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Dwight Crum Pier-To-Pier Swim

Subtitle: “BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!”

or

“WTF?”

I swam in the Dwight Crum Pier-to-Pier Swim yesterday. It’s a two mile ocean swim from the Hermosa Beach Pier to the Manhattan Beach Pier. They get over 1,000 entrants and this year it was a two wave start – first the men, and five minutes later the women. No wetsuits are allowed. It would be my longest open water swim since Lake Placid last year and my longest ever without a wetsuit. Based on my Ironman swim time, I expected to finish this race in a little over an hour. I thought this would be a good tune-up for the Ironman.

I met up with Cat and Jeff to park one car near the finish in Manhattan and then drove down to Hermosa. We got to Hermosa pretty early and spent about an hour walking around the beach, biding our time before jumping in for a quick warm-up swim. Before even getting into the water for a warm-up, I was a little cold. I put in my earplugs, figuring that they would help with the cold water. Normally I don’t have any problem jumping into the ocean, but yesterday it took me a little while to get up the courage to go past my knees. Eventually, I got in for a few minutes of warm-up swimming. Once I was in, the water felt chilly, but not too cold. I didn’t feel much of a current. My shoulder was a little tender, but once I’d swam for a couple minutes, it felt mostly fine.

The race started at 9AM. I hung back a couple seconds to let the front pack of men race into the surf and trotted my way in with the next group. It wasn’t that tough getting out; there was one wave breaking about 10 feet out that I dove under. After that, I started following the pack to go around the Hermosa Pier. From the start, I wasn’t swimming that great. I was breathing every other stroke, while normally I breathe every third or fourth. I wasn’t exhaling consistently, partly because my head wasn’t under water for as long as it would have normally been between strokes. It was pretty crowded, so I was thinking that I would settle into my stroke after I got past the Hermosa Pier and was in the long part of the swim parallel to the shore.

Unfortunately, that just never happened.

After a few minutes of bumping around in the crowd, the group spread out enough that there wasn’t much contact. I tried settling into my stroke and managed it for a few minutes, but pretty soon, the only thing I could think about was being cold. And this was only about 20 minutes in. At first, it was mostly just my fingers, but before long I was cold pretty much all over. I could barely concentrate on anything but the cold. Trying to keep myself focused on swimming was getting harder and harder. I found myself stopping my swimming and bringing my head out of the water fairly regularly. I’m not sure what I was thinking. I’m guessing that if I had just kept swimming, I might have stayed a little warmer. I tried counting strokes and setting a goal before I would “stop” again. That worked, sometimes.

At this point, I was probably 40 minutes in. I actually thought about bailing, but still thought that I would be out of the water in about an hour and knew I could make it another 20 minutes. I tried just putting my head down and swimming. The Manhattan Beach Pier was right in front of me, but for the next frustrating 20 minutes, it didn’t seem to be getting any closer at all. I tried turning around to see how far I’d come from the Hermosa Beach Pier, but couldn’t tell. I tried sighting on the buildings on the shore, but they all just blended together. I was really cold, shivering. It was a shitty feeling. The first time I’d ever been in this situation. I just pressed on. Throughout the race, I’d tried to draft, but my swimming and stopping were so inconsistent that drafting off anyone for a prolonged period of time was just about impossible. I remember seeing my watch say 1:00 and still couldn’t tell how long I had to go.

I finally got close to the pier and just muscled my way around it and to the shore. I don’t remember much of getting out of the water. The one thing I do remember is that my watch said around 1:20, which was pretty disappointing. I ran up the beach and across the finish line. Immediately after crossing, Jeff shouted out to me and must have seen (or heard, from my chattering teeth) how cold I was. He got me to the t-shirts and water and told me to run a little on the beach to try to warm up. Long story short, I didn’t stop shivering for at least a half hour. Jeff and Cat tried to get me to medical, but I stubbornly refused. They did get me some hot water from a coffee shop; the guy behind the counter took one look at us and offered it to us for free. I’m guessing I was still pretty purple. Cat and I went for a short run after we got back to the car and sometime during that run I finally warmed up.

I guess I got a little hypothermic. I’ve tried doing some research and I still don’t understand why that happened. I know other people got cold and saw people shivering around the finish, but I really suffered. I don’t have much body fat for insulation, but there were plenty of fit, lean people out there. I didn’t eat much yesterday morning, but my stomach wasn’t empty. If I ever try something like that again (which is pretty doubtful right about now), I’ll have to figure this question out first.

I’m disappointed in my performance, but trying not to let it get to me. The winner this year finished in 45:33. Last year the winner finished in 39:30 and 45:33 would have been about 30th place. So, it was a slower race than last year, which must mean that some external factor, like current, was working against us. There’s some consolation in that. Also, I’m not experienced swimming in open water without a wetsuit and should have practiced that a little. I’m in the middle of my hardest, longest weeks of training this season and haven’t had a day off in something like 12 days. I didn’t sleep that well Saturday night. So, maybe I was tired, physically beat up, a little glycogen deprived, not insulated enough to spend that much time in the ocean and swimming in relatively rough conditions. Still… I didn’t even finish in the top 50% overall. I’ll be swimming longer than that in 27 days, but I will be in a lake in a wetsuit and should be able to get a more consistent draft. Nonetheless, it was a bit of a mind-f*ck. I’ll be back in the pool tomorrow and I’m not going to go easy.

Brick – August 1
Total Time: 6:35
Bike:
Distance: 103.8 miles
Time: 6:05:30
Average heart rate: 112
Course: San Vicente/Ocean up PCH to Las Posas, up Mulholland, down Encinal, up Latigo, down Kannan Dume, home
Transition Time: 4:08
Run:
Distance: 2.75 miles
Time: 25 minutes
Average heart rate: 120
Course: Ocean Ave
Conditions: Early fog and mid-60’s, burned off to warm and sunny, mid-70’s

Dwight Crum Pier to Pier 2 Mile Swim – August 2
Time: 1:20:22
Overall place: 562/999
Division (35-39) place: 66/91

Run – August 2
Distance: 2.6 miles
Time: 21:30
Course: Manhattan Beach to Hermosa Beach
Conditions: Warm and sunny, high 60’s