It is the last weekend before Manhattan.  Thank goodness for tapers!  I only needed to do a 3 hour swim and 2 hour-ish respectively.  Since we are now on summer hours at my job, I typically get in one of the swims on Friday afternoon and the 2nd weekend swim on Saturday.  This allows me to have Sunday off which is a nice luxury for me. 

Before getting into the Friday afternoon swim, I needed to make a complete ass of myself.  I received a few questions from Steven Munatones and it was signed “open water enthusiast.”   Now I try to respond to everyone that has questions on my blog, because I feel we open water swimmers need to stick together and share as much information as possible.  I know that there were a ton of swimmers who helped (and continue to help me) me when I joined the community.  Per normal, I started answering Steven’s questions.  I tried to be as detailed as possible to give the full picture.  I went into the details around marathon swimming, the cold and how/why the body loses so much weight.  I also took time to check out Steven’s website, which I was already pretty familar with due to his listing of top 50 open water swims and the Ocean’s 7.  However, I didn’t see a whole lot about Steven’s open water history.  At the end of my response to Steven, I asked “What is your connection to open water swimming?” 

Steven responded very quickly and started to explain his open water history.  As he detailed the over 30 swims and his professional swimming career my brain decided to kick in…”Oh crud, you are that Steven Munatones.”  Just so you all know I went on to explain in detail open water marathon swimming to one of the great marathon swimmers (one that is inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame no less)!  Ah yes, my foot tasted wonderful.  Steve was a great sport and really an overall good guy.  I recommend checking out his site if you haven’t already www.10Kswimmer.com.  There is a ton of useful open water swimming information in there. 

I can’t thank my friend Courtney Remes enough about convincing me to do this blog.  It has introduced me to so many wonderful people around the world, even if I do make a complete arse of myself sometimes. 

Back to the training, so Friday I decided on a 3 hours swim.  Tim and I went back out to Hagg Lake which has warmed to 72 in the top 12 inches and about 66-68 in the bottom layer.  It was a comfortable swim.  Nothing to out of the ordinary until…the dark shadow appeared.  Tim and I were taking our normal bobbing break.  Ok I was breaking and Tim was humoring me when all of a sudden there was this huge shadow in the water coming right towards me.  I had visions of jaws running through my head.  Where to go?  What to do?  Then I remembered we were in fresh water.  It must be the Loch Ness monster relocating to warmer territory.  I quickly screamed and kicked and swam for broke.  I’m sure I would have beaten Gary Hall Jr.  As I started to dart away I got a good look at “Nessie”.  It was this huge monster of a salamander out enjoying the lake.  (Ok ok it was about 3 inches long and one of the cutest things once Tim grabbed it by the tail).  We spent some bonding time before we watched it swim off.  I began to get jealous of it’s tail as it swished and vanished into the murky waters.

Back to swimming again.  We were on the other side of the lake in our “pier to pier” swim.  (Side note: I misrepresented one of the names of the locations on the lake.  It is not Balthazar, the 3rd of the 3 wise men, but Balder which I don’t have time to google to explain).  Ok so we were over by Lincoln and there was this woman on the boat that kept waving at us.  Now I thought is was my good friend’s mom, Cary, but she was just waving and not saying anything.  I did the required safety check at this point.  Am I still swimming?  Yes.  Am I moving? Yes.  Is Tim still swimming and moving?  Yes.  Are we about to get run over by a boat? No.  Am I bleeding? No.  Is Tim bleeding? No.  Ok all systems are go, what is going on?  Finally Cary did say “Michelle” and with that I knew it was her.  We swam over and spent some time chatting.  It was really a nice little break even if we were treading water.  The rest of the swim was very uneventful if not warm.

Saturday Tim and I drove down to Nehalem Bay at the coast.  It was time to hit the salt water at least once before Manhattan.  I was just going to use this swim to stretch out and warm up.  1-2 hours tops.  As we walked down to the water and stuck our toes in we both realized it was back to the cold water.  Nehalem was running about 52-54 degrees.  Yowsah – that was cold after yesterday’s 72.  But swim we did.  Unfortunately the water was a little cloudy so I didn’t see nearly as many crab as I hoped.  Tim did see them doing their normal dance, which made me very happy.  1 hour 15 minutes later we climbed out of the water and drove over to the showers.  One great thing about Nehalem is there is a campground nearby where we can shower and gradually warm up after our swims. 

Those were the weekend swims.  Nothing too exciting.  Well except for Nessie. 

Monday I awoke with a pain in my right ear.  Not NOW!!!  I quickly scheduled an appointment with the Dr.  It is either swimmers ear or an ear infection neither of which have I had for years.  Oh well, we are treating both and hopefully it will be calmer before I hop on the plane Wednesday night.

Another thing I wanted to mention.  I think I may have to continue to do these crazy swims just to receive Dave Radcliff’s crazy packages.  He is so creative.  My kit included: a surgical mask to keep the water away from the mouth, surgical gloves with strainers attached to sift through anything in the water, Baby Ruth’s so I can study the difference between the good and the bad brown clumps, and a few other humorous items.  I don’t have photos at this time, but I’ll try to post.  It definitely broke some of the tension that I was experiencing last night. 

I believe that Jane will be contacting my Mom through out the swim and Mom will be updating the website.  So keep your eyes peeled.

I don’t usually do this, but I just couldn’t not share.  I’m so excited that this year’s Olympics are including the 10K open water swim.  It should be an event to watch.  You can think of it as roller derby in the water.  Check out the article.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120847591898524775.html?mod=todays_us_nonsub_weekendjournal 

Again it has been a while since I’ve updated my website and there has been a lot going on.  So here is a quick rundown.

You can see that there has been some updates on this blog and we are still under construction.  With the help of Synthetic Kit and my friend Courtney there are more features available.  I have had some friends complain that checking my blog every day to see if I was able to update (which usually isn’t the case) gets tiring.  One even went so far as to ask if my blog could notify him that I had made an update.  Well I wasn’t sure and I put the idea to Courtney.  Sure enough there was a way and now on the main page you can see that there is a subscription location.  So sign up with your email and you will be notified once I make an update.  Thank you Courtney!  Also we should all congratulate Courtney as she has just recently become engaged!!!!  Congratulations Courtney and Kevin!

And Then?

I forgot to tell you all that I had LASIK surgery in December.  Finally after 10 years of considering the procedure I decided to follow through.  I figured if I was still planning to do these long swims I had to eliminate one of my potential setbacks, my contacts.  I began to fear that I would lose a contact at the beginning of the swim and be blind for the rest of the swim.  I know that I could wear perscription goggles, but I just never went down that route.  Surprising thing is that when I finally talked with my eye doctor about wearing my contacts when I swam, he nearly freaked out.  Apparently this is not a good thing.  Oh well.  On December 21st, I went and had eye surgery.  Now 2.5 months later, things are great.  I can now see all the time with 20/20 vision.  I do have some mini wrinkles in my left eye which causes a fuzzy spot high in my vision zone.  I only really have a problem with it early in the morning and late in the evening.

And Then?

Thank you to everyone that has been asking about my mom and her treatment.  She is doing wonderful.  She has completed her radiation treatment and now is more on a monitoring plan.  True to her word, my mom will be around to make me miserable for a very long time   Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers.  As breast cancer continues to be prevalent in my family, just last month we had another diagnosis in the family.  For this reason, I will continue to swim for the University of Minnesota Cancer Center.

And Then?

Training has been going very well.  My shoulders are getting stronger and my swimming is getting faster.  For the time being I’m still doing some cross training with running and pilates.  I even signed up for another 5K on March 16th.  It is the Portland Shamrock run.  This will be my last run of the season and then I will be cutting out the running as cross training and begin swimming every day.  I will continue with pilates and strength training and PT for my shoulders. 

And Then?

Do you ever find that someone in your past has really touched your life in unexpected ways.  I have found that one of my swimming friends from college (who I haven’t seen since college) continues to be very present in my life.  At every practice in college Paula B would always have a smile and a kind word to push you through.  She always seemed genuinely excited to be at practice.  Now I was one of those swimmers that would delay getting into the water as long as I could.  I would even use the torture method of sliding ever so slowly in the water trying to keep my arms raised so the water didn’t hit my hands or face.  I figured once my hands and face were wet, there was no turning back.  But every day Paula would be so excited to get in the water.  Even now I can hear her saying “Hi guys!  How are you?  You ready to swim.”  However there is one phrase that always sticks in my mind.  “Last one Fast one.”  After a really hard set and we were finally looking at staring down the last 100, 200, 300, etc.  There was Paula beaming at the end of the lane “Last One Fast One Guys!!!”  It usually made me laugh, sometimes I just wanted to throw up thinking about “Last one Fast one”.  It turns out now I’m the one that says it in my lane.  Granted it is probably with a little more sarcasm than Paula ever showed but still there it is.

And Then?

At the beginning of February, I headed back to MN to introduce my sister at her induction into the College of St. Benedict Hall of Fame.  Of the 3 kids, I’m the least natural athlete.  My brother and sister could pick up any sport and excel.  My sister was being honored for being the most successful diver in the College of St. Benedict and I was so proud of her.  I thought no problem.  I’ll give a 3 minute speech giving some brief highlights of my sister’s career.  I even was so sure that right before I went up to speak, I looked at my sister and said “Oh your crying, I’m so not going to cry.”  I walked up to the microphone and not two sentences into the speech and I’m in uncontrollable tears.  Oh yes, full on tears where I can’t even get a word out.  I was so overwhelmed that Katie had asked me to introduce her and I began to think about all the times sitting and cheering her on knowing that I would never have her grace or composure.  She is magnificent and how can 3 minutes show that to the 100-200 people in the room.  Well crying for most of the speech probably didn’t help my cause.  I think Katie will seriously reconsider having me introduce her ever again.  I was just so proud.

And Then?

Out of the pool, I’ve been pounding the pavement and making phone calls trying to line up sponsors for my upcoming swims.  I want to ensure that I can cover the costs of my crew, registration fees, pilot fees, travel, accommodations, food etc.  Unfortunately, I can’t do that without the help of sponsors.  Things are moving slowly, but I’m getting a ton of positive responses from local businesses.  Hopefully once I line up sponsors, I will be able to focus more time on fundraising for breast cancer research.  I want to thank all those sponsors that have come on board and to those looking for an opportunity please feel free to contact me at mlmacy@hotmail.com.  To my friends and fellow swimmers, if you have any suggestions, please pass them along.

And Then?

No and then.

And THEN?

No and then.

And Then?

I think I’m all caught up.    

What a strange journey this continues to be! 

I just had a great dinner with Sybil Fisher, the first solo Oregon Channel swimmer.  She shared a 15 minute clip of her Channel swim and it showed just how challenging the race can be.  She spoke of the low points and suggestions to get through them.  She spoke of the pain and her ways of dealing with them.  She said that I have to be mentally prepared.  From my training, she says I’m right on track what needs to be in place is the mental attitude that I will not quit. 

After some rough months, I think I’m back mentally where I need to be.  I can do this.  I’ve definitely done the training.  And frankly I’m planning for a 14 hour swim, but if it takes me 2o then that is what it will take.  I’m committed to this.    I have the support from so many and I realize that while this is my personal journey there are a lot of people along for the ride buoying me along the way.

Joe Oakes and team successfully completed the Santa Barbara Channel Relay despite the cold temperatures at the start.  5 of the 6 relay teams finished the swim between 15-16 hours, including Joe’s team. 

Joe will now be preparing for his 4 swims in Ireland in September.

Also a good luck to Curtis, John and Martin as they prepare for their Alcatraz swim on August 4th.  Looking forward to hearing how it all goes. 

I’ve gotten a lot of questions about “What was that book that pushed you over the edge?” and “Have you seen…?”  I thought I would answer some of these questions.

Books (either read or on the reading list)

So reading about the Channel and open water swimming has become a major past time over this last year.  I take notes, mark passages, send things on to my crew, etc.  Here are some that I have found inspirational, interesting, and fun for the whole family!

• No Opportunity Wasted: 8 ways to Create a List for the Life You Want by Phil Keoghan
  • This is the book that I read that got me thinking “Why am I thinking about if only?  I can do this!”
• Swimming to Antartica by Lynne Cox
• Open Water Swimming: A Complete Guide for Distance Swimmers and Triathletes by Penny Lee Dean
• Wind, Waves and Sunburn: A Brief History of Marathon Swimming by Conrad Wennerberg
• Crossing: The Curious Story of the First Man to Swim the English Channel by Kathy Watson
• The Channel Swimming Association, Ltd. book 
• The Alcatraz Swimmer’s Manual by Joe Oakes
  • Yes this is the Joe Oakes that I trained with down in Nehalem.
• Dover Solo: Swimming the English Channel by Marcia Cleveland
• Haunts of the Black Masseur: The Swimmer as Hero by Charles Sprawson
• Swimming the Channel: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Healing by Sally Friedman
• Nothing Great is Easy: The Des Renford Story by Des Renford

Movies

• There is a recent film that came out from the UK called “On a Clear Day”  I saw this movie shortly after signing up for the Channel and prior to telling my family.  It was so inspirational, I cried.  Of course I now own a copy.

Somehow I believe I’m missing some books or movies so check back as I’m sure I will update this entry with more information.

Now I’m not one to regularly check my mail, as it usually consists of bills and junk.  And who really likes looking at bills and junk mail.  Not me!  I fully expected to find plenty of bills in my mail today as it is about that time.  Today brought many surprises though.  At first I quickly went through my letters.  Bill, junk, potential bill, more junk, and whoa what’s this a package from the Channel Swimming Association.  YEA!  Then just as quickly a key fell from the stack.  Hmm, what the heck I’ve never had a key in my mailbox before.  According to the instructions, it stated that I had a package and needed to use the key to retrieve it.  Most of the time the packages that I receive are from…well….me.  I know not very fun, but still fun for me to get.  I knew that I hadn’t sent (ok purchased) anything lately, so it wasn’t from me.  I was on the phone with my parents and they confirmed it wasn’t from them and there was no return address.  A mystery package that states This End Up, now I’m intrigued.

Once I finally made it back to my house I opened the CSA, Ltd package.  My swim caps with the CSA, Ltd logo had finally arrived.  A bright yellow and a bright orange.  I can now add these to my collection, as I’ve taken to posting my race caps on my wall.   I may even use one for the swim, but I’m leaning towards using my 100 mile Go The Distance cap in honor of the swimming I’ve been doing and to recognize the event.  Both caps will be tested before the actual swim…I’ll keep you updated on the selected uniform for the Channel.

Now the mystery package.  Since it did state This End Up, I decided shaking wasn’t a good plan.  I went in search of a scissors and slowly opened the box all the while thinking “Did I order something and not remember?”  I quickly found the card and ripped it open and glanced at the signature.  It was from one of my cousins.  I then skipped to the rest of the package and burst into laughter.  There was a photo of my cousins, Alyssa, Bill, David, Raegan, Andy and Jenny with huge grins and thumbs ups.    It makes me laugh every time I look at it.  This is just the stuff that I need and one of the reasons that I knew that it was right to come clean about my Channel attempt (again you were right I was wrong).  These mementos, quotes, emails, etc are the things that will buoy me (hopefully literally) during those tough training swims and in that long Channel attempt. 

Thank you to all the messages to date.  I read each and every one of them and have them filed in a special folder that I can quickly access anytime I start to need that pick me up.  You all have become a part of my attempt on the Channel.  I hope you are all prepared for the swim! 

Man people are really behind this swim.  The support has been overwhelming.  Now people are looking for t-shirts to show their support to everyone.  I would love to do t-shirts, but all t-shirts require a catchy slogan.   Get on your creative caps and think of slogans for my Channel swim.  If there is a stand out winner, t-shirts will be created for a small fee.