Nuclear Swim Recap

Our final open water swim in the Trysports Triangle Swim Series was held yesterday morning at Harris Lake. This 1 mile swim (named the Nuclear Swim since the Shearon Harris Nuclear power plant uses the lake to cool it's reactors) is a popular one and we usually get our biggest turnout.

Everything went very smoothly - we had enough t-shirts for any late signups, all food was there and delivered early, and the weeds were at a minimum this year. Because of the amount of swimmers we had, it was decided to once again split the men and women up. The men would go 10 min ahead of the women.

Some of you all may remember the Showdown I had with fellow master swim, Erik, at the Big Deuce. It was time for my rematch...bummer that we were in different waves! At the Jordan Lake swim, this is how we finished (different waves, here, too).

And at the Big Deuce (someone snuck in between us)

I coerced my friends Kari, Alysia and Karen to help me with packet pick-up and they were nice enough to fall for my manipulations and got to the race site early. We got in the water and sunk into whatever sludge is on the bottom of that lake with lots of squeals after the men had started. This is a nice wide start so there's not a whole lot of banging around and I situated myself right next to Alysia. After about 100 yards she was inching up so I decided to fall in behind her and let her sight and do all the work. It was perfect! I limited the amount of foot tapping I did and let her drag me around for 3/4 mile before I decided to kick it into high gear and sprint on home. Poor Alysia -- some friend I am! The entire time I was thinking, "MUST BEAT ERIK!!"

Getting out of the water was a bit slow with that sludge again, but I ran out and was extremely tired. Turns out it's pretty hard to sprint for a 1/4 mile.

The women's finish was a good one! With a $100 on the line it was a sprint to the end and only 1 second separated first and second. Marty got it on video and posted it to Facebook (check out the Triangle Open Water Swim Series page to view). I would post the video on here, but I have no idea how to get it off of facebook. I never claimed to be very smart.

Once out of the water, I apologized to Alysia for using her for most of the swim. She didn't care at all; love her :) Then I saw Wayne from Master's and asked him what his time was. He responded with, "I'm not telling YOU." Hmmm, my competive reputation has preceded me. He did tell me and I did a few fist pumps when I realized I had beaten him.

But the real question -- what was Erik's time?! I couldn't find him and when I finally did, he didn't know! They had the results up quick and we both rushed over to look. After a quick look, I yelled, "DANGIT ERIK!!!"

4 seconds! Again! And once again we weren't even in the same wave. So over the course of these 4 miles (and 2 miles not even swimming together) we were separated by 7 seconds. I'd say we're pretty evenly matched in the open water. Hopefully, he doesn't learn to sight (an issue for him right now, apparently).

Since I handed out the awards I gave him a massive eye roll when he got his. Nothing but love for my fellow OSB Master's swimmers ;)