My wife and I did our first triathlon(sprint distance) yesterday. I gotta say, I am addicted. However, I freaked out a bit in my first open water swim(500 yds). I was able to calm myself down each time I became nervous but to be completely honest, the swim SUCKED! Ive always been a decent swimmer in the pool and found out saturday how different ow is. Only similarity was that I was wet on both occasions. I completely abandoned my pool technique and for all intensive purposes I dog paddled 500 yds. When I did freestyle, I swam with my head out of the water the whole time. Have any of you accomplished swimmers experienced this? I got nervous and let it ruin my swim. I found a new love in competing and would like to work up to an olympic/half ironman distance, but ive got to get past this unknown fear. Will this come with time and more ow training? Thank you guys a ton for any response.
Wes
Former Member
Sighting:
I’m slightly nearsighted. I don’t have any problems with this in the pool, but in open water it’s more noticeable. I recently bought a pair of prescription goggles (Speedo Vanquishers) specifically for open water and they’ve made it significantly easier to spot a buoy way off in the distance.
It takes some time to get used to OW swimming but many people grow to really enjoy it. Sighting is easier than it first seems. For one thing, there are a bunch of swimmers around you going the same direction. You can keep track of them without doing a full stop and sight--if you are on a different course than the pack, the odds are pretty good that groupthink is right and you are wrong. If its your first few swims, don't worry about your placing as much as work on getting comfortable sighting, swimming in a pack, doing quick looks rather than full stops as someone described above. I find that I sight best when I do a couple quick looks on successive strokes--the multiple looks give me a chance to figure out what I am seeing more easily.
Good luck, and doing practice swims really is a good and necessary idea.
Open water is great if it's available and you live in a mild climate. I practiced in Lake Michigan several times before I did my first Chicago Triathlon (back in the Mrs. T's days) and trained enough for the distance but on race day I freaked at the start. I swam about 75 yards before grabbing the wall and trying to calm down. I grabbed the wall at least 3 more times and it was only a half mile swim. Later that day I heard another participant compare the swim start to the sinking of the Titanic--total panic.
While sighting is important, the key is to OW is to relax. Realize that for the first 100 yards or so you aren't going to have a chance to get into a rhythm. Take more frequent breathes, shorter strokes. Train for the chaos by swimming in a lane (circles) with at least two other swimmers--preferably with swimmers with whom you are unfamiliar. You'll learn in a hurry how to time your break-aways, when to hang back, how to negotiate around others, etc.
On race day, if you're a middle of the pack swimmer, start toward the back of the pack.
If you're serious about an IM, keep in mind that the swim start is usually a mass start-no waves. A buddy of mine did the Lake Placid IM and within the first 500 yards was kicked in the nose. He seriously considered calling it a day. When I did IM Wisconsin a few years later, there were 2,500 participants. I remembered my buddy's story. So at the beginning of the race I was about 25-30 yards behind the starting line. I just figured it was no big deal to add 20-25 seconds to my time, especially since I had to hang in there for 2.4 miles, hop on my bike for 7-8 hours and then run a marathon. Starting in the back really helped me relax and by the time I started catching up to people I had avoided some of the race start nuttiness.
The good news is the OW swims are much less panicked because OW swimmers are usually more experienced. The starts are smoother and you won't find people crowding around the giant inflatable buoys at every turn.
Best of luck.
