For an entire year, my training sessions in Aquatic Park have been the same: swim laps around the cove (~1 mile), or swim laps along the line of buoys close to shore (800m round trip). It’s not as bad as swimming aimlessly along a black line in a pool, but after an hour or so without a pace clock, coach, team mates, or sets, it still starts to get a little mind-numbing.

On Wednesday, fellow Dolphin Mike Chase introduced me to a new concept: get over keeping an exact mental record of distance when you swim in the Cove, and turn it into a playground! The Cove is comprised of all kinds of markers, obstacles, and possibilities. Strap on a watch to keep track of time (seriously, this gets to be so fun you might over-swim and be late to work!), take advantage of the currents, and go play!

Both Wednesday morning and Thursday morning, I met up with Mike and set off in all kinds of crazy zig-zag paths across the Cove.

“Okay, here’s the plan,” Mike said as we treaded water around the Oprah Buoy that helps anchor the Thayer, a black and red ship near the South End Club’s pier. “Flag, Appleton Hall, Opening, Goal Posts, BBB, Flag, Oprah.”

“Huh?” I said, losing track around “Opening.”

“Don’t worry, just keep up with me!” (Added bonus to swimming with Mike – he’s fast. So when he turns it on, I’m obliged to kick it up a few notches myself. Excellent!)

We fought the currents going one way, and rode them in the other direction. We raced to the green boat in the middle of one of the Cove walls, trying not to get swept into it (Appleton Hall). We visited the Bay proper, trying to discern the Golden Gate Bridge through the shrouding mists (Opening). We darted like fish in and out of the large, wooden poles sticking out of the water on one far edge of the Cove (Goal Posts). We swam under part of one of the sea walls to reach the BBB. We dodged boats as we raced back to the flag, and cruised on back to the Oprah buoy.

I’m a convert. Mike wasn’t around this morning – instead, he was off with 6 other Dolphins to do a 100 mile, 2 day relay swim down the Sacramento River to raise money to protect the San Francisco Bay (you can track their progress here.) I made up my own crazy path of shapes and zig-zags, and didn’t want to get out!

Meet Bill Bradley, a gregarious, 40-something new member of the Dolphin Club who has a huge grin on his face at all times.

Even when his body is shaking with early-stage hypothermia after a 6 hour swim in the 60 degree waters of Aquatic Park.

For the second time in 6 days.

Bill is no stranger to physical anguish.  In fact, looking over his history (and his motto, the title of this post) you might start to question his sanity.  He started running marathons and competing in Ironmans in 1996.  Okay, both are pretty tough, but no biggie.  Lots of people do that sort of thing.  Start talking 100 mile ultramarathons and 500 mile bike races rent with hallucinations from sheer fatigue, though, and the population of willing participants drops off pretty quick.  Now move those ultramarathons to Alaska (towing a 40 pound sled) and Death Valley (where people run on the white lines in the road so their shoes don’t melt), and -

- You have GOT to be KIDDING me!!  (<– My reaction to discovering that people actually do this sort of thing).

PS.  He’s also done triple Ironmans (as in 3 times the distances of normal Ironmans).  Yeah.

Bill isn’t the fastest swimmer.  He hasn’t been swimming in cold water for the past year.  Or even the past 3 months.   But he says he wants to swim the English Channel, and dog-gone it, he’s gonna do it.  Whatever it takes. And with the way he’s attacking the Bay, my money’s on him to succeed.

Bill and I are on the same neap tide (September 24 through October 3), and we are both Position 2 with different pilots (so we’re likely to swim on the same day).  If you have a sec, take a look at his website and give him a shout-out – he’s a real swell guy!

Today was one of those rare days in San Francisco that was undeniably gorgeous. The sun was out in a perfectly blue sky. The air was warm, and there was zero wind. The water was flat and glassy, and best of all, warm!

Normally, when I roll into the Dolphin Club after morning workout in San Mateo, the sky is misty and grey, the air cold, the water colder. I’m always tired from the 8-10 grand I just finished in the pool, and exposing my body to the dreary cold is the last thing in the world I feel like doing.

Today, I was still pretty exhausted from practice, but it was so nice out that I couldn’t wait to get in! I swam hard, feeling fast and strong, for 2 miles, at which point my triceps rebelled. I seriously felt as though my arms were burning! Part of me wanted to stop, but the part that was revelling in the virtually never-before-seen conditions refused to get out. I got an additional 2 miles in before a little thing called “work” necessitated my aquatic exit.

If only it could be like this the day of my Channel swim!

My morning swims in Aquatic Park go a little something like this:

I wake up at 5 or 5:30 in the morning, usually after having gotten to bed around midnight (I know, Dad, I need to work on that…) I grab a pack of Chomps and an Espresso Love GU (because it has 2x the caffeine and falling asleep on the freeway isn’t so good) and blearily head north to the Dolphin Club. Sometimes I then pass out in my car for about 10 minutes in the parking lot before hauling my overly stuffed swim backpack up the DC stairs to the locker room. After a good 20 minutes of putting on caps, stuffing in earplugs, readjusting caps, rinsing out goggles, hanging my towel and clothes in the sauna, and other such manners of stalling, I finally run through the stabbing cold air to the even colder water and start Round One of the day’s training.

Now, as you can imagine from my descriptions til now, my mind isn’t particularly sharp at this hour. Coming up with interesting routes around the Cove is too much of an effort in the morning, and I’d be likely to run into an anchored boat or something. So I just go up and down along the buoys for a little over an hour, using all of my early morning mental capacity to avoid running into other people. Normally, I do a pretty good job of this.

Okay. So here I am at 6:30am, dodging other swimmers even though the rising sun is in my eyes, when all of a sudden, BAM! I plow into something firm but soft and mammalian. I pop my head up, apologizing profusely, thinking I just killed a fellow swimmer. Imagine the increased confusion of my already hazy brain when this swimmer I just hit licked me!  It finally clicked that it wasn’t a swimmer I’d hit, but a big, friendly, yellow lab.  The dog belonged to a member of the South End Club, and he was out with his master for a morning dip.

All I can say is, that is one studly dog.  The water is still hovering around 51-52 degrees.  Talk about man’s best friend!

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This week marked the first of my long training swims, which in a way is kind of funny: 2 hours is going to seem like child’s play come August! Still, the water is a heck of a lot colder now than it will be in 4 months, and seeing as how all week it was 52 degrees or below, I was understandably nervous. Thankfully, San Francisco Bay decided to have pity on me and warmed up a whole 2 degrees! Yay!

Luckily, it was a beautiful, sunny day, and I loved getting to swim out of the cove and explore the Bay a little. My pilots timed it so I got to ride the flood current back to the Dolphin Club, so I felt like I was flying! Which is always nice when your hands are paralyzed in a funky sort of claw, and you would otherwise believe they couldn’t pull you anywhere. (That’s from the cold, by the way…normally my hands are quite nice actually).

I was colder by the end than I’ve ever been in my life while swimming, but hey, that was also longer than I’ve ever been in water so cold.  2 hours: check!

Next for May: 3 hours in a few weeks and 4 hours at the end of the month. Stay tuned!