One of the usual routes to the lakes has a huge detour in place thank to a landslide. Shark and I had already factored this into our journey to Derwent Water for the Epic swim, and set off to Windermere in plenty of time to incorporate some obligatory pre-swim refreshments (basically coffee and a scone loosely passed off as a nutritionally sound breakfast) and to get the best parking spot, or actually any parking spot – it gets really busy. Unfortunately it took us until we were nearly in Windermere itself before Shark told me that she wasn’t a hundred percent sure of the way to Derwent from there, and a frantic look on Google Maps revealed that we should have gone up the A1 (like we did last year…) avoiding the (albeit scenic) long and completely the wrong way altogether journey so far, and were some way off our destination still, meaning that time was now not on our side. Shark began blaming jetlag, having just returned from her holiday with Mr. Shark, however I have been to Amsterdam before and it’s pretty much in the same time zone as we are so I am not buying her excuse for a second. Our detour did sadly mean that something would have to give and unfortunately it was looking very likely that it was going to be our pre-swim breakfast. Using the map this time, we made haste (without breaking the speed limit) across to Derwent and consoled ourselves (made do) with the edible contents of Shark’s glove box (a third of a ClifBar and three unidentifiable objects that I suspect were once Jelly Babies, and were perfectly edible, despite being coated in fluff and a bit of tissue).
As fortune had it, we found a parking spot straight away and in a slight state of panic we hastily got ourselves ready, before heading to the registration point and the start line. Upon registration I discovered that Shark and I were swimming in separate waves. For some reason I was in the fastest group, along with lots of elite swimmers. I have no idea how this happened, as I am not elite by any stretch of the imagination – hell, I can’t even dive in (thankfully it was a deep water start, otherwise I’d have been in even bigger trouble), and so in a bid to at least not look like a fake, I attempted to blend in by hiding amongst them and doing a few gentle stretches (my wetsuit would not allow for anything too vigorous thankfully, so this also eliminated things like those extreme yoga poses I love so much like Lord of the Dance and Upward Facing Two-Foot Staff Pose), but I had been so worried that we were late that I had asked Shark to zip up my wetsuit as soon as we had arrived, and that was 20 minutes ago. The air temperatures was around 25oc so I began contemplating undoing it before I actually started to cook, but as I had lost Shark in the sea of same colour swim caps, this would mean asking an actual athlete to redo me up, and risk being ousted as a phony once they saw the battle to get it done up again. It could also mean they ran the risk of a possible pre-swim thumb strain getting me in, and the guilt would be too much, so decided on a better plan that included pouring a bottle of cold water down the inside on my wetsuit (absolutely nothing like in a Baywatch fashion I might add).
After the safety briefing we (the rest of the fast group and me, but not Shark) were asked to swim to the starting buoy. I nearly broke my neck even before I was off the pontoon, not because it was slippy, but because the swimmer in front dropped his goggles and in my haste to get in the lake, ran into the back of him in a very unladylike fashion. Let’s just say that wetsuits touched and leave it there.
I knew I was in trouble when everybody was already overtaking me in the warm up swim, and so on the back of this, I figured that as there was absolutely no chance whatsoever, for a thousand reasons that I would never win this race, that I would place myself in front of all of the swimmers so that for the first nanosecond of the swim I could actually say that I was in the lead. Something to brag about after the swim. That was until I overheard the two swimmers near me discussing a sub forty-five minute swim and their strategy. I realized quite quickly that there was a probability that I was about to be swum over if I got in the way, and not one to be preventing someone from achieving their very fast goal, I moved my slow self to the back of the group where the chat was more about the high level of midges (of which I can boast several quite impressive bites to the neck, but none to the other exposed part of my body- my ankles) and types and sizes of fishes in this lake. A conversation I was able to share the breadth of my knowledge (I checked on Google when I entered the swim). I’m not sure whether my fellow swimmers were impressed or slightly alarmed at the lengths of extensive research I had gone to. The expression for both is very similar I think.
After several minutes of treading water, and the obligatory pre-swim sing song (heads, shoulders, knees and toes), which had I have known about in advance would have spent time practicing my vocal ranges and gargling with salt water to help improve my tone, we were off, and all at very different speeds, mostly everyone else very fast, and me just doing my usual steady pace at the back. Having privy to the fast swimmers conversation about times I decided that my only goal was to swim fast enough to not be lapped by one of them. This meant that there was no time for faffing about, which was easy really as the water was lovely and warm, and calm, all thanks to the great weather we’ve been having, and all combined made for a great and relatively fast swim, with only one Day of the Triffids incident, involving a large piece of pond weed (probably not its botanical name) that was determined to share my swim experience by attaching itself, one way or another, to me. I did learn though that it is virtually impossible to continue to swim whilst battling to free your limbs (arm/watch) and your goggles from the stuff, and it is best, in the interest of safety to stop swimming for a second and just untangle yourself rather than attempting to detach it mid stroke, bringing myself to the attention of a very keen eyed safety kayaker, who appeared very quickly out of nowhere (honestly I’m talking Liam Heath fast) to check I was okay.
As the finish pontoon approached, a grim reality hit me; how was I going to get out when any kneeling down on my left knee means there’s a good change that it will dislocate, leaving my very much in trouble. It hadn’t crossed my mind when we got in that it may cause me, and possibly the organisers, a problem and the last thing I wanted was to be yelling “I need an ambulance!” without even crossing the finish line. This would not be happening. I wanted a finishers medal suddenly even more than I wanted my post swim cake, and so some quick thinking was required on my part, and so without caring what I looked like, I launched myself onto the jetty stomach first, before turning over, sitting up, and then standing; all with one straight leg. I still can’t decide whether it was comedy gold or utterly genius, but one thing is for sure, I was out in one piece to take ownership of my well-deserved, rather lovely medal, and there was more cheerful news, I also wasn’t lapped! Yay!
Derwent was such a lovely swim day out, and to celebrate our amazing swim, and to make up for this morning’s food routine going to pot thanks to Shark’s ‘jetlag’ we decided we deserved a huge slice of cake… and quickly, so hastily got dressed, which on reflection should not be attempted when you are still damp from your swim and cocooned in a Swimzi coat for modesty reasons, because you can get kind of tangled in your vest and in your panic to rectify the situation end up with the coat falling to the floor whilst not fully dressed and rather unexpectedly revealing yourself to the good people of Derwent!
On that bombshell we quickly packed up our belongings with me, red faced from embarrassment, and Shark red faced from laughing (lack of oxygen I think, serves her right) and after consulting with Google Maps once more, headed towards home… pretty much as the crow flies this time, and after a lengthy coffee and cake stop I admit I really wouldn't have minded a Nanna nap on the way back, however I was worried that Shark was still suffering from a case of same time zone jet lag, that I put myself in charge of map reading in a bid to get home whilst there were still daylight hours to be had. No rest for the wicked I guess!
Thanks for reading, and for those of you that enjoy my blogs, my book Open Water Woman Swims Windermere is now available in paperback and electronically on Amazon.
I also have a 'group' page on Facebook and am on Twitter and Instagram, where I post regular shenanigans and such like. If you'd like to join/follow you'd be very welcome. Here are the links. 😊
Thanks for reading, and for those of you that enjoy my blogs, my book Open Water Woman Swims Windermere is now available in paperback and electronically on Amazon.
I also have a 'group' page on Facebook and am on Twitter and Instagram, where I post regular shenanigans and such like. If you'd like to join/follow you'd be very welcome. Here are the links. 😊
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