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A story about open-water swimming

Last night I did a new little race with a handful of friends. It's called the Splash-N-Dash and consisted of a 1500m lake swim and 5k trail run. (The distances were approximate. Very approximate.)

I've had a cold all week so I wasn't really feeling all that racey, but it seemed like a fun thing to do and I knew it would feel good just to get outside of SF to the hot summer weather. The race turned out to be very fun and low-key.

There were a few 11-to-13-year-old kids racing. I was on the second lap of the two-lap swim when I saw one of the kids clinging to a lifeguard's surfboard. A boat zipped over to rescue him. Later on I saw him walking the run course with his dad, who apparently had quit his own race to console his son. I felt bad for the boy but was also impressed as hell that he was out there at all.

My first attempt at an open-water swim event was when I was 12. My summer camp had an annual Lake Swim, which I recall being a half-mile swim through the murky and weed-choked water. I loved to swim, so I signed up, thinking it would be no biggie. I trained for it all summer (or so I thought), breaststroking laps in the roped-off swim area every day(ish).

The night before the swim, those of us who had chosen to participate dragged our sleeping bags out to the beach and slept on the gravelly sand so our cabinmates wouldn't be disturbed when we got up. I remember having a sleepless night listening to the clank, clank, clank as the wind blew the boat riggings around.

The swim staff got us up early and took us across the lake in rowboats through the pre-dawn mist. We slipped off the boats and started swimming back to the beach. But my breaststroke wasn't very fast, and I quickly dropped behind the other swimmers. Also, I had underestimated how far half a mile really was, and I got tired quickly. Less than halfway across I cried uncle and climbed back into the rowboat.

At the end of the summer, when they gave out all the various end-of-camp awards, they called up all the lake swimmers to pick up certificates. I remember being embarrassed by my failure, but even more mortified that they called me up to pick up a certificate. I hadn't finished the swim! Whoever decided to give me the certificate probably either didn't even notice that I hadn't finished, or thought it would be better to include me in the list so I wouldn't feel left out. In my state of pre-pubescent hyper-self-awareness, I felt like my failure was being rubbed into my face. Drama queen, I know.

That was 21 years ago. Obviously it made a big impression.

About 14 years after that first open-water attempt, I decided to take up triathlon, started swim training for real, worked out a decent freestyle stroke, and became a pretty good swimmer. Since then I've done swims in the Bay from Alcatraz and from Treasure Island, I've finished four Ironman swims, I've been in the water with whales and sea lions and unidentified objects, and I'm a pretty confident swimmer. I have really grown to love open-water swim racing. But I still think about that first attempt every now and then. And I felt really bad for that kid hanging for dear life onto the lifeguard's surfboard. I've been there.

So anyway, in last night's race I placed 13th out of 27 women, right in the middle, so now of course I have to go back for the second race in the three-part series to see how much faster I can go when I'm not sick.

(The photo has nothing to do with the story, except that it took us an hour and forty-five minutes to get to the race 50 miles away because a car accident set this hillside on fire. And also because California is pretty much burning up right now, literally and weatherally. Right now at 10pm it is 80 degrees both inside and outside my apartment IN SAN FRANCISCO. But I'm sure we'll be back to the usual 57 degrees in a day or two.)

June 20, 2008 10:10 PM