It’s the middle of winter. And really quite cold. So I thought I’d go swimming in a lake! Last year and the year before I did a bit of open water swimming and really enjoyed it, but seemed to get out of the habit this year. I still get emails from the places I have swum at, and one, from Princes Club in Bedfont, caught my eye. It was advertising their second annual Polar Bear Swim – who would be foolish/brave enough to swim in a lake in the middle of winter?? They had 16 swimmers at the first one last year, and were hoping for 50 entrants this year.
3 entrants were me, Sharon and David – I knew they would be up for it! Well I knew David would, Sharon is less keen on swimming so very impressed that she was up for it too. We arrived with plenty of time before the start which was good because I needed lots of time to squeeze into my wetsuit. No way was I going in without it (although they were optional, and there were at least 10 non-wetsuit swimmers. Nutters.)
We went into the changing room and starting getting ready. I got my wetsuit partly on, but it did not want to move past my bum! At this point David started heckling from outside the changing room – he was ready and wondering what was taking us so long. We explained, then heard the words ‘I’m coming in!’. Good thing only Sharon and I were in there!
I won’t go into details but soon I was inside my wetsuit, and could just about breathe too. I added neoprene socks and gloves, two swimming hats and some goggles. Then we were ready.
There was a short briefing, Glenn seemed very pleased to see so many people, he told us to be nice to each other and not get in a melee like normal OW swimming events!
Then we strolled down the jetty to the water. I had feared that I might chicken out at the last minute, but it didn’t even cross my mind once we’d reached this point. I couldn’t face jumping in though, so when someone said go I climbed down the steps in a sedate manner. Even doing that I wasn’t the last one in, some people were even more hesitant than me.
I started swimming some sort of quasi-breaststroke, and by the time the water crept in my wetsuit I’d done about 5 strokes and felt like I was committed to it. Yes it was cold, but not nearly as bad as I expected it to be! I thought I’d be squealing and swearing, and hating it, but actually I thoroughly enjoyed it. I just could not bring myself to put my head in though, total mental block about that. So I continued with old-lady-style head-out breaststroke the whole way.
The swim was 100m, out to some buoys and back again. I think there was one person who got in and got straight out again, and 2 who were rescued but one of them got back in and did it again! Everyone else completed the swim. The whole thing was over in minutes, and the only part of me that was cold were my feet and ankles. I was worried about my hands, because I get Reynaulds syndrome when they get cold and it’s very painful, but they were fine. My swimming gloves are obviously better than my swimming socks.
Sharon finished shortly after me, David had kindly waited on the jetty for both of us and then we dived into the sauna. I loathe saunas usually, but there’s a time and a place for everything!
After the sauna we got changed and recovered in the clubhouse with various food and drink items. Then Heather kindly took me home and we went for a 5 mile run. I now feel utterly justified in doing absolutely nothing else today! Also it was a very good lesson about fear of the unknown – the thoought of doing it was far far worse than the actual swim, which was very enjoyable! And one more good point, it reminded me how much I enjoy OW swimming, and inspired to get down to the lake this Spring and Summer.
BTW – the water temperature was 2.5 degrees!
And we mustn’t omit that you forgot your towel and had to borrow one from yours truly! lol! Well swum 🙂
It was fun, I liked it 🙂
Of course, I would have liked it more if I could have seen anything at all….it all went wrong after going right under when I slipped into the water. Steamy goggles.
Well done Lirsty 🙂 Our bravery knows no bounds…or something!
[…] Kirsty and myself arrived in plenty of time to get into our wetsuits (after some squeezing and pulling […]