All posts by ironmike

You know what happens when you don’t swim for 4+ months?

You can’t lift your arms. That’s what happens.

So I went swimming today for the first time since my 5K in August, and before that, I don’t even remember when I last swam. Must have been sometime in June maybe. Nope, just remembered I have a log. Yep, July 10th was the last time I swam, except for that 5K in August.

Again, I went swimming today at a local indoor pool called Kalipso / Калипсо. I went ready to be turned away, based on my experiences in Russia. Readers of my blog will remember my series “Swimming Anthropology.” Russia requires crazy things like doctor’s notes (справка) before being allowed through the door of the pool. Oh, and don’t forget your swim cap. And your bag to put your outdoors shoes in before you even walk into the locker room. The locker room commanded by a Russian grandma, or babushka, sitting right in front of you and your junk. And dammit, you better not swim in the lane for WWII veterans.

Kalipso indoor pool, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan

So to prevent some or all of these roadblocks, I decided to do a practice run. Last week I ran by to find out about price and requirements. It was a fun use of my Russian and my beginning Kyrgyz. Swim caps required? Yes. Shoes off before entering the locker room? Yes. Cost? 3000 som (about $51) for 12 visits in a month, or 4500 som ($76) for 12 visits in a year. OK, I’m ready.

I showed up today nice and early, around 9:45. The woman at the front desk had told me that the best time to come was between 10:00 and 3:00. The pool doesn’t open till 8:00 so no chance of going before work. And apparently, after 3:00 it is crazy with noodlers, kids and “sport swimmers” (спортивные пловцы).

When I walked in and looked through the huge window overlooking the pool, I saw two empty lanes (out of two lanes!). I was excited. I handed over 3000 som. While the woman was writing my name on my card, and laughing at my name, I started taking off my shoes and put them into a bag. “Oh, you brought a bag for your shoes. Good.” Apparently, bags are required, too.

Sure as I thought that, I saw on the door to the locker room a note saying that if you don’t have your shoes in a bag, you have to leave them in the lobby. Thank goodness I brought a bag. Don’t want anyone messing with my nice dress boots.

I walked into the locker room with the lifeguard, practicing my Russian and Kyrgyz, reflecting on how nice and big the lockers were (I can bring my Speedo bag!), and how the locker room was lacking a babushka. I found my locker and started to take my pants off, with the lifeguard still there talking to me. As my legs leave my pants, a young 20-something Kyrgyz woman walks by carrying a mop. Not mopping. Just walking through the locker room. Interesting.

The lifeguard practiced his one good English sentence with me. “You. Must. Shower.”  I complimented him on his English, while at the same time wondering why he had that sentence down so well. How many Anglophones swim here that he needs to know how to say that in English? Better: How many Americans, Brits, Kiwis, Aussies, Indians, etc. swim here without showering? Yuck.

Showers are good. No lighting though. All lights broken except in the two toilet “rooms.” The swim building is nicely lit by sun so that was okay, but I wonder what happens when the sun is down? Shower had soap. That’s nice and unexpected. And the water was warm.

The pool is really mostly an amusement park type of pool. Lots of slides and shallow areas for noodlers and kids. But there are two “sport lanes ” (спортивные дорожки), both very wide, probably wide enough to do 3-4 swimmers abreast. The water wasn’t the cleanest looking. Didn’t smell of chlorine. Not sure how they clean it. I’ve heard some pools here are not equipped with filtration, which worries me. So I plan on always fully washing out my ears post natantes.

But the swim was great! It hurt immediately. My left shoulder hurt from the first length. My shoulders rarely if ever hurt! What’s up with that? The pain went away after the first 500. I was slow. 2000 meters taking me 47 minutes with about a minute rest between 500s. The real shock came when I tried to pull my ass out of the pool at the end of the workout. I couldn’t get out of the pool! Thankfully, there were only about four people in the pool at the time, all noodlers. So I dunked myself to the bottom, and rocketed out of the pool…to catch one buttock on the edge of the pool, Then I nudged the rest of my fat ass out of the pool. My arms felt so heavy! Next time I’ll park my sandals at the stairs and walk in like an old person.

Today felt really good in the end. I missed swimming. And I’m glad I found a place I can swim in regularly. Hopefully today won’t be the last time I swim while in Kyrgyzstan.

Great article from the British Medical Journal

Got linked to this article from the MSF. It’s titled Captain Webb’s legacy: the perils of swimming the English Channel. This article is probably not a good idea to send to your loved ones who want to know what it’s all about, your swimming The Channel.

The article is full of all the bad things that could happen to you while trying to swim to France. From jellyfish to cardiac arrest, channel swimming is dangerous. But isn’t that where the excitement is? Isn’t that the challenge than many of us lust after? Isn’t that why Hillary climbed Everest? Isn’t that why the pioneer of channel swimming said “Nothing great is easy“?

As if I needed a reason update

If you read my previous post, you know that the USMS has made severe (to us) changes to their open water swim sanctioning rules. Bottom line: Swims under 60 degrees would require a wetsuit, and swims under 57 degrees won’t happen.

This was discussed openly on the Marathon Swimmers Forum. Thankfully, a member of the USMS open water committee pointed out that what was missing in the DNOWS article about the rules change was the sentence “unless a USMS-approved thermal plan is in place.”

Seems that everything we thought about the temperature rules was wrong, as long as the race directors have a thermal plan approved by USMS. What does this plan have to contain? Where can I find an example thermal plan, you ask?

Well, there isn’t one. They haven’t created it yet. According to the USMS committee member:

USMS Long Distance and Open Water are working out the details on what needs to be included in a thermal plan.

So, USMS proposed changes to the rules for open water swimming back in September at the Convention, and here we are in December 2014, three months later, and they still haven’t figured out what constitutes a “USMS-approved thermal plan”?

I’ve never run a national sports organization, so perhaps I’m not qualified to make this judgment. But I’d hope that if I were to propose changes to rules that would include requiring a director get a plan approved by me, I’d want to offer up an example of what kind of plan I’d want to see.

Still I see no reason to join USMS for 2015. Perhaps that will change if BLDSA or some other swimming organization requires it of me to swim in their events. But as of now, I’m not re-upping my membership.

As if I needed a reason

I’ve been a member of USMS for a while now, and I’ve been happy. They’ve given me insurance when I needed it. Their swim meets are fun. SWIMMER magazine, at least until the wonderful H2Open came around, was not half bad.

The best part of USMS membership is when you’re swimming with a club. Or when you’re traveling. I’ve “used” my membership at Ft Bragg when I was traveling, and worked out with the Ft Bragg masters for a week, without paying anything.

But as I’m about 8000 miles from the closest USMS club, I thought I’d save some bucks in 2015 by not rejoining. “But IronMike, what if you do any of those European open water swims that require national federation membership for insurance purposes,” you might ask, dear reader(s). Well, that’s a good point. Upon further investigation, turns out I won’t need that for a lot of OW swims I can attend. And I can always join at the last minute if there’s a swim I can’t live without, as USMS sends you a virtual membership card immediately.

So I decided I’ll save the money this coming year. Then today I read the following from USMS:

According to new rule 302.2.2A, an open water swim shall not begin if the water temperature is less than 60°F (15.6°C) unless heat-retaining swimwear is required of all swimmers. A swim in which heat-retaining swimwear is required of all swimmers shall not begin if the water temperature is less than 57°F (13.9°C). For swims of three miles or more, the swim shall not begin if the water temperature exceeds 29.45°C (85°F).

As if I needed another reason to not join USMS. Talk about not OW-friendly, or marathon swimmer friendly. The above is for swims that want USMS insurance (which already is quite expensive and onerous). Many swim organizers have gone to other organizations for that (WOWSA is one I can think of off the top of my head).

What USMS has declared in the above is just crazy. Everyone knows the true test (and sometimes prerequisite) for channel swims is 6 hours in sub-60°F. This new rule by USMS is a blatant move against marathon swimmers (not just cold water swimmers, I’d say). And to say that no swim will happen at all, wetsuit or not, if the water is below 57°F is just mind-boggling. What the hell? OW swimmers do this quite often. It’s called acclimatization. And what about the upper end? I’ve been in pools hotter than that, and it sucks. I hope that upper end rule stands for indoor pools, too.

When asked to comment, the fair-weather swimmers at USMS stated that

[t]he rationale for these changes are due to athlete safety. This proposal aims to reduce significantly the risks from thermal issues from swimming in water that is dangerously cold or hot for most United States Masters Swimming members, but allows some flexibility for those who choose to swim in wetsuits. The United States Masters Swimming open water swimmer population, taken as a whole, are typically not elite athletes, in general do not acclimatize, spend more time (in some cases, much more time) in the water, have more health-related problems, and are much more likely to be using medications which can alter their adaptability.

OK, so using this rationalization, perhaps USMS should make some adjustments for the elite athletes among its population. Perhaps a 1-second delayed start per 50m in the pool? 20 minute delay for the elites in the USMS Open Water National Championship 10K? How to determine elite? Well, if you were on a national team for one. Maybe if you were in the top-3 in the event the previous year?  Yep, silly. My point.

I think their reasons for forcing wetsuits on us in a 3 degree range are wrong, misguided and ignorant. Instead of treating their clientele as adults (USMS is defined, after all, as “organized adult swimming”), they are deciding for us, deciding that our acclimatization is not sufficient, our hard work not satisfactory to carry us through 10 kilometers (or more) of cold water. And oh, we OW swimmers are all old and on meds, and too stupid to figure out we shouldn’t swim while on depressants. Thanks USMS. Good-bye. I’ll stick with MSF.

I’m all for the higher end limitation, however. RIP Fran Crippen.

The pool is full…again

Dear reader(s), those of you who are still sticking with me despite my infrequent posts, know that I wrote a blog entry a bit ago with a similar title. Here it is again if you missed it. (Go ahead. I’ll wait.)

Well, the pool is full again…with ice. Apparently here in Kyrgyzstan, they treat outdoor pools here with a string of half-filled plastic coke bottles. I don’t know the science behind it, but I’m guessing when the water freezes, the space in the bottle shrinks to make space for the expansion of the ice. But that’s my non-scientific explanation, and it’s purely a guess.

What do you think?

frozen pool

Finally, a real long-distance unassisted swim

So, finally, we have a no-shit, unassisted, observed, longest-distance swim on the record. Chloë McCardel, 29-year old awesome open water swimmer, on 23 October walked onto the beach in Nassau, Bahamas after swimming 42.5 (yes, forty-two and a half) hours from the southern tip of the island of Eleuthera, covering 124/5* kilometers.

Read that paragraph again, and find the important word(s). If you said unassisted, observed, and longest, then give yourself a gold star.

Chloë swam unassisted, meaning she had no special suit, no special mask, no fins, no jumping on the boat during lightning.  Chloë was observed by someone known to the marathon swim community, and independent of Chloë and her “machine”, one Mr. Dave Barra, marathon swimmer extraordinaire himself. And when we see his observer’s notes, I’m sure we’ll see details about Chloë’s swim, details seriously lacking in other recent attempts. Chloë’s swim is the longest on record, which can only be said because of the previous two italicized adjectives.

Great job Chloë and I hope you recover soon from your jellyfish stings and your 42.5-hours horizontal in salt-water!

*depending upon whom you read; I may change these numbers once Mr Barra’s observer notes become public. Note I said public, another requirement of a real marathon swim.

The pool is full!

But the weather got cold.

So I’ve written here how the swimming possibilities for me in Bishkek are limited. I’m okay with that. I’m being brave. But what I haven’t really talked about was the pool I have on my property.

Screenshot 2014-09-20 at 04.06.28
Not too shabby, eh?

The pool is about 10m long. I’ve ordered those straps you attach to your feet on one end, then you tie to the fence or run through the skimmers on the other end. They should be here in 2-3 weeks. The pool had to be drained and cleaned first. Yesterday the pool was finally full, cleaning chemicals added, and safe to swim in. That’s when the temperature dropped to the mid-50’s.

I know what my marathon and channel swimming chums would say. “So what?” True. But I’m not jumping in that water until I can strap my feet to the wall and swim. I’m sure the water is comparatively warm (I’ll have to get a pool thermometer), but with nothing to do in the pool that’ll warm me up, I’d freeze.

I’ve told people at work that I’m filling the pool and they think I’m insane. “Well, I have to get some swimming in!” That’s what I say that gets looks. “The water will be cold.” Then I tell them I spent two and a half hours in 13-15C water swimming my first 10K and they really think I lost my mind.

 

 

Forced hiatus from swimming

Well, that sucks. Doesn’t look like I’ll be swimming here in Kyrgyzstan. There are pools, they do exist in this country. There are indoor ones. Also, beautiful outdoor pools. But none can be used for laps.

So during my investigations yesterday, I went to three of the fairly “near” pools to my work and home. One is literally a few steps from my house, perhaps a quarter mile. They have an indoor “sport pool” (спортивный бассейн in Russian), with two whole lanes, about 25m each. $10 to swim more than an hour. I asked about reserving my own lane for a couple hours a couple times a week. Sadly, I have to wait until the manager comes back. When we got there, the indoor part of the aqua-complex was being repaired. In true FSU fashion, the first person I spoke to said the pool would be repaired by the 10th. The second I spoke with said the 15th. By the look of things, they won’t be ready until closer to the 1st of October.

There was a pool with 5 sport lanes, and if I can get there between 11 and 3 during the work week, I’ll have a free lane. Only $10 for 45 minutes. And 30-40 minutes to get there before or after work. Not ideal. Plus, they wouldn’t let me see the pool without paying, you guessed it, $10.

The first pool I went into with my daughter, we were allowed to go walk on the deck to see the pool. After we put little blue plastic slippers over our shoes. Yes, like Russia, you’re not allowed to go into a locker room or pool deck in outside shoes. Even if it’s not snowing outside. They took us to the sport pool, and there I saw some lanes painted on the bottom of the pool, and adults and kids swimming hither and thither. Because there were no lane lines.

Now my Russian is not half bad. I’m told that often by Russian speakers. (Практика, практика, практика.) For what I lack in vocabulary or grammar (G-d damn those verbs of motion), I make up for in my ability to explain with my simple word-stock what I’m trying to say. So I asked about lane lines and lap swim hours. The very nice Kyrgyz woman looked at me, pointed at the pool, and said, “Right now is lap time.”

Oh. Dear. God. Lap time had two old folks noodling (only w/o the noodles) through the lap pool, and a passel of bratty kids swimming wherever the hell they wanted throughout the pool. Pure chaos. Absolute. Oh, and it cost $80 per month for the luxury of twelve 45-minute visits. Sadly, that’s the best price-wise. But the worst, pool-wise.

Fortunately, every one of these pools would be great for the kiddos. They all had indoor “aqua-park” areas, with huge slides, water falls, even a wave pool. So we’ll have a place to go during the cold winter to get the kids some fun. Alas, for dad, not so much.

We’re building a new embassy here, and I’ve heard tell of a pool (a la Embassy Moscow, 15m long) in the new building. I haven’t seen any plans and I doubt something like that would be built in this day and (fiscal) age, but who knows. I’ll hold out hope. But for now, I think I’m going to have to find another physical hobby, and pick marathon swimming back up in the states when we return.

The silliest thing…or is it?

News came to the marathon swimming world today about magic goggles that’ll take you to the next buoy in a perfectly straight line, no need to sight. Yeah, you read that right. And yes, these are the goggles I’ve been dreaming of for years, although my imaginings include a heads-up display arrow in the goggle always pointing to the next buoy. And of course I’m against them. But should I be?

Basically, what we got here is a pair of goggles that do actually point to the next buoy when you push a button on them. If I understand it correctly, you look to your next buoy, push a button, and then you’ll be guided to that location. If you get off course, it’ll warn you with a yellow or red light in the goggle cup on the side that you’re swimming to.  So if you’re slicing, you can start swimming to the left to get back on course. Once you get to the buoy, look to your next buoy, point the button, swim. Look forward to a logjam at the buoys as all your buddies stop to tread water and click their goggle-mouse.

The immediate response by some in the community was WTF. As well it should be because all the advertising and response has been through the lens of a triathlete (see what I did there?).  Most of the comments on the company’s FB page are from triathletes looking to spend as little time in the water as possible without actually putting effort in to getting better at open water swimming.  But just because triathletes are for it doesn’t mean we should be against it.

Nevertheless…I’m against it.  In races, definitely.  How can directors ensure every swimmer has the same benefit? Should there now be four classes for each sex? Wetsuit with special goggles, wetsuit without, skins with or without?

But what about marathon swim races or solos? Ones in which you have a kayaker who is your eyes and does the navigation for you? How is that different? Some would say these goggles are pretty much the same thing.

Well, they’re not. For one, they violate the spirit of marathon swimming, which states:

Marathon swimmers embrace the challenge of crossing wild, open bodies of water with minimal assistance beyond their own physical strength and mental fortitude. There are ways to make the sport easier, but marathon swimmers consciously eschew them.

An oft-heard adjective among marathon swimmers is unassisted. This in no way means you cannot have pace swimmers, or a kayak or boat to navigate for you. But one category of equipment that is absolutely not allowed is “[w]earable electronic devices that transmit information to the swimmer beyond the time of day and elapsed time” if you are going to claim an unassisted marathon swim. That’s the rules. And these FrankenGoggles (h/t Loneswimmer) aren’t part of these rules we marathon swimmers hold dear.

More Nyad

Experienced marathon swimmer and professor of law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law, Hadar Aviram, has recently written an in-depth analysis of the hub-bub resultant after Nyad’s assisted Cuba-to-Florida swim last year and the production of a global standard for marathon swimming; The Rules if you will. It is well worth the read.

Dear reader(s) of my blog know that I was very critical of Nyad’s swim last year. I wrote a bit about her, and even got a new fan of the blog as a result, who spent the time to write me a nice hate-filled compliment!

If you’re not in the mood to read all 55 pages, skip to Parts II and III (after reading the intro that is). If you’re new to my blog and/or marathon swimming, read Part II which will give you a little background.

Dedicated readers will be rewarded with a little surprise in the article with yours truly being quoted. Twice!