Singapore 3km swim report
Hi, everybody, Homler asked me to report about my 3km rough water swim in Singapore yesterday, so here it is.
First, of all the weather was fine, which was a great relief because the swim portion of a triathlon I entered last month was canceled because of bad weather. The event was held at Tanjong Beach on Sentosa Island in Singapore. It is part of year long series held by Tri-Factor. Next there is a bike race, and then run event, culminating with the triathlon in October.
Instead of being one long course like Waikiki, this one was four loops of a 750m course. After each loop, you run a little up the beach so they can get your split. It is also a welcome chance to grab a quick drink of cool water to rinse out the seawater before running back in.
I arrived at 7:30 a.m., checked in, got marked up, warmed up a little in the water, and then sat on the beach hydrating with the Pocari Sweat I had swiped from the JAL lounge. There were 127 male swimmers and 24 female. Of the 127 males, there were 34 'Veterans,' which means 'old guys over the age of 45.' My goal was to win the Veteran category.
From my in-depth counseling with Steve and Pelham, my strategy was find the fast guy the follow him the entire race, and then, if I have enough energy, pass him at the end. I was in the 'Red' wave and was preceded by the White, Blue, and Yellow waves. According the the race booklet, all 3km Male Veterans were in the Red wave, so all I had to do was win my heat, and I would be Veteran champion.
For those used to the typical triathlon melee start, this was very orderly. At 8:39 I charged down the beach and plunged. I made it a point to stand at the front of the pack which probably helped, but in any case didn't have to dodge many elbows or feet. There were a few people who started out fast, but after only about 200 meters most of them had faded and there was only one guy keeping a good pace. I slotted myself behind him ('him' is ironically a Japanese guy, Koju Okano, a nice guy whom I introduced myself to after the race), but found myself having to do breaststroke to stay behind him, so I moved in front. Soon after I did that, however, we started to run into swimmers from the previous waves and it became a real battle to negotiate around them. A few hundred meters later my cap fell off and I had to stop a few seconds to put it back on. During that time Kojo passed me, and I decided that this must be a sign to let him do the hard work of cutting through the stragglers and for me to just coast behind him. I did that for the rest of the race. That is, until I rounded that last buoy, when I 'sprinted.' Sprint is probably not the right word, because it implies speed. After swimming 2.8km, I didn't have much left in me, and 200m is still a long way to sprint. Lets just say I swam as fast as I could, which is to say a little bit faster. That was enough to get me in front of Koju, though, and I stumbled onto the sand victorious.
At least I thought so.
It turns out there were Veterans in the other heats, and I so I came in fourth, not first. My time was 50:34. Could have I gone faster had I not paced myself behind Koju? Possibly. I did a lot of breaststroke to stay behind him. But had I not done the breaststroke, would I have had enough energy to 'sprint' to the finish? The third place time was only 7 seconds faster than mine, so definitely doable. Even second place was just a minute and change ahead of me, so I probably could have kept up with him if he was my pacesetter instead of Koju. The top time, though, was almost four minutes faster. Time to get back in the pool!
Here is the link for the results: http://trifactor.sg/wp-content/uploads/TSR%20TRI-Swim%20Results%20(3km).pdf
Quinn
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