The Breakthrough...

Manly Beach...and those waves!

After the harbour incident last week, I was incredibly reluctant to go back into the ocean.  Actually, reluctant is the wrong word - more like utterly averse to the idea of ever swimming in the sea ever again.  But I knew that if I didn't persevere, if I stopped turning up to Saturday training just once, it would be a slippery slope that would lead to quitting completely.  And frankly after ruminating over what Annie and other people told me after last Saturday's debacle, I was determined to give ocean swimming at least one more go before I quit all together.

The one thing that helped me get to surf training today was the fact that I had a catering function in the afternoon at North Curl Curl.  All the planning, prepping and cooking leading up to Saturday helped distract me from thinking about the upcoming surf session. I also needed to be incredibly organised - ensuring that I packed the car and left the house early so I can drop off all my stuff and still get to Manly Beach in time.  What's more, I wanted to get to training early, as I felt if I could get into the water before anybody else and get used to the cold temperature, it would go a long way in not taking my breath away when I first started swimming.

All went to plan and I dropped off my catering gear and the food and got to Manly in time for a quick early dip.  God. it was cold!  I do hope that it actually does get warmer sometime soon.  The Coaches have promised us it will, but it has yet to happen.  The dip and the cold gave me something else to think about instead of the impending swim session.  For once, Manly Beach had low surf, and I was worried that for the first time, I would have to swim out from Manly instead of Shelley Beach - this meant facing waves, and waves are NOT my friend. 

And I was right - we WERE swimming out of Manly Beach - a longish circuit around three of the surf boats that were positioned what I felt was a ridiculously far distance from shore, and then back into the beach, with waves of course.  I so did not want to do it.  I wanted to be sick.  I felt the tears coming.  I made myself stop and told myself to not be a sissy.  I angrily wiped my eyes and said to everyone that I had my quota of tears for this swim session and I wasn't allowed to cry anymore.

If not for my support crew of Jenny, Kath, Katy, Sarah and Simon (competitive ocean swimmer extraordinaire, who was there as promised by Annie), I simply would not have even contemplated going.  And it was HARD GOING.  I plunged in, and wanted to quit 5 strokes in.  They all yelled at me to keep going.  I didn't want to put my head into the water - it was too cold and too deep and too scary.  They all yelled at me to keep going.  I stopped and started, stopped and started by the surf skis - they all treaded water with me and encouraged me to keep going.  I told them to just swim away, to just do their own swim and leave me be, and they all refused.  I started screaming as the waves broke over my head as I headed back to shore - they all screamed at me to turn around and look at waves to see what was coming and I screamed back that I was too scared to look.  I just wanted the waves to stop.  Naturally, the only way it would stop was for me to keep swimming. 

I made it to shore after that first circuit and promptly burst into tears.  Of course, Jenny had to remind me about my promise to not cry anymore.  Coach Jon told me I could rest for a few minutes and then plunge back in for a second circuit.  And funnily enough, and I still don't know why, I didn't take up his offer to rest and promptly went back in.  And amazingly, it actually felt better the second time around.  I managed to keep my head down for at least 20 strokes.  I still screamed as the waves buffeted me as I swam around the surf skis, but not as much as I did the first time around.  The waves still did me in though - I was just so mind-numbingly terrified, I simply couldn't do what everyone else was doing which was look over their shoulder while swimming to watch the waves come in.  I just wanted to be out of there as fast as I could, without drowning.

I knew I couldn't make the third circuit around - I was too emotionally drained to do it.  I was spent.  And then Simon stepped in and offered to teach me about waves and just what to do with them.  The reality was that I was afraid of waves and surf because I didn't understand them - I didn't grow up with surf beaches.  Philippine beaches are very flat and very warm, so Australian beaches were an alien environment to me.

And this was it - this was my first ocean swim breakthrough.  For the next 20 or so minutes, I learned:

• That you meet a wave side on, not front on.  Makes sense when you experience it first hand!
• Just when you actually duck dive, and that's early into a wave, before it starts breaking. 
• It's a lot calmer at the bottom of a wave than above it.  And if you duck dive properly, you just pop up like a cork at the other end.
• You get dumped if you get caught in a wave while it's breaking, so best to try and avoid that!
• That a rip forms funny ripples in the sea, and that rips can be your friend depending on which direction you're swimming.
• Looking at a wave over your shoulder while you're swimming into shore allows you to see what's happening and helps you decide whether you should swim over a wave or under it.
• And it's actually really fun to body surf!

By the end of that little one-on-one session with Simon, I was actually smiling, and said the words that I thought I would never say: "I really enjoyed that!".  I think I probably surprised Coach Jon and Simon too.  Heck, I surprised myself. 

I still don't know if I can make it on race day - the thought of doing the actual swim still doesn't fail to make me want to vomit - but if I can keep on taking the baby steps that I've managed to make today, then I might, I just might make it!  I just might...