Topic: open water meltdown (5 of 7), Read 16 times
Conf: Racing - Pool or Open Water
From: Guy Ward
Date: Sunday, July 02, 2006 09:04 PM

The earlier series of Total Swim article on open water fears was really helpful as it explains my experiences.

I have no difficulty swimming long distances in my local pool – I swim freestyle for 20 minutes to half an hour daily with flip turns covering up to 1.5 kilometers. I don't feel fatigued at the end and could easily continue. So I figured I would have no problem doing an open-water swim. I even practiced in the bay and easily covered more than the race distance without feeling tired.

Boy did I have a lot to learn! At my first race I was gasping for breath and totally exhausted after maybe 300 meters, to the extent that I pulled out. I was totally demoralized and couldn't understand what the problem really was. I got lots of opinions but none seemed to ring true.

A month or so later I entered another open-water swim. This one had even more entrants than the previous one and is known as being a tight course with four buoy roundings, navigating around anchored boats and lots of aggressive swimmers (If I’d know all this in advance I might not have entered.) I was determined to complete this one and to try and stay cool and not be pushed out of my swim style. Yeah, right!

The race started well as I deliberately entered the water away from the main pack and toward the back of the field. It was a beautiful balmy day and the water was crystal clear, so there was lots to look at on the bottom to distract myself from all the thrashing. However after about five or six hundred meters the water was by now too deep to see the bottom and I had caught up with the main pack. I was still feeling good and maintaining my style.

I started to be continuously blocked and was having to change direction and swim around other swimmers. Then I was getting swum onto and into and banged everywhere imaginable. Needless to say my focus and composure were gone and no doubt my swimming style as well. Almost immediately I started to feel extremely fatigued and even contemplated withdrawing. However by this time I had swum more than half the course so figured I might as well go on. I became too fatigued to continue with freestyle and changed to backstroke. This made navigation more difficult but basically I figured that as long as I had thrashing swimmers either side I must be on course.

The fatigue was starting to become overbearing when I sighted the jetty and realized there was only 100 meters to go. There was no glorious dash to the finish, it was all I could do to backstroke to the beach and stagger across the finish line, totally spent. I guess I finished about two thirds of the way down in my age group and in a very slow time compared to my pool times. I was still pretty demoralized even though I had finished.

When I read Lorne's posting in Total Swim that really struck a chord. I know I really need to focus on staying composed – and Brian's posting seems very helpful.

I guess everyone has a different tolerance threshold in this regard – some people are not put off at all by swimming in a washing machine whereas others find this extremely stressful. There is no doubt that I am up the stressful end of this scale although this can doubtless be altered through training – as Brian points out – and I guess my experiences also point to this.

I'm not sure if I'll enter another open-water event. I really enjoy my daily swimming and I also enjoy open-water swimming. What I don't like is the extreme aggression of an open-water race – I just find it unsettling and somehow very disturbing – which no doubt explains my experiences with it.

Maybe I should organize some recreational open-water swimming – or open-water hiking? I guess I can also choose to enter open-water race events where the swimmers are more spread out and there are not so many turns.

From: Angus MacGowan
Date: Monday, July 03, 2006 05:05 AM

Guy, I note particularly the following section of your email:

" However after about five or six hundred meters the water was by now too deep to see the bottom and I had well and truly caught up with the main pack. I was still feeling good and was maintaining my style.

I started to be continuously blocked and was having to change direction and swim around other swimmers. Then I was getting swum onto and into and banged everywhere imaginable. Needless to say my focus and composure were gone "

From this, it seems to me that you have relatively little problem with open water swimming at this stage, but still have anxieties relating to swimming in close confines with other swimmers.

Fortunately, you are more able to plan a strategy for this than you would be if it was a "fear of open water" that troubled you.

As I see it, you have two options if you are uncomfortable swimming in the pack:

1. Avoid the pack;
2. Practice swimming in the pack.

I don't think there's anything to be gained by swimming in the pack. I've done probably 40 tris, and about 10 open waters races, and I don't see any benefit from swimming in the pack, even if you are used to it. Drafting is a different matter, but that can take place outside of a pack anyway - you can get in behind a lone swimmer and draft.

So, how about avoiding the pack?

Well, I'd consider this - in your last race, your plan to avoid the pack worked well, up to a point. Then you encountered a situation that you hadn't considered. Ironically, by avoiding the pack, you swam well and caught up to it.

Consider what you might do next time. Maybe stop, tread water for a moment or do some breaststroke, and get a really good view of what the pack is doing, where it is heading, and how wide you might want to swim to avoid it. Give yourself time, stay calm, and plan. Then, having revised your plan, execute it.

You may lose a minute doing this, however, you sound like the time you will save by maintaining you rhythm and morale will easily regain this for you.

This is just a suggestion. However, I do think it sounds like you are starting to focus on the problems you have with swimming in a pack rather than reaping the benefits from the work you have done in becoming comfortable swimming in clear water.

There are no medals for swimming in a pack. The best swimmers in a tri will seek to be clear of it at the front. So do not feel you are not a "real" open water swimmer just because you seek to be clear of it at the sides or the back.

From: Terry Laughlin
Date: Monday, July 03, 2006 05:56 AM

While pursuing Angus's suggestion as Plan A, you might also consider the possibility of gradually becoming more comfortable with pack swimming.

I have 30 years of OW experience and have become so comfortable with pack swimming that I swim my best now when in one. Last summer in the USMS 2-mile Cable Swim championship in Lake Placid. I swam the entire distance in a tight, but disciplined, pack of six swimmers. It was exhilarating to be moving at the speed we were and to have the group stay together all that way. (It does make quite a difference to be swimming with seasoned and accomplished OW swimmers. No chaos.)

Last weekend I again swam in the USMS 2-mile Cable Swim championship in Virginia. I got dropped by the first wave during the first quarter mile and swam alone until the mile mark, at which point three swimmers from the second wave caught me. I swam the second mile in their company and swam much better.

The key for me is to remain only peripherally aware of the other swimmers. My primary focus remains on the details of my own stroke.

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