The first event on the WestCoast Swimrun calendar took me south of the border to Bellingham, Washington. As a full set of swimrun gear fits a small backpack, ranging farther and wider to enjoy a full race season isn’t a hardship (looking at you Triathlon). For this reason starting the season with an away game was exciting, not exhausting.
A cornerstone of Swimrun competition is the team event. Part safety and part strategy, top teams are candid about managing this layer of complexity by partnering based on compatible personalities as much as making a strong physical duo.
With years of “race winner buys loser ice cream” bets (and a lot of free ice cream for me) between us and the the promise of a “cool new sport to try,” my friend and fellow AG Team Canada vet Darcy Hinds was an ideal choice and he quickly took up to the challenge.
We spent Saturday night hacking up an old XTerra wetsuit and jury rigging our flotation as led by YouTube. Sunday alarms went off at 0600, borders were crossed, venues were arrived at on-time.
Lake Padden Park is scenic in traditional Pacific Northwest summer chic: tall evergreens, calm waters and sunshine. Racers assembled for a short briefing and were shot through the starting archway into the lake.
A word on equipment, of all the things we had (wetsuits, goggles, paddles, flotation) we had not considered the importance of a tether.
Swimrun teams are to stay with 10m from start to finish. Having been similar paces in previous seasons we’d assumed drafting without one would be manageable.
Team talk on the subject as the start gun fired was as follows - “I’ll be right on your feet! Go!!” So go I did. Charging across the lake keeping level with the lead pack, an adrenaline-fuelled revel in the condition I’d gained training for El Cruce Cancun a few weeks before. I hauled myself out of the water and up the rocky incline before turning to help my teammate.
...and saw no one...
The nearest swimmers were many meters out into the lake and none of them looked like Darcy.
Whoops.
There are no mistakes, only happy accidents, so I pulled out my camera and cheered people on as they climbed, scrambled and seal-flopped their way up the bank. Darcy arrived a short time later and we continued onto the trail.
Another equipment note. I and a handful of other competitors were wearing purpose-built swimrun wetsuits - swimrun suits feature a front zip and several other features to aid transition and prolonged running.
Darcy’s Modified rear-zip Xterra was not nearly so forgiving. After the struggle trying the first run with it only unzipped for all future runs it would be removed to the waist.
The trails ranged from wide gravel paths to flowing single tracks that took runners up into the woods, over every hilltop and dropping through every fern gully Race Director Brent could find for us. The steepest uphill sections were walked. It was not a day for Strava pride - vert isn’t real, we’re just out of shape.
There are elements of course preparation for a swimrun that all experienced competitors adhere to. We did none of them. I don’t recommend it. Being closer to an adventure race than a triathlon, having prior knowledge of where you are going is important to keeping your pace, course and composure. By the end of the race I had given up all pretence and was simply asking the awesomely accommodating course vollys about the upcoming segments. I want to tell you I learned from this and it never happened again, I really do.
The course slid by segment by segment. Lurching out of the water at the final swim exit we sprinted to the finish and, after nearly three hours on-course and having survived our first official swimrun, Darcy crossed the line first.
Again.