AT OWS
Austin Triathletes' Open Water Swim 2008
The bad news -- as bad as "bad" can be on a cooler day than of late, overcast, on a non-workday morning, surrounded by fellow swimmer friends -- is that my time was woefully below what I had wanted/assumed.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, I had a great swim. I actually liked the water temps, despite grumblings around me of it being too warm. The course was a "dog leg"? shaped out-and-back-loop-type-thing, "keep the buoys to your left, U-turn at the yellow ones". Our 2.4 mile swim was 2 of those loops.
My original intent, when I put this race on my calendar, was to compare my 2.4 mile IMAZ time with a 2.4 mile stand-alone time. With the beating I took and associated panic at IMAZ, I thought my stand-alone swim time would be quicker, and wanted to prove it to myself. With a 1:12:21 at IMAZ, I wanted a sub-1:10 today, hopefully a 1:07 or 1:08-ish. Then it became apparent that this would not have been a wetsuit-legal swim (I don't know if I was ever sane in thinking an Aug. Mansfield Dam swim ever would have been, or whether the hottest summer for 80 years was a contributing factor to it not being). Anyway, wetsuit swim to non-wetsuit swim makes it a non-apples-to-apples comparison. Oh, well, c'est la vie. Swim it hard anyway, see what you do. In lieu of the wetsuit, I was instead shaved-ready :) but can't do anything about the non-buoyant sinking legs :(
I swam a perfect race. Really, it felt so "correct", correct effort level, correct tactics. I drafted for 3/4's of it, breathing half of that every 2 strokes and half every 3 strokes, intermixed, quite "solidly comfortable" then, at the final far yellow turn buoy, with half a mile to go, I dropped the bomb, picked it up, pulled around my draft, dropped him, dropped my draftee/s and began chasing down the white-cap and kick-splash ahead of me (Mighty Mich, I guess I closed the gap from 30-50m to 8m over that last 1/2 mile). The pickup moving me from "solidly comfortable" to "comfortably hard" then "hard" for the final 5 mins.
I do openly apologize, without hesitation or reservation, to the woman that I was drafting off for the first 400m. The poor thing was a little slower than me and I kept -- and I mean kept, every damn time I reached forward with either reach:( -- tapping her toes or ankle. Finally, she actually stopped and turned around and, if I hadn't just swum on by, those clenched fists I noticed would have punched me on the nose! Sorry, sorry, sorry.
But I soon picked up another draft. And stayed with him for the next mile or so. And I had a chap on my toes for 1.5 miles! ... until I dropped them both at the 1.5 mile marker.
I finished that final half a mile really strong, dropping those around me, gaining on the one ahead of me. I had a great swim. It felt great. I was thrilled with it. ... until Mighty Mich deflated me by telling me what her/our/my time was. What? wtf? Are you sure? Damn. Grrr. Argh. Ack. Gerf.
I was chicked by Mighty Mich (well, lets be clear, I was chicked by many more women that just Michelle, but Michelle was the white-cap and kick-splash that I was desperately trying to catch for the last half mile of the swim, who was 30-50 meters ahead of me at the 1/2 mile-to-go turnaround, and who was turned around smiling to greet me in just beyond the timing mats on the beach at the finish; I couldn't quite catch her)
Coeur d'Claire/
triphorphun later said I swam my zig-zag route up the straight-line course with aplomb! Wait, isn't that one of those Bass ackwards compliments? In my defense, I was following other toes, not trailblazing :}
I didn't win a speed suit as the fastest Masters Male, I didn't podium place top-3 in my 40-49 AG. But it was lots of fun and I enjoyed it immensely. I was secretly pleased to not be riding or running after the swim, as many of those around me at the festivities after were in fact doing. It's a recovery week for me, and a 2.4 mile swim is it for today :-)
My time was 1:27:22, 5th in AG. 2:16/100m (20 mins -- twenty minutes! -- off the 1:07 I wanted:) I'm gonna go out on a limb and say the course was long! Full results here.
I don't usually frequent Starbucks, and when I do usually just get bold black drip coffee, but I stopped at the one with a golf course view out there on 620 for a more fru-fru coffee drink and the NYT on the patio on the way home. Sinfully pleasant.
The bad news -- as bad as "bad" can be on a cooler day than of late, overcast, on a non-workday morning, surrounded by fellow swimmer friends -- is that my time was woefully below what I had wanted/assumed.
Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, I had a great swim. I actually liked the water temps, despite grumblings around me of it being too warm. The course was a "dog leg"? shaped out-and-back-loop-type-thing, "keep the buoys to your left, U-turn at the yellow ones". Our 2.4 mile swim was 2 of those loops.
My original intent, when I put this race on my calendar, was to compare my 2.4 mile IMAZ time with a 2.4 mile stand-alone time. With the beating I took and associated panic at IMAZ, I thought my stand-alone swim time would be quicker, and wanted to prove it to myself. With a 1:12:21 at IMAZ, I wanted a sub-1:10 today, hopefully a 1:07 or 1:08-ish. Then it became apparent that this would not have been a wetsuit-legal swim (I don't know if I was ever sane in thinking an Aug. Mansfield Dam swim ever would have been, or whether the hottest summer for 80 years was a contributing factor to it not being). Anyway, wetsuit swim to non-wetsuit swim makes it a non-apples-to-apples comparison. Oh, well, c'est la vie. Swim it hard anyway, see what you do. In lieu of the wetsuit, I was instead shaved-ready :) but can't do anything about the non-buoyant sinking legs :(
I swam a perfect race. Really, it felt so "correct", correct effort level, correct tactics. I drafted for 3/4's of it, breathing half of that every 2 strokes and half every 3 strokes, intermixed, quite "solidly comfortable" then, at the final far yellow turn buoy, with half a mile to go, I dropped the bomb, picked it up, pulled around my draft, dropped him, dropped my draftee/s and began chasing down the white-cap and kick-splash ahead of me (Mighty Mich, I guess I closed the gap from 30-50m to 8m over that last 1/2 mile). The pickup moving me from "solidly comfortable" to "comfortably hard" then "hard" for the final 5 mins.
I do openly apologize, without hesitation or reservation, to the woman that I was drafting off for the first 400m. The poor thing was a little slower than me and I kept -- and I mean kept, every damn time I reached forward with either reach:( -- tapping her toes or ankle. Finally, she actually stopped and turned around and, if I hadn't just swum on by, those clenched fists I noticed would have punched me on the nose! Sorry, sorry, sorry.
But I soon picked up another draft. And stayed with him for the next mile or so. And I had a chap on my toes for 1.5 miles! ... until I dropped them both at the 1.5 mile marker.
I finished that final half a mile really strong, dropping those around me, gaining on the one ahead of me. I had a great swim. It felt great. I was thrilled with it. ... until Mighty Mich deflated me by telling me what her/our/my time was. What? wtf? Are you sure? Damn. Grrr. Argh. Ack. Gerf.
I was chicked by Mighty Mich (well, lets be clear, I was chicked by many more women that just Michelle, but Michelle was the white-cap and kick-splash that I was desperately trying to catch for the last half mile of the swim, who was 30-50 meters ahead of me at the 1/2 mile-to-go turnaround, and who was turned around smiling to greet me in just beyond the timing mats on the beach at the finish; I couldn't quite catch her)
Coeur d'Claire/
triphorphun later said I swam my zig-zag route up the straight-line course with aplomb! Wait, isn't that one of those Bass ackwards compliments? In my defense, I was following other toes, not trailblazing :}
I didn't win a speed suit as the fastest Masters Male, I didn't podium place top-3 in my 40-49 AG. But it was lots of fun and I enjoyed it immensely. I was secretly pleased to not be riding or running after the swim, as many of those around me at the festivities after were in fact doing. It's a recovery week for me, and a 2.4 mile swim is it for today :-)
My time was 1:27:22, 5th in AG. 2:16/100m (20 mins -- twenty minutes! -- off the 1:07 I wanted:) I'm gonna go out on a limb and say the course was long! Full results here.
I don't usually frequent Starbucks, and when I do usually just get bold black drip coffee, but I stopped at the one with a golf course view out there on 620 for a more fru-fru coffee drink and the NYT on the patio on the way home. Sinfully pleasant.