Great Chesapeake Bay Swim - SwimOther

The swim starts at Sandy Point State Park, heads under the Bay Bridge for the vast majority of the race, and ends at a marina on Kent Island.. you have to stay between the spans of the bridge or face DQ.

We had a beautiful, if hot, day for the race. I was fortunate to get into the field, but I was pretty woefully undertrained for this distance.. I had done some building up, but the 4.4 mi was just about 50% farther than I had gone in a single training session. With the new baby, it turns out I was too optimistic about the training I'd be able to get in. I knew I could make the distance, but I also knew it might hurt. Check.

The first mile went OK.. I passed the buoy almost dead-on 30min- a little slow, but I had been taking it easy. The second mile was much worse- I got caught in an area where I felt I just wasn't making any forward progress.. must have been a current I ran into. Whatever it was, the 2nd mile took about 45 min, far slower than I have ever been. After that I just stopped looking at my watch.

The 3rd mile seemed to go a little better, but it turned into a death march for the last mile or so.. I started getting very hungry and at the same time a little seasick, even though the water was pretty calm.

I don't think I've ever been so happy to crawl out of the water. It was a great experience, and I'm glad I did it, but I deserved what I got in terms of the pain.

Well, train more, obviously. But also probably stop at the nutrition boats to grab a banana or cookie. Drafting could have been better, too.

Tried to eat a crab-cake sandwich, but the stomach was having none of it. Swallowed too much bay water, I guess. Stayed around for the awards ceremony, where Mark got an AG 2nd place.


Hah!


Definitely a great race and an excellent challenge. I'll never look at the Bay Bridge the same again!