#79~Resort Style Lap Swimming

Over the years I have been to many luxury resorts. While many say they have Olympic sized swimming pools it's simply not true. Typically, it means they have 20-25 yard/meter pool-that is not Olympic sized.  In fact, I am not sure I have ever seen a 50 meter pool at a luxury resort.

This week my travels took me to posh Palm Beach and the swanky Breakers Hotel & Resort. The hotel was built by American oil, railroad and real estate tycoon, Henry Flagler in 1896.  The expansive hotel complex sits on a low bluff on the Atlantic Ocean.  Adjacent to the actual hotel with its prominent twin towers is a fitness center and spa that has four different pools and easy access to the beach. 

Some pre-trip planning assured me that I would find a pool worthy of some decent lap swimming. I got up early and headed to the pool at dawn thinking that the well heeled patrons of The Breakers would be sleeping in. That wasn't the case. When I got to the 25 meter three lane pool just before sunrise all the lanes were filled. The three old timer swimmers made it pretty obvious that we wouldn't be splitting lanes or circle swimming. I headed off to the squarish shaped lounging pool to swim by myself to kill some time. My stroke count would suggest it was about 35 meters long. I swam up and down the pool trying to swim straight which wasn't easy without a black line to follow. When I saw the old timers leave the lap pool I went over to swim some laps.  

The very nature of a resort pool with only three lanes, no pace clock and bath temperature water isn't conducive to a tough work out. I stuck to easy lap swimming which was  luxurious and appropriate for the serene setting.

The next day it was effectively the same drill with a slight diversion of swimming in the ocean for about 300 meters. I didn't swim out too far because it was dawn, I was by myself, and I was swimming in Florida's east coast waters and well you know...it's just not safe to swim in those conditions if you know what I mean.

With the sun rising over the Atlantic both mornings it was a wonderful way to start my days!

Earlier in the week I was also on the west coast of Florida in Clearwater Beach and had the chance to take a morning swimming in the Gulf of Mexico. It was like a hot tub!

Three-peat!!!

Lots of pressure for this years Boston Sharkfest swim. This was the fifth annual swim. I have competed  in all of them and have won my age group the last two years. There was tremendous self imposed pressure to three-peat!!!  I did not let myself down!

It was a beautiful, last day of summer. Blue skies, the temps in the mid-seventies and even better the water was 68 degrees. Perfect conditions for a sans wetsuit swim. I'm met my fast friend Eric at registration. We checked in and surveyed the course from the finish line, left our bags at the bag drop and made our way to the water taxi.

Taking the water taxi over to East Boston looking back to Boston and the Moakley Courthouse finish line Eric and I visually charted our course. It was clear that the better plan was not to follow the red buoy line but to bear right and swim through the handful moored sailboats to the finish.

We waited about 30 minutes in the park before visiting with other swimmers and listening to the final race briefing. Eric and I self seated ourselves in the first wave that went off at roughly 11:30am. It's dock start with 75 swimmers per wave. It was a bit crazy at the start but the crowd thinned nicely by the end of the pier. Eric pulled away, quickly as expected. Sticking to the game plan I sighted off the right corner of the Moakley Courthouse. The water felt great and I knew I was right on course when I swam through the sailboats and saw the finish line approximately 500 meters away. 

Approaching the finish line and seeing the swimmers off my left that were following the buoy line I could tell I had a better line to the finish.  Finishing strong in a pack of youngsters I nudged a few of them out at the end.

Waiting for the results at the timing tent it shortly became apparent that it was going to be an age group win and a three-peat!

The awards ceremony was long as the organizers started with the wetsuit division and eventually made it to the skins division. At my age you don't get a chance to be on the podium so I was going to wait for it come hell or high water. There weren't many people in the crowd when I stepped on the podium but it was definitely worth the wait.

I was 34th out of 136 in the skins division with everyone ahead of me 17-35 years younger than me.  When you factor in the wetsuit division I was 48th overall out of 480 swimmers. Age adjusted not too shabby.

Looking forward to next year and hopefully securing a-dynasty!

A great day was capped off by a fun benefit dinner at Landsake Farm our local community organic farm.

Swim the Sea

This weeks swims reminded me of the quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Live in the sunshine, swim the sea and drink the wild air.

Twice this week I have had a chance to swim the sea. That doesn't happen to me often unless I'm on vacation or in some tropical locale. With the Anacapa Santa Barbara Channel swim about six weeks away swimming in water cooler than the pool at MIT is key.

The first swim was at First Beach in Newport, Rhode Island. I was there for an overnight business trip so I got up early and found the beach around sunrise. There were two cars in the parking lot with a couple of people watching the sunrise and drinking coffee. I think they may have been a bit surprised when I changed into my speedo and with my buoy in tow walked directly into the rolling waves and started swimming. The tide was out so I had to swim out a fair distance out so I could actually swim. It was a bit choppy and towards the one end of the beach it was a mess of red algae or seaweed. I lasted for about 25 minutes when decided I that if I really wanted to swim longer I was going to have to swim out farther to get out of the chop. I realized that may not be a good idea as I was the only one out there. The water temp was balmy 67 degrees.

The second was today, Saturday where I took a 45 minute drive out to Nahant just north of Logan airport a bit.  I was to meet a small group of the Nahant Knuckleheads for a swim. I got there just before 7:30am start time and when nobody showed I after a few minutes I went out on my own. It's a big long white sand beach and at that hour there were quite a few people out walking or jogging. The tide was out and I headed north as far as I could without getting in the way of a kite boarder and then I turned around and went the other direction towards Nahant until I found more kite boarders. The wind had definitely picked up and it was obvious that more kite boarders would be on their way. As I was heading back to shore I saw the group I had hoped to swim with just heading out.  I figured I swam just under two miles and again the water was 67 degrees. Ideally, it would have been better from a acclimatization point of view  if it was a few degrees cooler. Maybe next weekend for Sharkfest in Boston Harbor.

It was nice to swim the sea a couple times this week.

Driving past the Weston Town Green I realized it was the 15th anniversary of the September 11th attacks. Every year the town remembers that day in 2001 by placing flags on the town green in the shape of a flag. It's always a dramatic tribute. While the grass was brown due to our drought is was still beautiful and moving nonetheless.