Swim To The Moon

The family truckster is all packed and the Herbal family is headed to Pinkney. We'll be staying in the campground if you want to stop by for some brews. Wait, I gotta detox and get up at 4:30 am and do this swim.

How'd it go?

There was a rumor of a swan's nest near the course, but fortunately, I think, the cygnets are out of the nest. For an in-land lake with a lot of boat traffic, I thought the water quality was not bad. Here I was expecting the results to be under the results link. foolish me... thanks for the link!

In general, I thought it was a pretty good race. It got started late, because at least one bus got lost dropping off swimmers at the start. Otherwise, I thought organization was average or slightly better than average. No results have been posted yet, which is disappointing. The weeds were pretty thick, in spots, especially through the channels between lakes. On occasion, the sun shone through the clouds to be in direct alignment with siting the next marker. The water temperature was perfect (for me) at around 79F. I had a pretty good swim, but not as good as I wanted. I was having a tough time coming back from a vacation two weeks prior, even though I did some swimming while on vacation. My time was a bit faster than my 10k split, but not by as much as I would have thought (but of course temp, length, etc were not the same). Got a very nice towel as top 3 in age group. Much more useful than a medal. Jim

Congratulations, Jimswim and Chick o' Sea! This is one of those races where it pays to enter. You too could get an award! :) Frogs, minnows, pondweed, and waterfowl? :) :)

We pull out tomorrow morning. I make it my custom to enjoy a brew as soon as I can after finishing any open water swims. I shall endeavor to have some on hand. I just started this tradition myself for this race by having two ice cold ales waiting for me at the end. I figured I deserved it for swimming my longest yet race and suffering through my first dry night of camping in 25 years the night before. I would have shared one if I knew who you were. As for the race - I suffered through thigh cramping for the last 2 miles. I finished with a time of 1:34 which was just off my 1:30 guesstimate. I suppose someone is now going to tell me the course was only 2.5 miles which wouldn't surprise me with all the stops and slow downs I had. I should be happy because I said my only real goal was to finish and I managed that despite suffering through some pretty serious adversity. Yet I feel more frustrated than anything because #1 I was not able to swim up to my ability and #2 I was not really able to enjoy the swim. Despite the cramps, I still feel as if my training ended up being more than enough to put forth a solid effort (for me) but for whatever reason it wasn't meant to be this day. I thought the course was awesome. I don't know if I could be real excited to swim in a triangle after doing this one. When I have more time, I might post the detailed version of what went down including the DNR Cops episode at the campground the night before. This thing ended up quite a long saga for what otherwise could have been a real manageable swim.

I really enjoyed it. Expected the water to be funky and hot and wasn't disappointed :) loved it being a point to point! no boring factor. No problems spotting the buoys. I was a little annoyed when people got up and walked right in front of me a couple of times but had fun passing them. It was on the slow side for a 5k for me, though I'm in shockingly bad shape so was happy with it. They give towels for top 3 in age group!!!??? I had to leave before the awards. The results have been up since Monday morning, but not on the page I expected them www.estevents.com/index.html Cool. They said they'd mail me my award :)

First, congratulations on finishing. I think I was in the 1:20 range, but haven't seen an official time yet. It was, indeed, a bit of a rough swim with some shallow parts throughout the course, and the last third being in a single lake which was a bit mental demoralizing. However, I should say that the race was exceptionally well run, and it was very enjoyable despite my thinking I was almost done when I still had over a third of the course to go. Cheers, and hopefully we can enjoy a post race beer sometime in the future.