Toyota 1 Mile Bay Challenge

TOYOTA 1 MILE BAY CHALLENGE

Time: 36:46
Overall finish: 145/300
Gender finish: 67/192
AG finish: 10/17


I had spent the night at a friend's house before the race, and I didn't sleep well. I woke up often, worrying about oversleeping and worrying about the race itself.



James and I left Baltimore at around 7:15 a.m. to head to the bay bridge. The 1 miler is the 'lesser' event to the Chesapeake Bay Swim - a 4.4 mile swim from shore to shore. We got there without incident (or, thank god, traffic), and I checked in, got my cap and chip, and waited for my wave to start. The waves were arranged weirdly -- by the order of sign up, and not by predicted time. Although I signed up several months ago, I was in the last wave. Each wave was 10 minutes apart, and after waiting for the three previous waves to start, I zipped up my wetsuit and headed to the water.
The water was what I like to call comfortably-cool -- not freezing, but cool enough to wake you up. We waded into the water (the entire mile was in a part of the Bay on a shelf -- you could stand in any area) and got ready for the gun to go off. And... we're off! It was the typical kicking and pulling frenzy --- grabbing someone's leg, getting hit on the arm, etc. I had trouble with sighting in this race -- something I haven't had a problem with in previous open water swims. The finish was awful -- the shore looked like it was receding ... every time I felt that I was close, I'd look up and see that I had a while to go.

I finished in a dissapointing 36:46, a full 5 minutes slower than my one mile swim at Reston. I grabbed some water and my tshirt, changed out of my swim suit and wetsuit, and headed home.

The whole experience was just 'eh,' which kind of sucks. I didn't feel that great in the water, I had trouble sighting the buoys, and my time was dissapointing. Oh well, they can't all be winners.