Race Report

Event: Splish, Splash, Dash Open Water Swim Race
Location: Crystal Lake in Crystal Lake, Illinois
Distance Category: 1 mile
Date: July 15, 2007

(I realize it's kind of silly to get this race report done before last week's, but this one is a lot shorter.)

I was pleasantly surprised to see a full parking lot when I arrived at the race venue... I find comfort in numbers when I'm in open water. I peripherally noted the bikes hanging from many of the cars, but it wasn't until I was standing in line for registration that I realized what it meant: I found them! I found all the triathletes! I'd say we comprised 8 out of 10 people racing, and many were Madison-bound. It felt so freaking cool to be with my own kind somewhere other than at an actual triathlon.

At 6:45am it was humid and already approaching 80; a great day for a swim but I was nervous about the water temperature because so many people were sporting wetsuits. Luckily, it turned out they were triathletes testing their suits in open water prior to races with a cold swim. Had a brief moment of panic when one girl said she heard the water was 65, but she was quickly corrected by someone who said she's in this lake all the time and it's about 79. Phew!

Found Regner and Swim Coach Marcy, took some goofy pix (will post when I get copies) and scoped out the course. Just as I was thinking the turnaround buoy looked impossibly far away, John (Regner) blurted out that it didn't look so bad. (Easy for him to say, he can walk out his back door and swim across a lake every day.)

I felt a surprising new emotion this morning as I contemplated the task before me: calm composure. I'm used to my heart racing just coming in view of a lake, and here I was, looking out at this impossibly huge lake, completely at ease with the fact that I was about to swim out to the middle of it. Not confident, mind you, but anything short of sheer terror is really quite an improvement.

SCM was panicky, tears welling up in her eyes and repeatedly questioning why she was stupid enough to sign up for this. I spotted the obvious pattern emerging - this is just how she act pre-race - and didn't worry too much about it. Sure enough, post-race she was happy and had so much fun she's excited to do it next year.

I lined up at the back of the pack - there were about 100 swimmers total - and waded in when the gun went off. I was immediately left far behind by all by a lone breast stroker. About halfway to the turnaround I lost sight of even her.

The warm shallows extend pretty far and even a quarter mile out I had some uncomfortable weed encounters, so I swam for a shameful distance with my head out of the water. My neck was cramping and I felt slooooow, so to get going again without succumbing all-out panic (sadly, the sight of underwater weeds still does that to me) I resorted to my patented swim-with-eyes-closed technique. I only open them when I breathe and sight and it works just fine. For some reason I'm less freaked out when invisible tentacles caress me from below - when it happens I concentrate hard on staying calm and swimming through - than when I can see them reaching for me, waving blindly in the dim water, at which point I panic, gasp for air and thrash around ineffectively.

Even though I'd been in a fairly decent state of mind, I calmed down considerably when I felt the water temperature drop a little and I knew I was in deeper, weed-free water. This is when I did my best actual swimming because I was able to concentrate on things like stroke and rotation and kicking.

Because I swam the half mile last weekend in 22 I thought perhaps I could pull this off in about 45. Even though that estimate was aggressively fast for me - last time I saw a mile, a year ago, it took me about 63 minutes - I knew in the grand scheme of things it's ridiculous slow. But I knew I wouldn't be last to finish because the 2-milers had to do another loop.

As I neared the turnaround I cheered a little bit because I had not yet been passed by any of the 2-milers. I expected to be, and was passed by the leader in just another minute or so, but it made me happy not to be lapped before I turned around.

The rising sun made the return trip a challenge because I was too blinded to sight the buoys. It didn't help that the course had a slight arc to it. I ended up swimming slightly off course - maybe 30 yards wide - not long after I turned around. This was about the time the bulk of the 2-milers were lapping me, so I was happy to have swim caps to follow until I could see the buoys again.

This happens every time I swim in a lake, and I need to work on it before I move up to bigger triathlons: I always feel a bit panicky when I start an open water swim, and as a result I tend to gulp air. This quickly leads to a painfully bloated stomach that impedes my ability to inhale fully. I have to pause to get rid of it, but even with diligent effort I fail to expel all the air with my oh-so-ladylike burping technique, and the rest invariably causes painful abdominal cramps within 20 minutes or so. I'm clearly feeling better about open water in general, so I'm hoping this problem swimming outside simply fades away with time, the way it did swimming inside.

Don't have a final result yet, but my friends checked the clock when I finished and said it was around 48 minutes. Not great, but still 14 minutes faster than last time I swam a mile! I feel like this was an ideal training experience and I'm looking forward to making it an annual event.

My favorite part of the morning was heading out to the van and seeing that the triathlete contingent had turned the parking lot into a makeshift T1, and knowing that next year I'll be right there with them.