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I'm doing the Craggy Tri in Oban in 2 weeks.
My biking and running are fine but...
The swim is 500m open water in the sea.
I've only swum in a wetsuit once. I haven't ever swum in the sea.
Will I die? I'll be doing breast stroke as well...
Yes, you will die. And with some considerable discomfort!!
Not from the Triathlon mind, but from the Midge. They have been mental at times this year.
I'm guessing your from Rugby, there has to be some open water venues down that way. Tri clubs too, still some time to get a couple of open water swims in.
I don't reckon the midges will be a problem. I go to Oban every week and they've never bothered me there, and Kerrera should get more of a breeze than the town does, and it's close to midday, so not their preferred time of day.
It'll be the triathlon that kills you.
From Rugby? Swim across Draycote Water... That'll learn ya.. 😀
No you will have fun.
The wetsuit makes swim easier - a lot! But try and get some OW practice. Go to tritalk.co.uk to see sticky of OW swim venues. Far worse than midges will be wetsuit rash if you haven't practised lubing yourself. Lots of vaseline (ignore the rots your wetsuit scare stories) around neck, arms and legs and try to practised getting it off. One small tip. Put your arms and legs in a plastic carrier bag when putting wetsuit in. It makes it so easy.
Enjoy it and dont panic in the swim.
Basically your doomed whatever happens...
enjoy
Deadly serious, (pun intended) I believe that there actually is an alarmingly high death rate for triathletes. Google it.
Enjoy the tri!
Expect a few punches and kicks whilst you're swimming!
You'll be fine, but tri (get it...) to get out in open water if you can before hand. The wet suits are surprisingly warm, even without a wee inside and you are quite bouyant which is good if you need a little rest. As someone above says, the swim is generally a bit manic at the start, expect to get whacked, kicked, punched and slapped! Have fun!
500m is only 10 or 11 minutes or so swum breaststroke hard in a wetsuit (obviously dependent on wind, tides, your fitness etc. it could be a bit longer but it isn't going to be more than 15-20 minutes surely). Personally I wouldn't be worrying too much about wetsuit rash or anything, just about being able to get the darned thing off afterwards.
The best advice for sea swimming, is go where you want to go, don't piss around zig zagging and swimming further than you need to go. To do this you need to sight - before you get in, look for the buoy (assuming you're swimming round a course with buoys) and if possible spot something tall on the horizon directly behind it, swimming directly towards that will get you close enough to the buoy in case you can't actually sight off that (sometimes if the waves are high you can't see it at all). Swimming breaststroke you can sight every stroke which makes this really easy.
Oh and if you're going through waves swimming breaststroke, try and time your stroke so that when your head goes down, it goes under the wave and it comes up out the other side. Saves you getting a face full of sal****er, and is supposedly faster too.
Can you swim 500m in a pool?
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this is what happens when you get tired and Search and Rescue come for you!