My experience at the event:
After swimming almost 2km in the ocean in the 70.3 Iron Man in Durban few weeks back, I decided that swimming after all is not too bad. Yes, I'm still terrible at it, but after 4 months of once a week private training lessons, I feel like I discovered yet another sport that I can do.
With the Midmar Mile (a classic over here) coming in few months time, I decided to take part in one of the qualification rounds, taking part in the 800m distance within the beautiful Heia Safari Ranch, rebranded "
Hero Adventure Park" some months back.
In a cold (the day before we had a massive storm) Sunday morning, Curtis came with to support me during the race. Luckily the start was quite late (10.20) so I had time to relax and getting ready for it. Once in the water I decided that I would simply focus on technique and breathing and not worry about the time. I forgot unfortunately to focus on the buoys (which I struggled to see with a color too similar to the surroundings) and after a great, straight, 200 meters, I got a bit lost on the second and third buoy.
At the end I came out of the water in 26 minutes, having swam a full kilometer instead of the 800 meters I was supposed to do. But I wasn't last for a change, and I wasn't even that tired!
Details of the race here:
http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/620571580 Some pictures:
Relaxed before the start
The 3km swimmers after the second lap
Out of the water! A new category for my medal collection
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