be for this event. But I'm very happy (I didn't know this carnival even had prizes as many of them don't) and it's not bad for the first 50m freestyle I've entered in over 12 years. Unfortunately I don't get to keep the trophy but it's going to be engraved with my name and will remain in trophy cabinet at my club pool for the next year. That's such a cool concept- wherever the trophy is, it will have my name on it. 


Of course I had to take some pictures with the trophy:

I've never been the sort of person to have a high opinion of myself so I'd hate to give the impression of talking myself up here. I still have so much I want to achieve. I definitely think sports are about personal bests. Any personal best and achievement is worth celebrating. I think there's no better feeling in the world. Swimming has been so positive for me and given me a sense of purpose for the last two months. I know my life would be so different right now if it hadn't been the focus recently. The combination of my best friend leaving work last month, my general low opinion of myself and my substantial decline in motivation for my job, mean that in the absence of swimming I would be struggling and feeling very low all the time. I'm fortunate to have found swimming when I did as this would have been an otherwise harder time for me. I highly recommend getting into a sport and it's wonderful that achievement can be gained from any small improvement.  


Finally I purchased some new running shoes. Being the shopaholic I m, my recent love for sports mean I'm now rather obsessed with colourful sportswear. My swimsuit collection has grown rapidly. I decided to buy some new running shoes. My other shoes weren't bad but I'm trying to do everything I can to minimise injurt so that includes having the right equipment. I've never had Nikes before and the colours are so beautiful! I am very happy with them.

What did you achieve this month?