It’s over. And I didn’t drown. And that in and of itself is probably one of my biggest accomplishments of the year.

For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, let me elaborate.

This past weekend, I participated on a relay team in the 2008 Danskin Women’s Triathlon in Seattle, WA. Now, if you know me at all, you may have guessed that I’m not exactly what comes to mind when you think of a triathlon. Nevertheless, two of my closest friends in the world talked me into being on their team (because they needed a swimmer), and, not knowing any better, I said yes.

Of course, when I agreed to participate, I didn’t realize how hard it would be to go from a post-baby, out-of-shape non-swimmer to someone who could swim 604 meters in the open water of Lake Washington. The hardest part was figuring out how to get to the gym to swim around the nap schedules of my two darling angels. In the end, I hired a babysitter to come to my house while kiddo #2 slept. Brilliant! How sad it will be when school starts again and that’s no longer an option.

In its 19th consecutive year, the Danskin Women’s Triathlon Series remains the longest running multi-sports Series in the world. It’s a sprint distance (i.e. shorter than regular triathlons) and is geared towards women of any age and ability. For this particular race there were nearly 4,000 women, and I have never seen so many ages, body types and sizes in one place in my entire life. It was amazing. The supportive enviroment was unbelievable. We saw middle-aged women helping their elderly mothers out of the water, a blind racer on a tandem bike, and a 75-year old who crossed the finish line.

As a relay team, we each took one portion of the race. My job was to start the race by swimming the 604 meters. I had been swimming that distance in the pool (about 24 lengths) in about 18 minutes. But they did warn me that the open water swim was much different, and to be prepared to swim about 900 meters (36 lengths) which I could do in about 26 minutes. So, my goal was to finish my split in 26 minutes.

I was prepared that it was going to be much more physically difficult to swim in open water, but I was not prepared for how much more mentally difficult it actually was. My “wave” was #2, and we entered the water at 6:46am. Uh, yeah…. cold. Immediately, I knew it was much more than I had bargained for. At about 50 meters in, I had a major anxiety attack. I couldn’t put my face in the water because it was black and I couldn’t see where I was going. And I’d get kicked in the face. But I couldn’t keep my head above water because I kept getting waves splashing me in the face and I was tiring too easily. So, I panicked, and I couldn’t breathe. I literally thought I was going to drown, because I wanted to quit, but I didn’t think I could even make it back to shore.

But, that’s where the uber-supportive environment comes in. There were tons of kayaks in the water, and I hailed the first one. He let me grab his boat, and tried to calm me down, telling me to take deep breaths. Then he pointed to the next boat and had me swim to him. Then they hailed down an “angel swimmer.” Danskin Swim Angels are volunteers who participate in the swim segment providing encouragement and support to women who may experience temporary anxiety in the water.

My angel asked me my name, and told me she was going to swim with me for awhile… and… she had a NOODLE! I was not allowed to swim with the noodle, but whenever I needed to stop and take a breather, she was right there for me. She helped me to the first buoy, where I rounded the corner and headed down the long stretch. At this point, I was swimming parallel to the shore, which was easier without the waves lapping in my face. I was able to swim longer stretches without her and at some point I lost her in the crowd. I grabbed onto another kayak for a short rest, and happened to glance back to the first buoy. I realized I was closer to the second buoy… I was over half way there!

And that’s when everything changed. Suddenly, I was no longer hyperventilating. I got my stride together, and even felt stronger than in the pool. I got going on a couple of good grooves, until I would get kicked in the head again and come up coughing and choking. A kayaker would yell out, “You okay green cap?” and I’d nod and keep on swimming! And once I got close enough to hear the crowd cheering, my adrenaline really picked up, and so did my pace. I finished my swim in 29 minutes – only 3 minutes slower than my goal!!

The whole experience was incredibly exhilirating, and next year the three of us have committed to doing the whole thing individually, instead of as a relay team. Perhaps by then, we could actually improve on our current “Float, Coast & Crawl” status and become real “Swim, Bike & Run”-ers. If anyone would like to join us in our goal, I highly encourage it! If we can do it, anyone can, and we are looking for more teammates to join us in the experience. It’s definitely a day to remember!

This is pretty much what the view looked like when I stepped in the water at 6:46am!

Team Golden Winters with support staff

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 21st, 2008 at 11:59 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.