Previous races - Ironman Lanzarote part 2 - the swim

 Ironman Lanzarote part 2 - the swim

Pre-race pizza on the Friday night. Nerve-settling beer I’d sworn that I wouldn’t have on the Friday evening, along with another pirate who’d come to the same conclusion. Alarm set for 5:30. This was happening.

I’ve done the setup-in-the-dark for an iron race before, so that bit wasn’t too unusual. I decided against topping my tyres off in the morning - with the heat, I really didn’t want anything to go bang while I was swimming. Nutrition box and bottles onto the bike. Then it was wetsuit on, and head down to the start.

The swim start at Lanzarote is famous - as far as I am aware, its the last of the Ironman races that does a mass swim start. You pick your spot in the crowd according to your expected swim finish time - I headed to the back - and when the hooter goes, that’s it, we’re all off together. I’m sure its great to watch - it was the usual spin drier when you were in it, even from my position behind everyone else.

OK, head down, follow the marks. Sighting was easy, as there was a chain of small buoys between the major marks to follow. The waves actually weren’t as bad as I had thought - my concern was that I only breathe one side in front crawl, as I’d never learnt bilateral breathing. However, once out in the open sea, the waves just lifted you up and down, and unless you got an unlucky gust blowing the water off the top of the wave breathing wasn’t too bad. The salt water stung everywhere, though - and with my famous drink-my-way-around swimming style, I do remember thinking that at least I won’t pass out later on the bike due to lack of salt.

The Lanzarote swim is a two-lap course with what triathletes call an Australian exit -up onto the beach, round the little fence and over the timing mat, try and avoid getting stung by spiders and back into the water again. At the end of my first lap of two, I was just coming towards the beach when something shot over me - it was the front swimmer in the pack, completing his second lap, with a load just behind him. I got rapidly out of the way to one side of the course before I got drowned, as these folks were stopping for nothing. Up onto the beach, the event clock said 50 minutes, which I was delighted with for one lap after my Thursday experience. I still don’t know how anyone can complete that whole two lap course in 50 minutes, though. Must have had a better wetsuit. Or something.

Back out again, on the long outward leg of the rectangle, things seemed to be going slower, and I was getting worried again - it was taking an age to get from one guide buoy to the next. I discovered later that the tide in the bay was much stronger at 9am that morning than it was at 8am, and was pushing back against us slower swimmers. Finally round the end, past the kids aquapark, and back along parallel to the coast - which was, of course, too far into shore to get any reverse benefit from that tide. Back round the final mark, this time with no-one swimming over me - the fast kids were halfway round the bike course by now - and out of the water. The clock said 1:50. That’ll do. Massive cheers from the pirate bunch who were waiting for me to finally get the swim finished before they could start their day’s drinking.