Is this swim time for real?

Its possible wind/currents changed, but mostly i would just say you are a much faster swimmer now, enjoy!

If you were good enough for a true 1:06/100yd then you would know it.  That is smokin' fast.  I'd say there was something funky with the course and/or currents.

That's 11 minutes for 1056 yards.... that is really speedy, like win-the-swim-portion-of-the-race speedy.  Like the post above says, people who swim at that pace, know that they do.

So, it's really unlikely that the course was measured correctly.  That said, it is also really unlikely that the course was half the size of the course the last time you swam it... which means, you've gotten faster!  So congrats for that.  But probably not 1:06/100 fast.

Years ago I did a tri in Harrisburg that had the swim in the Susquehanna River.  It had rained most of the week, and the water was moving quickly, almost scary fast.  It gave everyone their best swim times ever.  So I second the idea that the currents may have played a role.  Unless it was a lake, in which case, I'd think about the measuring being off.

Hrm. As others have said, if you were a 1:06 swimmer you'd know it. What have your pool times been like lately?

Most likely possibility, the course was mismeasured, and a little shorter. Another possibility is you missed a buoy somewhere, I've done that before.

Sounds like it's just some fitness and training paying off though!

John

What they said.

If you were doing that kind of time in the pool, you would know you did it in a tri.

If you are doing 2:00, 100's... you don't just bust out with a 1:06 per 100 in a race.

Thats pretty dang quick. Most people cant swim that, and most of the ones that can wouldnt have anything left after it.

Swims are often measure wrong. Compare how you did to the rest of the athletes and are you is similar ranking like MOP this year and last year? If so swim is probably measure wrong. If you moved from BOP to MOP ranking wise my guess would be swim is shorter this year and you improved as well.

I did a HIM this weekend and my swim time was 33:12 and I placed 293/316. I know the course was short by a lot but how much is only a guess. A guy that was front of the pack last year and did the race this year went from 32:08  in '08 to 23:29 in '09.  I very much doubt he improved that much. I'm guessing swim was 1550-1750 yards maybe but who knows if last year it was measured right either. The guy that put out the bouys last year is on my tri team and told me he used one of those golf distance devices to figure out the distance. With GPS and so many triathletes have Garmins how hard would it be to drive the course in a boat the swim to see if he distance is close.

Thank you all for your responses. I think Newleaf's comments make sense. As he mentioned, the course was probably measured short, but doubtful it was measured at half the distance it should have been. This would mean I did improve. How much improvement is unknown. I guess I just need to check my times in the pool to get an idea of my speed.


Thanks again.

I am a pretty consistent swimmer and I usually do about 1:30 /100 in the pool and OWS even in salt water.  This weekend I did a 2.4 mile OWS in folsom lake CA and finished at 56:42.  This is about 7 minutes shorter than what I was expecting to do (1:20/100).   A friend of mine also thought the course was short based on his time.  You never know if the course is accurately measured. 

The important thing is how you felt swimming. Do you think you felt better? did your form get better?did you have an easier time with the OWS experience? wasyou HR under control?

good luck