Swimming Alone

I swim alone most of the time,..don`t know what someone else would be able to do should I get in trouble. I own a rescue can but have never used it,..I`m not wild about having a strap accross my chest/shoulder. Perhaps I should give it a try...it cost 50 bucks. :rolleyes: Yes,...visibility is a good thing,..especially where you have boaters,..I wear a hot orange swim cap.

I had to promise my wife not to swim alone in the lake last summer. but one of my swimming partners has made this arguement against a swimming buddy. we can be between 2-8 people in the water at one time. only 2-3 swim the same pace. the rest of us swim to the next bouy and then we wait for everyone to gather, then swim to the next. last year it was 250m between bouys, this year 200. after a few practices we decided it was better for the faster swimmers to swim the 750 or 800 in one swim and then wait at the other end. here comes the "no need for a buddy" arguement. if I am swimming 10-15m in front of my buddy, and he goes under, and it takes me 10-15s before I look back, he could be as much as 25-40m behind me and underwater. not very likely that I could swim back and find him and then be able to save him. I find it hard to sink with a wetsuit, so my only concern with swimming OW is being hit by a boat. luckily for me the lake I swim in only has pedal boats.

I am fortunate and have two training partners that and we all swim at about the same pace. The lifeguard in me sights them along with sighting our objective during the swim. we do stop to regroup at major turns along the route but this does not hold up our swim for long. On occasions I do swim alone I use tow a rescue tube and have a shore support with a cell phone if needed (usually one of my children). Also in Chicago this summer I swam a couple times along the wall which is patrolled by lifeguards during the season.

It seems to me that in order to make a reasoned decision about this, as opposed to a rationalization for the decision you want, you would need information about how open water incidents actually happen. Do people really suddenly just disappear under the water? Especially when wearing a wetsuit? Do people usually just lose consciousness or do they usually go through a period of distress first? If the danger is being hit by a boat will a second person be able to assist after the fact? Are you more likely to have a health problem or be hit by a boat? Clearly swimming in an area with no power boats seems safer. The beach where our team swims has a very gradual increase in depth, some of the swimmers choose to swim at a depth where they can stand up. Our beach has a marked off no-boats area for swimming, we swim inside that. When swimming buoy to buoy faster swimmers can double back a buoy to avoid having to wait. It might be safer to give the slower swimmers a head start instead of waiting for them. Would carrying a whistle be a compromise safety measure? Anyway, I don't have all the answers, but it seems to me that you need data on the risks to do any sort of rational risk assessment, and that the risks will vary significantly based on local conditions.

I swim alone most of the time,..don`t know what someone else would be able to do should I get in trouble. I own a rescue can but have never used it,..I`m not wild about having a strap accross my chest/shoulder. Perhaps I should give it a try...it cost 50 bucks. A shoulder strap isn't too bad for short swims (19 years of ocean lifeguarding), but for a long swim it's going to chafe a bit. Try this instead: life1rescue.com/.../2-Lifeguard-Buoy-Belt.html It's a belt you wear around your waist: you can thread the loop from your rescue can through one of the metal rings and then put the can through the loop and tighten. I've never used this particular model of line belt, but it looks like it would work for this purpose.

About 5-8 years ago, I bought one of those red rescue tubes for exactly this purpose. If I'm using it in a lake, I usually don't even worry about staying too close to shore. The strap doesn't usually bother me much -- only occasionally catch the strap on a leg, usually when heading downwind. Good luck.

I swim alone all the time. There's this one guy at the beach who always warns me about danger - boats, poor visibility, heart attacks, drowning. After hearing this a few times I told him I would be happy to go doing the thing I loved and he shut up after that. But seriously, I do swim alone in the boat-infested waters of L.I. Sound but I don't worry about having a partner there because: 1) I would never get a chance to swim if it required someone else being present, and 2) I don't feel that it would make it any safer having someone else around. However, you need to feel safe when you're swimming, and if the rescue tube helps (as well as anything else: wetsuit, swim cap, etc.) I say go for it. And keep swimming!

I have been swimming alone for 13 years now. I think about it every time I enter the water. I swim when there are no boats in an inland lake. If the water is warm or not cold...I don't worry much. If it is cooler I wear wet suit shorts so I can easily float if I cramp up. If you are going to do intervals that may tax you to limitations,m stay where you can stand up in water. If water is rough. Some kind of floatation. Warm placid lake,distance swim....I just stretch out and cruise anywhere. Best inland lake in Michigan for me is pPickeral Lake in pickney recreation area. No power boats, sits down in some hills in the woods..so it is protected from wind. In the middle of state park..no buildings...clean water. I like to see a kayak or two for safe measure. Alot of times when I swim there is nobody even on the lake or in site on land. One last detail. I USUALLY let people know where I swim and most of the time when...so they know where to look for me..if you get my DRIFT. Open swimming in the inland lake in the summer is a huge part of why I love life.:) I also bike{triathlete]...that is much more dangerous.

Swam alone again tonight, ya thought about this thread...water was like glass...sun setting..cruisin at constant speed like a wave ..it was awsome...

I'm 55 and started life guarding on the ocean at 16. I swim alone in open water, always have, always will. But keep in mind, you are not just 100 yards from people who can help. Things can happen fast and there is little likelihood anyone could help you. 100 yards, 1000 yards the reasoning is the same. I lived in Alaska at Denali National Park years ago. I would go backpacking in the wilderness alone, something YOU should never do. The same rules apply to swimming in open water alone. Know your abilities, assess the risks and then ask yourself is this something I want to experience. Swimming alone is not just a swim workout with a lot of extra water around you.