It has been a little while since my last blog update; I've been out swimming a lot. I passed my qualifying swim, which was the last official hurdle before my swim this August. In some ways it seems like it has snuck up on me a bit, however, it does feel like I have been preparing for it for ages too. I have only made it down to Dover once this year but I will be heading down again soon now that the water is warming up, it has just about got to 14deg C.
I went on an interesting river swim the other weekend with some like minded crazy people who are swimming from Oxford to Henley. It was a good reminder how quickly things can go wrong. We all started off fine and dodged an attack from a swan. He had a little nibble at one of the tow floats and swam behind us to make sure we were leaving his patch but it was a pretty mild swan encounter. Before people ask, it wasn't my tow float, for a change.
Then one of our possy stopped about 4km in with cramp, one of my nightmare scenarios in the middle of the river with nowhere to put your feet down. Lucky he was able to swim to the side and stretch it out. It pretty much stops you dead in your tracks and once you have it happen once if you carry on swimming it will happen again.
The first lock on our swim is approached through a long 1km man-made cutting surrounded by lots of trees which were currently dropping all of their flower petals into the river. At first it looks quite pretty but quickly becomes annoying as there are bits of twigs which scratch your arms as you swim past. I picked up a new nickname in this section, not something you would associate with a slightly bearded grown man:
'Petal'
Unbeknownst to me, a lot of flower petals had become lodged in my beard so when I stopped to talk to my swimming compadres I was a slightly bearded man with flower petals arranged about my face. Here's hoping that nickname doesn't stick.
The next stretch of river saw another swan encounter, however this pair of swans stayed on the edge of the river and let us swim right by. Very unusual for me... Cramp stuck again, and our pace understandably slowed.
This is where we started to have issues as the river is still pretty cold and the weather wasn't playing ball either. We decided to call the swim where we could get picked up easily. A few texts at the next lock and a lift was sorted. As we were still about 1k we walked over the lock to jump back in and were greeted by a rather inquisitive swan. S/he sat on the water at the bottom of the steps just watching as we all claimed down the ladder into the water. As we started swimming the swan just swam off.
We finished the swim early due to people starting to feel the cold, it doesn't take long if you aren't swimming at your normal pace and it is better to get out too early than too late. Hypothermia really is quite dangerous and it is better to err on the side of caution.
Sorry to all those who were routing for me to be attacked by some sort of animal but it didn't happen this time...
I went on an interesting river swim the other weekend with some like minded crazy people who are swimming from Oxford to Henley. It was a good reminder how quickly things can go wrong. We all started off fine and dodged an attack from a swan. He had a little nibble at one of the tow floats and swam behind us to make sure we were leaving his patch but it was a pretty mild swan encounter. Before people ask, it wasn't my tow float, for a change.
Then one of our possy stopped about 4km in with cramp, one of my nightmare scenarios in the middle of the river with nowhere to put your feet down. Lucky he was able to swim to the side and stretch it out. It pretty much stops you dead in your tracks and once you have it happen once if you carry on swimming it will happen again.
The first lock on our swim is approached through a long 1km man-made cutting surrounded by lots of trees which were currently dropping all of their flower petals into the river. At first it looks quite pretty but quickly becomes annoying as there are bits of twigs which scratch your arms as you swim past. I picked up a new nickname in this section, not something you would associate with a slightly bearded grown man:
'Petal'
Unbeknownst to me, a lot of flower petals had become lodged in my beard so when I stopped to talk to my swimming compadres I was a slightly bearded man with flower petals arranged about my face. Here's hoping that nickname doesn't stick.
The next stretch of river saw another swan encounter, however this pair of swans stayed on the edge of the river and let us swim right by. Very unusual for me... Cramp stuck again, and our pace understandably slowed.
This is where we started to have issues as the river is still pretty cold and the weather wasn't playing ball either. We decided to call the swim where we could get picked up easily. A few texts at the next lock and a lift was sorted. As we were still about 1k we walked over the lock to jump back in and were greeted by a rather inquisitive swan. S/he sat on the water at the bottom of the steps just watching as we all claimed down the ladder into the water. As we started swimming the swan just swam off.
We finished the swim early due to people starting to feel the cold, it doesn't take long if you aren't swimming at your normal pace and it is better to get out too early than too late. Hypothermia really is quite dangerous and it is better to err on the side of caution.
Sorry to all those who were routing for me to be attacked by some sort of animal but it didn't happen this time...