Iron Jack

I had two training highlights last week – the first was going for a run with my husband, and the second was my swim in the Thorndon Pool in Wellington.

 

One week into the new job and I was off to Wellington to meet the national public affairs team. Back to back meetings over two days, a very early start to catch the red-eye flight, and gale-force winds that were even worse than usual, even for “windy Wellington”, meant that my training sessions down there had been limited. Alright, non-existent.

 

I got to the end of my second day’s programme and found myself with about and hour spare before I had to head to the airport. I sat there for about ten minutes arguing with myself about going to the pool.

 

“You know you should,” one half of my brain said.

 

“Yes, but I’m absolutely shattered and I have spin class tonight anyway,” said the other.

 

“Yes but you’re already a swim down and you need to make it up now.”

 

“I can make it up on Friday.”

 

“Which will mean four early morning starts in a row, you know you won’t do it.”

 

“Go away.”

 

“No, you go away!”

 

I stopped arguing with myself long enough to talk to my new-found colleagues about it. Their view was overwhelmingly in favour of going.

 

“But you better be quick,” says Lisa. “The pool closes in 30 minutes!”

 

Aaaaaargh. I finally decide to go and the pool is about to close on me. I hightailed it out the door and ran to the pool. The attendant informed me I could get out of the pool at 2pm, rather than needing to be out of the complex by 2pm. Phew. And their clock was five minutes slower than mind. Fantastic. Thirty seconds later I was in the water – I have never got changed to fast in my life. I stood on the side for about a second and dived into the water.

 

Bliss.

 

The Thorndon Pool is an outdoor swimming pool at the Beehive end of Wellington. For those non-kiwis, the Beehive is the political hub of New Zealand, thus the Beehive end is a thriving hub of Government departments. The pool is usually only open over summer, but was opening for just two hours over lunch-times for a short time while another council pool was closed. I lived in Wellington for two years from 1998 to 2000 and I had never swum in the Thorndon Pool – god knows why, it was absolutely amazing.

 

Yes, even though it was surrounded by a big wall it was still very windy. Yes the pool was full of leaves and twigs as a result of the gale force winds. But it was just fantastic. The sun was shining. And I was swimming. Awesome.

 

Because I only had less than 30 minutes, I decided to just swim a kilometre as fast as I could. No drills. Just freestyle. I clocked in at 24 minutes, my fastest kilometre ever. I don’t know whether it was the pool, or whether it was the first time I’d “just” swum for a while, but I’m definitely thinking the pool had a lot to do with it.

 

An hour later I was on the plane on my way home, very pleased I’d managed to fit in my swim.