COOWS race for the environment by completing the Blue Mile on Saturday 3rd July 2010.
Saturday was the big day for the COOWS - glorious sunshine greeted us at the crack of sparrows when we arrived, letting the pre-race nerves sink in and checking out the course before our 7:30am briefing. We then suited up, ready to go - and hit the water for our floating start. The water was the perfect temperature at 14.7 degrees - not too hot, not too cold - just like baby bear's porridge! Then we were off and racing after a prompt toot of the fog horn at 9am. There were over 140 swimmers taking part in the event over three waves - there were just over 50 in ours.
During the race we faced some choppy wash from the boats leaving/entering the harbour; difficulty sighting the marker buoys because of the glaring sunshine; a few competitors flailing arms and legs catching blows to our bodies; saltwater wetsuit combo burns; severe cramping; slight sunburn - just the sacrifice true athletes pay for the love of their sport and the thrill of the race!!
So we each completed our Blue Mile, with Cat coming in 8th in our wave, Zoe 16th and Sarah 20th; Cat was 59th overall, Zoe 80th and Sarah 91st. Not too bad for our first event - more training now for the Great Swim series! We were even interveiwed for the local press:
You can see more about the event here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/10499518.stm and more updates will be posted here over the next few days: http://www.thebluemile.org/index.html
A huge thanks to all those who have supported us thus far, and especially to everyone who sponsored us with much needed funds towards the important work that WWF do to conserve and protect our beautiful marine environment that we all love to play in. Especially to Orca for providing us with Project Kaisei wetsuits (they were super!) for our swim series.
Donations will be accepted for a few weeks yet, so if anyone would like to sponsor us, even though we have now completed the race, contributions will still be most gratefully received and will help us reach our target of £250.
Watch this space for more news and training anecdotes for the lead up to the Great Swim series!!
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