The Observer Newspapers | Lurching Through a Reston Lake Swim

May 19 , 2008

Lurching Through a Reston Lake Swim

To the editor:

I'm not a fast swimmer. And my technique is so bad that schwimmermeister Sara Thorpe, in a recent swim clinic in Washington, D.C., placed me in the "penalty box" for 30 minutes to swim doggy-paddle style, in a futile bid to straighten my crab-like stroke.

So, faced Sunday with my first-ever three miles of open water—a one-mile race followed by a two-miler at Lake Audubon in Reston known as the Lake McDonnell competition—I was rather nervous.

I employed some desperate stratagems to get through the thing. Swimming 5,175 yards burns thousands of calories, so one should, marathon-like, indulge in a pre-race pasta feast. However, the previous day's schedule had prevented a proper last meal. So I slurped on cold spaghetti and eggs on the drive out past the aptly named Mixing Bowl, my Beltway expanding with each bite. Once at the lake, I downed enough honey to sate Smokey the Bear, and enough water to trigger hyponatremia.

On hitting the rather frigid water, my body was shocked into the realization it actually had to swim an absurd distance. Panicking, I hyperventilated, and for 300 yards was unable to swim bilaterally, but was stuck breathing only on the left side. Then the opposite reaction set in.

The bloodstreams of fatally wounded animals release opiate-like chemicals that trigger feelings of euphoria. Thus, for 1,000 yards I swam in ecstasy, alternating crawl with backstroke to save my pipe-thin arms, savoring the view of the cloudless sky, then turning over again, rotating from the core as Sara Thorpedo had instructed.

The last 325 yards were like a typical easy mile workout: the arms grew number than teeth shot through with a gallon of Novacaine, but nothing especially harrowing.

Preening with the one-miler done, I walked up from the water's edge to the results board—but was soon deflated: like those of the other slackers, my results hadn't been posted yet.

After a start of more deceptive ecstasy, the two-miler settled into a painful grind. The hands and forearms again grew numb. Instead of providing relief, backstroking now only brought seasickness. The eye in the sky scorched down on the previous day's sunburn. Weariness wrecked my form: I reverted to my crabbed technique and, in delirum, spied Sara Thorpedo in a kayak, demanding I do the doggy paddle.

My lower intestines screamed from all the water I'd ingested, but the tight Neoprene forbade open-water relief. (A resulting swollen bladder did have the salutary effect of greater buoyancy.)

For once my goggles were fog-free, however, which provided a saving grace. A swimmer had stopped before me, unable to sight the next buoy. I pointed it out and, turnabout being fair play, drafted behind her, saving much energy. Occasionally, through the kicked-up foam, my fingers would tickle her heels—post-race video clearly revealed one swimmer grinning and guffawing with each breach for air.

Now in the home stretch, we picked up the pace, but not that much. Turning to backstroke one last time, I eyed a dozen blue-headed barracuda aiming straight for us. But the swimmers from the elite wave soon surged ahead, lapping us.

I got back onto my belly, and back into the draft. With a hundred yards to go my partner mysteriously veered right. Air bubbles blocking the view, I smacked into the giant metal drain at the lake's edge.

Moments later, I staggered ashore, metal-bruised, sunburned, in a zombie-like state, impatient officials ripping off my swim cap like scalping Apaches.

After some minutes of repose, I slept-walked over to the board.

But my results hadn't been posted yet.

Ed Moser

Alexandria

Editor's note: Mr. Moser is a former writer for Jay Leno's "The Tonight Show" and wrote this report on his experience in last Sunday's one- and two-mile lake swims in Reston.