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| Dover Harbour on a calm day - if only it had been like this on Saturday |
Arrived with only minutes to spare and was a bit disorganised from the start but managed to make it into the water for 8.45 (which meant leaving home at 6.30 !!). Water temperature is now very comfortable at about 17 degrees (which bodes well for the swim in September) so getting in and getting going was not a problem. Realising after about an hour that I'd forgotten to buy a parking ticket for my car was a bit of a problem though. I couldn't get out now though so I just trusted to fate on that front...
The sea was pretty choppy in the harbour and out at sea we could see huge white capped waves. Naturally this didn't make for the best swimming conditions and after 3 hours or so the seasickness kicked in. I say seasickness but actually it is probably a mixture of motion sickness and the bodies rather understandable reaction to swallowing loads of sea water. No matter how good a swimmer you are, when you have 1-2 ft waves breaking over your head, you are going to end up inhaling/swallowing/absorbing some of it. You just have to try and do your best as making sure you're breathing obviously becomes the priority !
At about this time the weather started to clear quite rapidly and there was even a threat of some sunshine. This was a marked change from first thing that morning when it was chucking it down with rain and there was cloud and wind everywhere. Having beeen soaked to the skin before getting in to the sea I hadn't even thought to put sun cream on. The fickle English weather seemed to be doing a rare about turn though so at 4 hours in I had to jump out, run up the beach past Freda (Streeter - known as the Channel General) who started goading me on the assumption that I was quitting, and then into my bag for the sun cream. Freshly covered in a thick layer of factor 40 I returned to the water !
5 hours in and I was now starting my food fantasies. After this sort of time your body is very keen to start ingesting calories so the brain seems to default to thinking about nosh and lots of it ! On Saturday I seemed to be craving a cheese fondue for some reason, but after a while I decided that the Premier Inn (my home for Saturday night) would probably not have it on their menu, in spite of what their name might lead you to believe. With harsh reality restored I started trying to make my mind up between breaded mushrooms or onion rings - deep fried of course !!
6 hours went by fairly well as the sea was starting to calm a bit but the 7th hour seems to drag and drag. I think this is more down to my psyche than anything else as the last phase of any training session always seems to be the most laborious for me (see 10 hr swim blog). Despite the fact that time had slowed down, I made it to the shore at 15.45 and clambered up the bank of pebbles for a well earned cup of sugary tea.
Having had a chat to a few of the friends I've made within the channel swimming nutter community down in Dover, I hauled a rather weary body to the Premier Inn. Having got into my room and cleaned up I decided that to even sit down on the bed would be fatal. The guaranteed outcome would be me waking up a 1 in the morning feeling absolutely starved and unable to move. As a result I did some stretching (Sarah [my physio] - see, I am doing as I'm told !) and then went and sat in the bar with several pints of OJ and lemonade. After some food at 6.30 I was then fast asleep by 9 and slept soundly until 7 the following morning.
Sunday
Having scrammed some breakfast down me and then got my things together I raced down to the beach for 8.30 trying really hard to fight the nerves back. I was feeling really sore in my shoulders and my back muscles were very tight. In short I was having what I believe is commonly know as 'a little bit of a wobble'.
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| At the end of my Back to Back - 13 hrs of swimming over 2 days |
Luckily, when I arrived at the beach almost everyone else was ready so I switched into 'get ready quickly' mode which nicely took my mind off things. So effective was this change in mindset that I got down to the beach with my wedding ring still on and no vaseline on my neck and shoulders (essential to prevent chaffing). I ran back up the beach and sorted that lot out before getting into the water, gritting my teeth and getting on with it.
After 30 minutes of slightly painful warm up swimming it actually felt fine other than a bit of shoulder pain from my recurring injury in the left shoulder. The sea was nearly dead flat and there was only a breath of wind under a near cloudless blue sky - perfect weather.
The swim went on and I was nearly (let me emphasis nearly) enjoying myself. Managed to keep my mind active by thinking through all sorts of things and eventually found myself entering the fifth hour. This seemed to drag a bit but not as much as the sixth hour which seemed to go on and on...(see above - I think this is a trend !). Eventually I made it though and I hauled myself out after having swum just over 30km in 2 days...urgh !
