It still feels a bit surreal – but I did the swim!
On the day, I was feeling pretty calm, we got there all together and the girls waited for me.
The walk to the pier was quite interesting – everybody was very quiet – there were 5000 swimmers doing it on the day!
There were also about 30,000 spectators, so it was quite a big event. At the same time – it seemed really peaceful and because it was all around health, there was no alcohol in sight and only one security guard for the whole event!
Anyway, when I got to the pier, I caught up with Graham who is in the swim squad with Oscar and that really helped. He was in the prior wave to me – his start was at 12.45 and mine was at 12.55. We had a little chat – he was thinking of staying with the main pack and going that way – I was thinking of going as wide as possible to get the waves to help me swim in.
Graham’s a much stronger swimmer though and being a triathlete has far more experience in open water swims – so he was pretty confident about his path and I think that helped me too.
The weather was perfect, about 25 degrees, overcast and virtually no wind. There was a gentle swell coming through the waves which was fine to handle.
I remember getting out there in the water and the main thing that I could do better next time is check my direction more often – it seemed to me that I was swimming in the wrong direction for most of the race 🙂
Surprisingly I felt quite ok with not seeing the ground – I was mainly focused on getting to the finish line of the race 🙂 and staying on the surface 🙂 – so it was fine.
All in all, I completed the race in 26.56, and while its not quite 20 minutes that I was hoping for – it was an OK time for my first ever Pier to Pub race – so I was really happy and proud of myself for doing it!
Now on to getting stronger and developing a better technique in the water!