Observer's Report- Mercer Island Marathon Swim

On Friday morning 11 swimmers and a gaggle of support crew assembled in Luther Burbank Park to attempt the Mercer Island Marathon Swim. Mercer Island is in the middle of Lake Washington, approximately 20k in circumference, and is basically suburban Seattle.  Folks, like Paul Allen, with a lot of money and a desire to be close to the city live here. Many with boats. The swim goes clockwise around the island. This was the second year of the swim.

I was assigned Jessie Harewicz, a swimmer from Vancovuer, BC, as my swimmer to observe.

I'd never been a swim official before, but it was easy to get the hang of.  The role was to:

1. make sure everyone, swimmer and crew, stayed safe.
2. ensure the swimmer followed the official rules of the swim.
3. document the swim to verify that the swimmer completes it unassisted.

The swim rules are pretty basic. The gear is a bathing-suit, goggles and swim cap (ear and nose plugs as well as sunscreen and anti-chaffing balm are permitted).  The swimmer needs to complete the course without any assistance in flotation or forward movement. If she needs to rest, she must float or tread water. Touching the support boats is not permitted.

The documentation was also straight forward. I was given a blank template to fill out every 30 min.  It included location (GPS would be nice, but I just used landmarks), weather-- especially things that would impact the swim like wind, stroke rate for the swimmer, nutrition for the swimmer, and anything about the swimmer's mental cognition or physical condition that was worthy of note. I added a few notes on what we were seeing, since her head was down through the whole swim.  It then serves both the purpose of official documentation, and of being a journal for the swimmer. The final log looked like this:

I also got to spend the day in a boat with a guy I don't know.  His boat is a little ski boat that he mostly uses to take his 10 year old twin sons out skiing on.  So there is no cabin.  Which, of course means no bathroom. More on that later.

The day was rainy and overcast, temperatures around 15-18*C. The water was a touch warmer, the Lake Bouy reading 19*. We gathered at Luther Burbank Park at 7am for an 8am start.  There were over 50 people involved between swimmers, race staff, observers, kayak support and boat captains. The pre-swim time was a combination of transactional, getting stuff ready, and social, reuniting with old friend and people who would be friends by the end of the day.

Every participant got a number on their hand, to match that of their swimmer, to help keep us together in teams.

Swimmers who live in various places but have bonded at other major swims, reunited and caught up on swims past and future.

There was also tons of gear to pack into each boat.  Food for the swimmer and the crew for a whole day, as well as safety gear including a "Caution Swimmers" sign, extra water, and the GPS systems for tracking and communication (also known as our cell phones).

The start was a wet start, the swimmers dove in, gathered behind the starting line (imaginary, between two buoys) and at the sound of "go" started swimming. I also started the timer on my cell phone, as the official time keeper for Jessi.

Here she is, diving in:

It is hard to describe something that both had nothing happen for hours and also was very nuanced every moment. As an Observer I did observe the whole 8 hours and 21 min.  I kept Jessi in my sight for the entire day.  While she did all the work, swimming and swimming and swimming. I gained a lot of respect for her and learned a ton about her without even talking to her all that much. I know that her right arm makes more splash than her left and that she kicks very little. I know that she almost never takes a break or switches stroke. I know that she has a competitive streak, even when the competition is among already very accomplished swimmers. I know she likes PB&J for her swimming snacks. The relationship is both very remote and very intimate. You really learn someone's character from watching them accomplish and endurance feat like this.

The day in the boat was both exciting and tedious.  The captain and I had conversations that were rambling and general as well as ones that were serious and reflective.  We had a cell phone text-message thread with the other observers, so would hear some chatter about what was going on. We also used that thread to give warnings about other boats, like the Argosy Cruise boat that came through.

One of the funnier threads, was about bathrooms. The race director had flagged four spots on the map where there were parks with public facilities. As the front pack of swimmers got to one, they did a mass stop off on shore to use the bathroom. The text message thread was full of potty humor. The observer from one of the boats with a head posted to the thread about how they had a flusher, and it was heated!  We all got jealous.  Apparently, the team boat behind me (with a head) had a conversation about how those of us without heads would go.  About 10 min after that, they saw me sit on the swim step and splash myself.  One said to another, "Oh, I guess I get it now".

From my perspective, it was a day on the lake, with the great bonus of watching a crew of amazing athletes in a sport I'm growing to love.

Swimming and Leadership

Facebook's "On This Day" feature reminded me of a blog post I wrote a few years back that was an intersection of leadership and swimming. I was faculty in a Higher Education Leadership program at the time, and we were blogging about "everyday leadership."  The post is below:

Persistence and Leadership: A Story of an Epic Swim

September 25, 2014 · School of Applied Leadership

-Written By Dr. Rebecca 

This weekend I completed the longest swim of my life. It was about 2.5 miles (swim distances are never precise, as you never swim a straight line) as I circumnavigated Seward Park in Seattle. Seward Park, for those of you not from Seattle, is a city park that is a peninsula in Lake Washington. You can park your car, enter the water on the North side of the peninsula, swim for two and a half miles and exit the water on the south side of the peninsula, about 100 yards from your car. This makes it ideal for a long swim, as you can stay close to shore, never backtrack, and swim long.

As I swam this weekend, I reflected on how my swim was a metaphor for leadership:

Sometimes it isn’t about Precision, it is about Forward Motion

I love to swim and found a passion for open water swimming about four years ago. The ability to just walk into a body of water and swim wherever I want, gives me freedom. I’m not a fan of chlorine or flip-turns, but with Lake Washington always free and always open, I can swim as far as I want whenever I want. Open water swimming also de-emphasizes precision and stroke. An open water swimmer has to breathe on the side where the waves don’t hit her in the face. And she needs to lift her eyes every few strokes to ensure she is on track. An open water swimmer doesn’t have a line on the bottom of the pool to follow, so she needs to forge her own path through the openness.

Sometimes, as a leader, the focus on precision and clear paths keeps us from making forward progress. Leading by going where the water is calmer, can be beneficial, if otherwise the waves would keep you from getting there.

The greatest accomplishments are the ones we are not sure we will achieve.

The first mile of my swim was out of a cove and into the wind. The waves were strong and the wind was heavy. It was one of the most hard-fought swims I’ve ever done. I would look at a landmark on shore and think there was no way I’d ever get there. Then I’d swim and swim and swim, and only make it part of the way. I’d have to take a breath, and keep going. Eventually I’d get there. Then I’d pick the next landmark goal. Many times during this first mile, I wanted to give up. Many times I was truly unsure I’d make it. I knew I always had the option to swim to shore, climb out, and walk back to my car. This wasn’t something I wanted to do, but it was an option. When I finished the swim, I looked back on that first mile and the doubts I had. It make the victory of completion that much sweeter.

As a leader, doing something you know how to do is easy. True leadership skills are proven when accomplishing something you are unsure how to do.

Achievement is a Mental Game

The swim got hard at times. Not just the fight against the wind of the first mile, but the fatigue of two solid hours of swimming. The motion sickness from mild dehydration coupled with the motion of boat wakes. The goggle headache from two hours of suction around my eyes. It was physically uncomfortable. There were times I just wanted to quit. But I didn’t. When I got tired or uncomfortable I refocused myself. Reminded myself of the goal. Gave myself a pep-talk about persistence and accomplishment. And kept swimming.

Leadership, similarly, can be a mental game. As a leader you not only have to motivate yourself, but your team to keep moving toward the goal. Projects can get uncomfortable, but with a reminder of the outcome, and a refocusing of the team, you can get there.

Dr. Cory is an associate professor and the associate program director for Higher Education and Adult Learning at CityU’s School of Applied Leadership

Park to Park 2017

I've been doing Park to Park for years.  It was the first big goal open water swim I did when I was getting into swimming.  And it is a staple in my summer calendar. The course is fun, straight across Lake Washington, from one city park to another. I do the "classic" one way course.

Last year, the conditions were awful.  Worse waves then I typically see in Puget Sound.  My time was long- 1:14 for the 1.4 ish miles of the swim.

This year I didn't think much about the swim. I joined at the last moment possible. I didn't do any special training other than skipping the long swim I usually do the day before.

I joined up with some of my friends from the Notorious Alki Swimmers.  I love these folks.  They are strong, powerful, funny, smart people. I'm always excited to see them and am so glad they have become friends.

My goal for this swim was pretty much "fun and finish."  I have been working on my freestyle (crawl) and thought I'd try to add more free into the swim.  To achieve that goal, I was wearing my motion sickness wrist bands.

The swim was chip timed. This is also new in the last few years. It means they KNOW that everyone who entered the water also got out.  It also means we get to take a "prison chic" photo. (that's me with the aqua sock on!)

The swim has moved to a mass start in recent years, away from the wave start in the past, with slow waves going first.  The advantage of this is that slower swimmers don't have the constant experience of being passed by faster swimmers, and the mental head-game that brings. The downside is that it means that the mass start is chaotic, and one has to try to seed themselves appropriately.

 The mass start looks like this:

A challenge for me at the start can be going out too fast and therefore loosing breath control, hyperventilating and having to work hard to calm down. As I've become more experienced at these events I've gotten better at seeding myself, and at knowing I need to swim my own event. Sometimes a warm up that helps to get over the cold shock can help, but this time I decided the water was warm enough to not need that.  I was right.

I started near the rear, figuring I could avoid the "washing machine" feeling at the beginning, and that passing people later would feel good. I started out with free, and quickly realized that was a mistake. I needed to warm up and get a rhythm in breast, then could switch over. Part of how I knew it was a mistake is that I couldn't focus on anything except swimming. I wasn't able to sing a song, or work on bi-lateral breathing. I was just swimming, and expending a lot of energy. So I switched back to breast for a while.

The course had large numbered buoys to show the way. They started at 5 and worked their way down to 1, so you always had a sense of where you were.  I actually found this a bit annoying. It took away some of the challenge of an OWS. I like having to pay attention and sight.

Once I got my rhythm, I tried to increase my percent of free. I set a goal of doing only free from buoy 4 to buoy 3.  During this time I did watch a rescue, so did a few strokes of breast for that.  There was a swimmer hanging onto a kayak.  The kayaker had their paddle up in the air to signal for a boat. The paddle boarder nearby also raised her paddle. But for some reason the boat didn't come.  So the paddle boarder went and got the motor boat. Which, once they got the boat's attention, came quickly and got the swimmer out of the water. I was a bit distressed by how long it took, however.

I did make it to buoy 3 with only free-- except for the time to watch and make sure the other swimmer was safe. It is very hard to tread water and take a selfie when you want a specific background, but some how I was able to commemorate the occasion.

The buoys counted down pretty quickly. My shoulder got a bit tired of the free, so I switched back and forth with more regularity after that one long push.  I never got to the "I need to finish now" point. I felt strong.  The finish came up pretty quickly.  I was still surrounded by swimmers. I never got that "i'm alone on the course" feeling.

They used a bright light (seen in the photo above) to make finding the finish easier.  It helped, but again, took some of the fun out of the adventure.

After the swim I met back up with my friends and we all compared notes. Everyone had a great time, and was happy. The food was OK, bagels etc and the Greek yogurt folks were there giving out some AMAZING yogurt! I got the bus back to the cars, and chatted with a friend the whole way. 

When I got home, I checked my time. 1:07. A whole 7 minutes faster than last  year!! That's about 13% faster!

What a difference two years makes!

Facebook has that delightful feature where they remind you what you posted on this day in years past.  Here's one of mine for today, from two years ago.

That's me. In a swim cap, googles, and a wet suit.  In front of the "Open Water Swimming Permitted" sign at Lake Washington. My caption says "let the season begin! easy half mile in lake Washington"

Two years ago I was still wearing a wet suit.

Two years ago I was swimming mostly in Lake Washington.

Two years ago May 9th was my "season opener".

Two years ago I could swim half a mile.

Now I swim "skin" and haven't worn the wet suit in 18 months.

Now I swim mostly in Puget Sound.

Now I swim year round, so there is no season opener.

Now an "easy" swim is a mile, or more.

It is always fun to see progress.  This is a great example of how far I've come!

The chop!

This weekend I had a bridal shower that kept me from Alki (and was totally worth it, Mazel Tov to the bride-to-be!!).  A mimosa before a swim may not be the best of ideas, but it helped me be festive. Since I couldn't make it to Alki, I posted on Facebook for a friend to swim with in the afternoon.

I met up with L at the big lake in the middle of the afternoon.  Seattle is in the middle of a heat wave, so it was in the high 80s and everyone wanted to be on the water.  With a strong wind and TONS of boats the lake was really choppy. I'd estimate there were 1-2 foot swells, and in many directions. The wind was mostly out of the north.

L and I did the mile round trip to the dog park. The swim out was much rougher than the swim back, with the wind. I had to stick to breast stroke, even though I want to work on my flutter kick, as freestyle would have made me seasick.  However, I observed how comfortable I was in the waves.  I remembered a swim from my 42nd birthday, a year and a half ago, where I was in similar chop and wasn't sure I was going to make it. I kept thinking I should give up and get out.  This time that wasn't even a consideration. I knew I could handle the chop.  It was great to note how far I'd come.

The funny sight on this swim was three men swimming and trying to keep their beer bottles out of the waves.  Each one had one hand, with a bottle, raised well above his head.  They did offer to share, so at least they were nice about it.

Taste of the Water

In the past week I've had the pleasure of swimming in Puget Sound, Lake Washington and the pool at my local gym.  One of the things that struck me about the first swim back in the Lake, after a winter in Puget Sound, was that the water isn't salty!  It know, it isn't profound. It is definitely something I knew, intellectually.  But the realization was visceral.

I don't love the taste of Puget Sound. I know some of my fellow swimmers do. But the salt bothers me.  Lake Washington, doesn't have the salt taste, but it isn't really a clean taste either. It is always a bit "green" like there is something growing.  Which there is.

The best tasting lake I've swum in recently is Crescent Lake in Olympic National Park. The water had no taste at all.  It was amazing. So clean!  The color was remarkable too, blue, and clear deep enough to trigger my fear of heights as I came close to shore and could see the bottom again.

Crescent Lake

So although I don't try to drink the water (though I often get a face-full on a windy day) I am aware of the taste of what I swim in. Just one more reason to avoid polluting our waterways!