Mass swim starts -- any funny/scary stories? (Page 2)

My first tri was an olympic in March.  I debated for a month about whether to by a wetsuit or not, and finally decided I was all man and would not need one.  (see avatar to the right or albums).  Well, I get to the race and there were three hundred people getting into their wetsuits... uh oh.

The temp outside was about 60 with a 20-30 mph wind, and I learned later that the water temp was 55.  I spent the whole pre-race trying not looking at the water and freezing my ass off.  Finally our wave gets the 2 min warning and we procede into the water.  So I'm standing in the water, my then 264 pounds spilling out of my Apple red jammers, surrounded by 15 men in wetsuits.  My legs were pretty cold in the water, but not painfully so.  These guys look at me like I'm crazy, not just because I wasn't wearing a wetsuit, but because I couldnlt stop smiling.  I made a few jokes and made my "water looks uphill" comment.

POW! Time to race.  I was positioned in the back as I had only trained in the water for a month and new I would be slower than the rest (this was some type of qualifying event).  Everyone starts and it's like frogs in a belnder.  I just stood for about 10 seconds waiting, then walked forward and finally submerged.  The water was so cold I literally could not breathe.  I had to consciously force my lungs to inhale.  When I did, I immediately started to hyperventilate.  I tried to freestyle/crawl, but just cound not breath and the 2-3 foot waves (in a friken cove in a lake in the hill country, for craps sake) didn't help.  I eventually had to do the whole 1500 meters, in 55 degree water, with the breast stroke, for 49 minutes.  As I only practiced the crawl and the water was freezing, of course I cramped up about a third of the way into it and had to swim about a 1000 yards with my legs locked in knots. I was so cold that my skin felt hot then numb and I could only take very shallow, furtive breaths.  I wanted to quit so bad but would never have been able to live with the "I told you so's" from all the naysayers.

I finally get out of the water and the anounser yells over the PA "THOMAS WELSH, THE POLAR BEAR!"  My arm actually moved to flip him off but I stopped myself as there were families there.  My second race my time was almost half and I felt like I was cheating it was so easy compared to the first one.

PS. I have raced with the ladies in a two wave start.  It was great fun.  We would crawl for about 5 minutes, breastroke for about 45 seconds whiile chating about divorce, mortgages, kids, then "I'm off" and go another 5 minutes and repeat...

Practice safe tri-ing people!

Hahahahahaha!

I couldn't help but to laugh when some women in this thread talked about the lady like behavior in an all woman's wave.  Maybe they're more lady like in the southwest.  I've gotten kicked, scratched, punched, by triathletes of both sexes.  I have found in all women's races like Danskin the swims are much mellower then an all women's wave in a mixed race.

Interesting swims, no particular order:

1. The first West Point Triathlon everyone swam in one wave.  The field was pretty small. (150 men, 50 women)  It was interesting swimming in the same wave with the West Point cadets.  Cadets are well conditioned young men and women, but some of them couldn't swim very well.  It made for interesting navigation around flailing arms and such.

2. Timberman 1/2 iron.  I did the swim leg on a relay team.  The wave consisted of relays, and clysdales.  I decided I would try to stay behind the clysdales for drafting purposes and also to avoid getting run over.  Having a 200 lb guy swim over me is not my idea of fun.  The tactic worked well for me.  The biggest challenge was seeing after we turned east right into the sun.

3. Timberman Sprint.  It was pouring rain, and the buoy indicating the turn around had come loose and was floating out "to sea".  The starter told everyone to swim out to the buoy and go around.  Apparently there was a miscommunication becasue there was a kayak where the buoy had been and actually we were supposed to swim around that.  Most of us eneded out going to the buoy, and doing 2/3 mile swim instead of the advertised 1/3 mile.  I guess they finally let the newcomer wave swim around the kayak.  The long swim helped me.  Most of my winning margin in the age group came on the swim.

4. Escape from Fort Deleware in 2003.  Rained entire week before race.  First couple of waves got off okay, but then current changed.  Current reached 6 knots.  Scariest swim I've ever done.  It took me 58 minutes to do Olympic swim.  My usual Oly time ranges between 28 to 35 minutes.  They ended out pulling a 1/4 of the field out of the water after 1:15.  Totally brutal swim.