Did you ever have one of those swims?

Warm up was slow going. I could feel the creakiness in my shoulders. 300 m free barely got things moving. 300 pull helped. Fin kick got my legs going a bit. The 50 m hard set wasn't particularly fast. Then the long set. After the first few laps I was looking for my hand on the clock. It took several laps to realize I was essentially swimming 2 minute 100's. I thought I was swimming 1:50's. Thats what it felt like, both in terms of effort and water flowing past my face. I pushed a bit harder and sped up a bit, but I was struggling. Here I was working way harder than normal, and swimming much slower, even while methodically going through a little swimming efficiency checklist. I was passing my neighbours regularly, but wasn't swimming at all like normal. I really slowed down near the end, and had to really push the last 150 to come in exactly on 50 m for 2500 m. That is firmly blah in terms of pace. I was breathing pretty hard and had tired arms and there was still more on the list. I struggled through. Stretched my arms thoroughly after. 4K and 1.5 hrs in the water.

Waited till mid day for the run. I wanted it to be hot, but I wanted to be done before the severe thunderstorm came rolling through. 10 min warmup, 40 min steady smooth comfortable pace, and 10 minute cool down for an hour total. It was quite well. My feet and legs felt just fine. Stretched after.