First Race - Hell Froze Over With Me in the Middle - Part II

BWAAAAAAAAH!

The air horn sounded sending my heart out of my nose and making my pooper pucker like someone put Icy Hot in my drawers.  My heat was underway.  I'm not sure how many people were actually in my wave but it felt like I was one out of a thousand lemmings running in slow motion to our inglorious doom.  "Crap, crap, crap, craaaaaaaaap."  There was no backing out now even if my life depended on it.  I was in the middle of the pack being pushed toward the frigid water by a bunch of foolhardy triathlon nerds who were chomping at the bit to get their race on.  I was like that sorry Roman soldier with his fellow soldier's spear in his back as they charged forward into battle.  It was either go forward and fight to live or die turning around to flee.

Not only would I have been trampled had I turned around to back out, but the wife's heat was right behind us.  It would be better to drown in the frigid duck-water lake than to endure the life-long shaming that would have taken place had I backed out. (Little did I know the same thing was going through the wife's head as she watched us plunge into the frosty fluid).  "Here goes nothing."  Summing up my last bit of false bravado, I gave myself a mental kick in the ass as I let myself fall face first into the water.  SONOFA!!! (Insert string of profanities).  Razors sliced my face and anywhere else not covered by my wetsuit.  "Turtle syndrome" was taken to an entirely new level.  Oxygen evaporated from my lungs as they were instead filled with wet cement.  My frigid watery death was all but a mere formality now.  Crap, I didn't even have my will done!

"Hold on, you can't drown in a wetsuit, you can't drown in a wetsuit" I assured myself.  "Just stroke and breath, stroke and breath."  "You're as buoyant as a beer can floating down a river."  "Wait, even they eventually sink...."  Smack, choke, gasp, flail, snot bubbles, panic.  Hand on my leg, heel to my forehead, goggles cockeyed on my face (At least I put my swim cap over the straps like a seasoned pro so I didn't lose them - This was one thing I read online that was right!)   Lake water filled my eyes and mouth, somehow at the same time.  This was the single worst idea of my life.  I was going to die like Leonardo DiCaprio's character in the Titanic. I could hear that terrible soundtrack whining in my head as I slipped to my watery grave.  Ole Jack made drowning in freezing water look so peaceful but I felt like a one-winged penguin being chased by a great white shark.  "This is not peaceful, this sucks!"

"Okay, okay, okay, tread water and gather yourself man!"  "Hey, a kayak is right there, go ahead and grab it ... stop it, don't be that guy, don't eat the apple!"  "Shore is pretty much just as far away now as the next buoy, keep swimming."  "It's too cold, you can't breath, this is just stupid, it can't be good for you, go ahead and just call it a day.  Don't leave your son fatherless." "Can't quit, what does that teach the son?  Plus, the wife will never let you live it down, you're better off drowning."  "Ah look, there's a bunch of people hanging onto the buoy like seals on the one iceberg that is still afloat in the middle of the Arctic Ocean."  "Haha, you guys are cheating, I'm still swimming.  I am awesomer than all ya'll!" My self-talk was like an inebriated lunatic that didn't take his medication.

"Relax, breast stroke, breath; breast stroke, breath; stroke a breast, breath." Hehe I said "stroke a breast."  Apparently I was going delirious.  BWAAAAAAAAHHHHHH.  The women's Olympic distance heat was being sent off behind us.  "Get moving fool before you get passed by a bunch of chicks."  "Regular stroke, breath; regular stroke, breath."  "Don't mind that hand on your ass and foot about to kick you in the face."  "Follow the bubbles, bump, roll, relax, breath."  I was finding a rythm.  "We got this."  "Relax, pull, breath, sight; relax, pull, breath, sight.  I was moving right along now.  Ironman Kona here I come!  Relax pull, breath, sight; relax, pull ... THUNK! What the hell?!  The top of my melon ran smack into something.  Choking on dirty ice water I popped straight up to see what had fallen out of the sky to smack me in the head.  A damn kayak!  "Did I go that far off course?"  There was no way, the one thing I was doing right was sighting and following the buoys.  Nope, didn't go off course.  A bright-eyed, bright-shirt sporting, smiling volunteer was sitting in her kayak smack dab in the middle of the swim course watching us all go on our merry way.  "You alright?" She asked.  "No, can't you see I'm trying to drown myself here and you aren't making things any easier" I replied in my head.  "Ugh" was all I could really muster to groan in response.

"Fruitin, fartin, fricken, frackin, biscuit baking, banana boater!"  As if the swim wasn't hard enough already they had to throw obstacles in the middle of it.   "Did I look that bad that someone paddled over to get me?" I wondered.  "Oh well."  "Lord I got to keep on moooooveeeeen..."  Now Bob Marley popped into my head as I blissfully imagined pulling the bright-eyed, bright-shirt sporting, smiling, apparently warm kayaking volunteer out of her kayak and paddling myself to safety.  Undeterred, I struggled to find my "rhythm" again.  "There it is, here we go, but what's that?"  The water behind me started churning.  It's weird how you can hear and feel something approaching you from behind even in murky water.  I was like a lure about to be devoured by a famished fish.

A few seconds went by and something was grabbing my feet, another thing pushed my head down, a dark object went darting by me, bubbles everywhere.  What the ...?  Is that a freaking porpoise (no porpoises don't hang out in Iowa lakes)? Is that a swim cap?  Is that an arm?  It's a stinking person.  Damn it! The girls were passing me now.  They had to be ex-Olympian swimmers right?  One by one, they glided right by me, each one taking my masculinity down another notch.  First man-nerds now women!  As if about drowning wasn't bad enough.  Their wake went straight into my gaping mouth as I attempted to breath.  Hack, spit, choke, panic, another round of breast stroke.  "I guess I should be swimming my swim workouts with the breast stroke" I thought.  "You can't come out of this looking good so just survive man, just survive.  Kona will have to wait."

What felt like an eternity went by as I scratched and clawed my way through the Arctic water, slowly working my way to the safety of the blow-up arch and boat ramp marking the end to this torturous task.  My lungs were on fire, which was weird with as much water as I swallowed, and my arms felt like they were going to fall off.  I couldn't feel my face, feet or fingers.  Numb, humbled but happy to be alive, my hand felt the scratch of the boat ramp concrete ridges.  Twelve and a half minutes had felt like hours but now it was all but a distant nightmare

A relief unlike I had ever felt before swept over me as my feet came up under me and I grasped that glorious volunteer's hand to help me out of the water.  "LAND FREAKING HO!"  I wanted to bear hug the volunteer and bend down and kiss the earth that had saved me from my watery grave but alas, aint nobody got time for that, I was racing ... again.  I didn't care about the needles penetrating my feet with every step, I had survived.  I even snuck a peak back and saw to my surprise that there were still people in the water.  I wasn't last!

A little light-headed, I staggered up the ramp to the cheers of the wonderful people that had come to see the triathlon phenomenon that was me.  It sounded like I had just scored the winning touchdown at the Super Bowl, in my head anyway.  "Short, choppy steps" I coached myself.  "Get your heart rate down, breath man, breath."  I had survived!  I had made it through the part that terrified me the most.  A feeling of glorious accomplishment swept over me as I shuffled up the 15% grade hill to transition (it wasn't that steep, just taking some artistic liberties here).  I didn't care, I survived.  My false bravado and overconfidence began creeping back in with every step away from the water.  I was a lock to finish my first triathlon ... Or was I?

First Race - Hell Froze Over With Me in the Middle - Part I

The bus rolled up to the swim start to drop us all off.  There was no way back but to swim across the lake unless of course you wanted to take a massive hike of shame.  Not me, not I, no way was that going to happen.  I was not about to take that loss and the wife would never, ever, ever, let me live that down.  I had trained my tail off and it was my time to shine.

Cold, wet, grass greeted our bare feet as we exited the bus.  "I hope the water isn't this cold."  It was the kind of cold that makes your feet tingle with every step.  "Ah the water has to be warmer, the grass just got extra cold overnight with the rain" I told myself.  The race director announced that the water was a balmy 56 degrees.  Because of that, the Olympic distance swim would be the same as the Sprint "to ensure the safety of the athletes."

I talked myself into being cool with the shortened swim.  It was my first go at this and a shorter swim certainly couldn't hurt.  As I walked down the hill leading to the beach, a bunch of people were already in the water getting their warm up on.  There were even a couple of guys standing around in nothing but their Speedo's and no wetsuit to speak of.  "Nucking futs" I thought.  Then again one of the guys was wearing an Army t-shirt.  "They probably do crazy stuff like this for basic training or survival school" I thought.  "That dude is a bad man and I am apparently a sissified tweedy bird."  "But a warm tweedy bird in this wetsuit."

The lyrics of the last song on my pre-race playlist mocked me as I got ready to wade into the lake.  "Toes in the water ass in the sand, not a worry in the world a cold ... FREAKING FROZEN LAKE, HOLY CRAP!  Did we somehow move to Alaska?  Where are the penguins and Eskimos?  To say the water was cold would be an understatement.  There had to have been a layer of ice over the top.  How it wasn't frozen solid I have no idea.  The buoys appeared to move further and further away from shore with each step I took into the water.   My toes were numb in a matter of seconds.  "Got to do this; its a shorter swim; got to do this."  "Those are people out there not penguins and they are still alive and moving.  Got to do this!"  I gingerly forced myself further into the water for a "warm up" swim.  Is this a 400 or a 4000 meter swim?!  What is going on here?!  Is that England on the other side?  Are we swimming the freaking English Channel?  My mind  had become a hot mess of self-doubt, personal resentment, and false bravado.  I think I even figured out a way to somehow blame the wife even though this race was my idea.

"OK, screw it just dive right in and get it over with.  Everyone else is out there clearly not dead."  Needles, thousands of needles pierced my face.  Any part of my body not covered by the wetsuit went numb.  A strange invisible monster stuck its arm straight down my throat, mercilessly tearing out my lungs.  A water leprechaun began filling my wetsuit with ice cubes while Chucky continued stabbing my face, feet and hands.  Purple and gasping I stood right up, dazed, confused, and pretty sure I hell had frozen over with me standing smack dab in the middle of it.  "Oh we're looking out for the athletes, alright" I mocked.  That was all they said all morning talking about shortening the swim.  "What's the point of swimming 400 meters as opposed to a mile if you are a popsicle by the first buoy?"  "If they were looking out for the athletes, they wouldn't be making us swim where the Titanic sank."

Sulking and questing my sanity for even embarking on this voyage, I took a couple of big breaths and looked around at the rest of my fellow fools.  Everybody else was still alive and swimming their warm ups like it was summertime at Waimea Bay.  "What the hell?"  "Am I racing a bunch of polar bears?"  OK, if they could do it, so could I.  "How are we going to do this?" I thought, probably out loud.  "How am I going to survive?"  Light bulb!  Back home nothing cut through the chill on a cold night-dive (free diving/"snorkeling" in the ocean at night with a waterproof flashlight, waking fish up with a spear through their head) better than a quick pee.  Maybe that's the key.  Warm pee in wetsuit = warm body.  Certainly worth a try.

Not going to lie, the pee trick helped ... a little.  That was until I put my face back into the freezing water.  It literally took your breath away.   You want to know what it was like?  Go outside, scoop up a cooler full of snow, let it melt, and right after the last speck melts, go bobbing for apples.  OK, "relax and blow bubbles."  "That worked, now stroke, breath, stroke, breath. You got this."  My self-talk was at an all-time high.  Breathing every three strokes like I practiced in the pool was not going to work.  It was pure survival mode.  I tried to convince myself, "it is all but impossible to drown wearing a wetsuit."  "Not if you die from hypothermia first."  Damn self-talk!  My race strategy was now modified.  Survive the swim; rock the bike; rock the run; probably don't have to worry about accepting any awards.

Everyone got out of the water to thaw out as the race director barked out the last minute instructions.  Something about if you need to, don't hesitate to grab hold of a kayak or canoe or buoy and you wont be penalized so long as you don't use it to advance yourself.  "Screw that! I'm not about to wuss out and take a half time on the swim."  To me that would be like walking during a road race, it's an automatic loss.  You can't count say you "ran" that race if you walked any part of it.  In fact, don't even pick up your finishers medal at the end.  Go strait to the car, get in and drive your shameful buttocks home.  If I was going to do this, I'm doing it right!

After the last minute directions, the race director started singing the National Anthem.  It was pretty terrible sounding through the megaphone.  Terrible, but goosebumps crept in none-the-less and a sudden rush of emotion smacked me as many of the participants started chiming in and singing along.  This is real.  All these people regardless of their age, experience, "athletic" ability, or background, had all committed to this endeavor and they weren't allowing themselves to be contained by what other people might think about them.  It was like it was one giant shameless family, possibly united by the fact that they all knew we were about to die from hypothermia.  "Huh, wonder if we'll get a fly over?"

30 SECONDS!  My day dreaming was cut short as the race director started the countdown for first swim wave.  It was the Men's Sprint wave.  There was no time trial start like I saw at Hy-Vee, we weren't going in age groups, it was a mass start based on which race you were doing.  "Good thing I did the open water swim clinic last week" I thought.  "It's going to suck but I can survive."  The first horn sounded and bodies started hitting the water.  The crazy serious dudes were diving right in, taking off like seals being chased by killer wales.  Others took their time entering, wading in before taking the plunge.  Even more waited for the entire wave to be on their way before even walking down to the water.  "Your losing time fellahs!"  The water was a gigantic washing machine of flailing arms, legs, and bright colored swim caps.  Ha!  One guy didn't get but 50 yards out before he turned a direct course for a kayak.  I mocked him in my head.  "Chump, you should know ahead of time that you can't make the swim, save yourself the embarrassment and sleep in." 

It was but maybe three minutes before the next horn sounded.  Women's Sprint ....  Off they went.  "Crap that means we are next."  My heart was beating out of my wetsuit, my breathing became shallow, and I all but wanted to pee myself again as we inched closer to the waters edge.  People were jostling for position and to get the best line to the first buoy.  "Be safe, have fun" everyone was telling each other.  "Be safe?" I thought.  "Do people ACTUALLY die in these things?"  (The answer is "yes" by the way.  See http://www.endurancecorner.com/Larry_Creswell/triathlon_death)
"It's a sanctioned event, it has to be safe right? Why are they telling each other to be safe?"  "Do I really want to do this?"