Not sure if you saw the e-mail but here it is:
Open water swimmers,
Now that spring is here, it's about time to start thinking about open-water swimming again. Historically, we start the Wednesday night Lake Hartwell swims the first week in April, but the water temperatures are colder than average this year. The lake is still below 60 degrees, so most of us are not too eager to jump in the lake just yet.
The first lake swim of the season will be on April 17 (two weeks from today), by which point the water temperatures should (hopefully) be in the upper 60s. That's still quite chilly, but around the temp that we usually start the swims.
For those that are new to the mailing list, the short version is: we swim in Clemson between 5:30 and 7:00 pm on Wednesday evenings. No RSVP is needed, just show up, make some friends, and have fun. Full details are below.
There will be a few changes to the lake swims this season. The most visible of these is that we've lost the kayak support this year. One of our regular kayakers is out of the country, another is injured, and I have used up my influence with the others. So there will be no safety boats on the lake in April and May, as we have had in previous years. Instead, the April / May swims will take the same format as the June - October swims always have, with support via the buddy system and safety in numbers, rather than a kayak escort.
I'll send regular updates about water temperatures, weather, and upcoming swim events in the early part of the season, dropping down to very infrequent emails as the season goes on.
See you at the lake,
-Steve Stuart
In my experience the lake warms up pretty quickly once there are a couple of really sunny days in a row. April is pretty chilly but by May the water is fine. By race day the water is warm enogh to get by without a wetsuit.