Day 351 - Thursday 6th October 2011

Whilst the wind was raging in the night it seemed to be a lot calmer this morning; not gone, just calmer.  

In view of the possible crazy sea conditions the arch was alive with testosterone.  About 30% busier than usual and boasts of “I’ll swim around the pier, I’ll dive of the steps, I am the greatest etc etc.  Now last year I would have just gone along and dived in and braved it out, but this year I have a more cautious side to me; not always it has to be said, but certainly sometimes.  The thing is that when you are in a dangerous sport such as sea swimming your ability changes from day to day dependent on you; be it your physical state, your health, whether you’re tired or not, stressed or not.  You really must listen to how you are feeling on the day; this is something I didn’t do last year and I found myself frequently in positions of fairly extreme danger and wondering how the hell I was going to get out of it.  So this year I have been listening more to how I am on the day and then swimming according to that.  This morning for example as the testosterone was building in the arch the challenges being laid down I calmly put on my goggles and hat and swam the other way!  Big Bob and I left the “men” to swim around the pier and we once again headed West against the tide, but not too far out, just a few metres out from the end of the donut groin.

The sea was full of swells and some of the waves were seriously big, real bondi beach surf waves.  Getting in and getting out was a matter of timing and making sure you never turned your back on a wave.  A few times when we were heading in we had to turn around and dive back through a wave and go out again; the only safe option.  When we were back on terra firma we watched Shoichi coming out.  He swam into shallower waters where he could stand and with a big smile on his face casually strolled in.  Bob and I were pointing and shouting and at the last minute he realised what we were doing and turned to see a wave about four times higher than him bearing over and blocking out all his sunlight.  Quick as a fish he span and dived through it.  Coming in safely to shore a few seconds later, still with a big smile on his face, it was again a lesson; never turn your back on the sea!!