Open Water

The last milestone I'd yet to accomplish before the triathlon was an open water swim. I could have gone Saturday, or yesterday, but, not to put too fine a point on it, I chickened out. I hadn't swum past the end of the dock at our town beach in all the time I've lived here, and hadn't ventured beyond a marked swim area since I was 12 years old. (Back then I was a confident swimmer.)

But today, I pulled on my SuperWoman suit (short-pants version!) and waded in to the lovely Mudge Pond. I must have looked silly with my goggles and swim cap, next to all the toddlers and tykes splashing around! But I ignored this - no self-consciousness, remember? and carried on. The water was chilly but once I'd gotten acclimated, quite refreshing - I could have probably done fine without the suit and am still thinking of skipping it next week. It was also choppy, and I kept getting the feeling of tentacles brushing against me - just the seaweed that grows in the pond, but still... eery. Also eery: that sense when you go from a warm spot to a cool spot.

I did a few breathless laps around the floating dock, while my family sat at the end of the regular one and cheered me on. I only stayed int he water 10 minutes or so, but had another go an hour later - this time the breeze had settled so the water was calmer, and I ventured a little farther out. Lots of people swim all the way across the lake and back (it's a tiny lake!) and I've no doubt that after a few more attempts I'll build the confidence to do it too. The swimming itself is no problem. I'd been wondering how long I could sustain my stroke without a wall to touch every 25 yards, but I didn't find that to be a problem - I paused when I needed to, but probably quite a bit less often than I would have in the pool.

What I didn't do was stroke efficiently - my legs were dragging, even in the wetsuit. My husband diplomatically said, "maybe it's taught differently now, but when I was a kid I was taught that my feet should break the surface when I swim."

If I understand the Terry Laughlin / Total Immersion technique correctly, this is indeed correct - that if your upper body and head are in proper alignment (head down, chest thrust forward) your feet will naturally rise. But I didn't do this consistently - it was just a wierd feeling to be thrusting down into the murky green deep (no black line to follow!) So, I have 2 or 3 workouts left to plan - I want at least one more of each under my belt, especially to test my latest and greatest shoe experiment, which I think I already described.

The weather forecast for Saturday has been posted: 75 degrees (not bad, but cooler would be nicer) and 40% chance of thunderstorms. Yikes! Evidenly it was 40 degrees and pouring last year - I'll take this over that!