Today was my turn to do one of the warm up races for the Flowers Sea Swim in June that Katie and I are training for. The swim in June is 1 mile long while today was 1/2 that distance at 800 meters. I have only been training for a little over a week so my goal was just to finish in a reasonable time somewhere at or below 20 minutes. The swim was from Governor's Beach (next to the British Governor's residence) up to Seven Mile Public Beach. As I walked up to register I thought the man registering ahead of me looked familiar and when he turned around I realized it was the Governor who is an avid swimmer.
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| Yes, that is Governor Taylor and his dog in line in front of me |
Katie had to leave for a baby shower so I was on my own for the swim. Fortunately one of her friends Kristy was doing the swim and her husband was there to take some shots of us that I will post after they email them to us. Katie did get a shot of me right before it was time to head over to the start line.
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My number was S B 29 (for swim boys and entrance number 29). I had told myself before the start to go out slow and pace myself but when the start horn went off I went out fast even as I was telling myself to slow down. I did the first 200 meters in a little less than 3 minutes but was really winded and by the 400 meter mark was dying. I tried rolling onto my back and just kicking and then some breast stroke to try and catch my breath but my foolish sprinting at the beginning had really killed any shot at a consistent pace. I was still moving well and crossed the line in 43rd place out of the 86 swimmers at somewhere between 18 and half minutes and 19 minutes so within my personal goal of doing the swim in under 20 minutes.
Had I paced myself early on I think I could have done at least 1-2 minutes faster as the last 200 meters for me seemed to take forever. At the end I was nauseous and dizzy and it took a good thirty minutes for me to start to feel OK. I met two of the instructors for ICCI at the tent by the finish line and I must have looked bad as both were checking on me every so often and at one point, one of them even offered to drive me back down to the start area. I was mostly embarrassed and there was no way I wasn't walking back. Fortunately I got enough of my wind back to do so after they handed out the prizes. Kristy's husband Justin tells me has has a couple of great shots of me at the finish still in the water and looking completely exhausted. I was so out of it I didn't even realize he was taking photographs. This was a good lesson in two things, first that I am no where near the shape I need to be in to swim the mile in open water, and second, I have to learn to let go of the competitive juices and swim at pace rather than going out too fast. The good news is we have over two months now to train for the mile and get into the shape we need to be in. We have set two days a week for training swims and this will motivate me to keep to them if I don't want to fail miserably in June.
