Grecian swimming and another win for the smugglers

Well a very enjoyable week of swimming in the warm Mediterranean waters. Almost 50km was achieved in a very pleasant fashion. Swimming through warm (20 degrees), calm, clear blue sea water, good for the mileage but in terms of similarities to swimming the English Channel probably only the salt content was much the same. I think the locals thought I was pretty mad, one day I swam most of the length of the island to join the family for lunch (8km) and then afterwards swam back again. The waiter who served us was interested to hear what I was doing that day, he said "I don't think anyone's ever done that", I got the distinct impression he was thinking no one would want to swim up and down the length of the island when there was perfectly good roads to drive on.

So recap for May - 192.5km, won the Lido sprint, swam in Dover Harbour and froze my bol*&cks. Plan for June - swim in Champion of Champions race in Dover Harbour, 1500m pool race and otherwise lots more swimming, see if I can top 200km for the month and 85kg!

I had the pleasure of a lake swim on Thursday evening, a 1.9km (approx) race in Herefordshire. Out came the pink Budgys. Not a particularly big field (about 40 swimmers), good to see 3 others who weren't wearing wetsuits (one of them being Dave Granger another channel aspirant). The water temp was surprisingly warm (low 20s) but the visibility (none) was more reminiscent of Dover Harbour. I shot off at the start and found I had opened a comfortable lead by the first buoy - the benefits of all this fitness is knowing that your are not going to struggle on the 2nd lap of a 1.9km swim. I finished 2.5 minutes ahead of the nearest wetsuit. I was slightly put out by the 2nd placed swimmer who claimed he lost my feet because I swam off course towards the first buoy, the fact that he was over 2 minutes slower than me seemed to have been lost on him.

We had another good training session yesterday morning at the Lido. I say "we" although "we" has grown from 4 swimmers to about 15. Apart from Dave and myself the rest are triathletes (and therefore wetsuited). I started off a month ago doing my own thing, fitting in a 4km session in an hour. Gradually it got modified to allow for other swimmers who tagged on the back and now it has become a regular feature with more and more people joining the session at the back of the lane. Somehow I have become session creator and lane leader. As long as they understand it's my lane, my session and my way or the highway I don't think there will be a problem.