The Tears .... Have Started

I always knew there would be tears involved with channel training, just didn't expect them so soon or for the reason they occurred.

Sunday was not a miserable day in Dover but not exactly the nicest day either. Cloudy, howling cold winds and some adhoc wave motions. But on the plus side it wasn't raining and Freda was feeling particularly nice by giving us only a 1 hr swim to start with. 1 hour done with the only problem a claw in each hand by the end - out to shake & rattle for 1.5 hours before going in again. Only an hour again - woo hoo.

As with all second swims it's easier than the first - you're still a little cold and the initial temperature adjustment isn't as much. I was powering along through the waves with one lap down and only 23 mins or a short lap to go when 'bang' something fair and square hit me in the forehead. I popped up to find it was another swimmer who had been on the other side of a wave and I hadn't seen him, nor him me. There was no arm contact just one large flying head butt at each other. Now this man was 6ft something and a rather large steam train to have a head on collision with. I was shocked, dizzy and with an immediate headache the tears started to well in my goggles. We exchanged the are you ok's 'yes' - 'yes' - right crack on and keep swimming. The thing that startled me most is we had 1km in length and about 100m in width to play in yet we managed to smash head first into each other.... How???

As I swam past the swimmers beach with my tears filling my goggles I thought to myself I could just hop out now it would be ok as I had a sore head ..... On second thoughts - No!! .... I want to be a channel swimmer and hopping out early won't get me to France - a quick 'man up princess' was administered by the logical side of my brain and on I swam for the remaining 20 mins the tears still filling my goggles.

Usually the tears will come from being frozen and sat on the swimmers beach at the shore begging the beach crew to let you out. I didn't expect them from a head clash.... They had to start sooner or later and I'm sure there'll be more.