For those of you who have just about had it listening to my road cycling stories, fear not!  A new sport has come to town.  Since I am going to be (mostly) taking a hiatus from cycling this year, I have decided to focus on running and swimming.  And you know what happens when someone runs, swims, and cycles.  You guessed it.  They do triathlons.  Well, let’s not put the cart before the horse, or rather the bike before the goggles, just yet.

My old kind of swimming: sunglasses on, hair staying dry.

While I know how to run (kinda), I am not a freestyle swimmer.  I can swim all day long, staying afloat, staring at my toes as I lie on my back.  But I’ve never been a fan of freestyle swimming.  I’m averse to water going up my nose.  I just don’t like the feeling.  It’s a fear that I can’t quite put my finger on.  I don’t consciously think I am going to drown, but I do get the sensation that I won’t be able to breathe if there is water up my nose.  So I usually take a big gulp of air, dive under the water, and swim like a frog until I need to come up for air.  Apparently, that is “Not Fast”.  I can also backstroke okay, but that’s not going to cut it in a race, either.Last fall, I took a swim “lesson”, talking to a swimmer friend about my fears, and getting in the water to practice getting over them.  In one hour, I made a huge amount of progress.  Since then, I have tried swimming whenever I could, but in the winter in New Jersey, you can guess how many times that was.  So when we left on our trip two weeks ago, I made a goal to get in the water every day I could for the entire year.  Even if it was only to swim one time around the boat.  I figure if I swim for 365 days straight, I’ve GOTTA make some improvements.  Maybe even become an actual Swimmer.

So far, so good.  It may be a bit of a challenge to swim every single day, but I’ve gotten in the water almost every day so far.  I quickly learned that “open water” swimming is quite different from swimming in a pool.  And salt water is way different than chlorine water.  The open water has waves and current, so when you turn your head to get air, you will most likely swallow a fish.  I was told to really rotate my body so that my face is practically looking directly up at the sky when I open my mouth to take a breath.  That seems to be working.  (Although today, I was talking to a lifeguard and he told me that in open water triathlon swimming, you want to lift your head up forward, so you can see where you are going.  I’m going to have to YouTube this, unless any of you avid swimmers want to weigh in.)

swimming against max current in Piscataqua River (Portsmouth, NH)

Open water is also not clear, like a pool.  They don’t paint those cute little lane lines at the bottom of the ocean so you can see where you are going, make sure you stay in a straight line, and know when the “end” is near.  In the open water, you can’t see if some creature is about to eat you for lunch or sting the bejesus out of you.  There is also a distinct lack of a pool edge to hold onto while you hyperventilate every 25 meters.  However, I am quickly discovering that the salt in open water is my new BFF.  The extra buoyancy that the denser salt water provides is just enough to allow me to focus on stamina and technique, rather than fighting to stay afloat.  Add a wetsuit to the equation and I practically feel like a hydroplaning high-speed ferry.  I have only used my wetsuit once, since it is quite an ordeal to put on, take off, and wash down, but it was an absolute joy to use.  Once we get to Maine, I think I will be relying on it daily to steel myself against the infamous brisk waters there.Today I got to use the pool at a yacht club in Marblehead, MA, thanks to our new sailing friend Alec, who offered to have us use the facilities as his guest.  I spent the early morning and evening using the laundry room there, so I took advantage of the long wash cycles to swim laps.  After two weeks of open water swimming, where you have no idea how far you have gone, I was so excited to see that I could now swim 350 meters freestyle (with aforementioned hyperventilation breaks, of course).  In the evening, I had time for an additional 200 meters before the pool closed.  I was so jazzed about my improvement from just a few weeks ago that I could have done more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjskhoGHlBU

It’s a good thing I have a whole year to practice, though.  I still feel like I’m flailing around quite a bit.  And I have no idea what my kicking situation is.  I can’t stay in a straight line (unless I’m in a pool with the cute little lines).  Sometimes I have to stop and clear the water out of my goggles.  I certainly can’t do that cool turn around thing at the end of the pool to go back the other way (if I can manage that someday, I will be so impressed.)  But I’m on my way, and I love being on my way.  I love learning new things and practicing them until I can see improvement.  I especially love fun ways to exercise that allow me to eat ice cream at every port along the East Coast.  And you should hope that I stick with it, because I think reading about swimming is probably about 6 million times more exciting than reading about running…

Oh, and in other Sports News, there will be a slight delay in learning to do a yoga head stand on our new inflatable stand-up paddle board.  One of the seams exploded in Newport and we are waiting for a new one to arrive.

Also, if you are NOT tired of hearing my road cycling stories, click on my Personal Blog to read about my riding from the first time I clicked in to my first century!