Today, I went to Zushi beach, one stop beyond the cherry blossom obsessed Japanese visiting the temples of Kamakura at the end of the Yokosuka line. Of course noone else is swimming today, Japanese only do things "in season" and the swimming season is July and August. The other reason noone else is swimming is because its really cold, but if you compare it to Gullane (Edinburgh) in August, the water temperature is still 3 degrees warmer already at the beginning of April!Its important to get some open water swimming practise in, mainly for psychological reasons as swimming through murky water out at sea is a world away from the safety of the heated indoor pool. Its the first test for the new Orca S2 wetsuit, I made the purchase a while back from Wiggle but have been waiting to convince some one its a good idea to go swimming in the sea at this time of year in order to test it out.
The person who didnt need to much convincing was Peter, who is also doing Miyakojima triathlon (in 2 weeks time!), and after that Ironman Japan near Nagasaki. So hes happy to test the open water, again more for the open water than for the swimming.
Of course it was cold at first, but its warmer than the air temperature so once you're swimming it really wasn't so bad. Lots of windsurfers around, and a few jet bikers so its important to stop once in a while to let them know there's 2 crazy Englishmen swimming in the sea.
The S2 westuit is great, so much bouyancy I felt like I was only half in the water. This should carry me at least half way around the course in 2 weeks, but at the same time the weight of the sleeves will be more tiring.
Gullane Triathlon, August - 13°C
Zushi beach, April 4th 16°C
Miyakojima, 18th 23°C
Olympic pool 25-28°C
Kona, Hawaii 26°C
Central Sports 25m pool 31°C
Restecp again, Andy. I think I will stick with the cycling. What do you have lined up for your last weekend before the "strongman"? You will be a 鉄人, but not yet a 鉄中年. (I read your Belgian friend's blog aswell -- 250 km!)
ReplyDeleteGambatte Andrew! But isn't the water really, really dirty?
ReplyDeleteIts quite murky water, didnt see any colourful fish or turtles, mostly this is due to the dark sand, so it will never look clear.
ReplyDeleteBut we did survive without any stomach problems, so in that sense its clean enough.