Supporting the Washington's Crossing Swim

People organize open water swims with a variety of goals: to raise money for a charitable cause, to give swimmers experience in distance swimming, and so on. While every swim is different, two goals common to every swim are to (1) not lose any swimmers, and (2) not chew anyone up with the propellers of a motor boat. That's where kayakers come in.

It's great to have power boats accompany packs of swimmers out on the water, but a power boat can safely get only so close to a swimmer before violating goal (2), while if the boaters stay at a safe distance they might wind up to far away to notice or help a swimmer in distress, tragically violating goal (1). Kayakers, on the other hand, can mix with the swimmers with little risk of injury. So, swim organizers always try to recruit "safety boat" kayakers to shepherd the swimmers along the route.

Those of us in Chesapeake Paddlers Association used to participate in a lot of swims (and I have a pile of event t-shirts to prove it) but we somehow got away from doing swim suppoert - events were to chaotic, or the kayakers were treated like step-children. I don't know - we just got out of the habit. I was surprised when I got a notice about a swim support from Sue, our club secretary. I didn't sign up immediately, but neither did I delete the email. In fact, it wasn't until Tall Tom mentioned that he was thinking of doing it and pointed out that this was actually a paid gig (usually swim support is a volunteer thing) that I signed up. In the end, Tom, Rob and I, along with another kayaker who occasionally shows up to our Thursday group, volunteered and, because we were the experienced kayakers, were assigned the farthest out area to patrol (there were other folks in kayaks handling the closer in zones, though I wouldn't exactly call them kayakers).

This event was being managed by a swimmer named Michelle, who Rob knew. In the past he had been her kayaker on some really long distance swims, where each swimmer is paired with a dedicated support kayaker. She did a really nice job of organizing and communicating, providing almost too much detail to fully digest ahead of the race! I mentioned patrol zones above - this is the first time I had ever been assigned a particular zone to patrol. She even had a map.

Patrol Zone Map

We arrived at National Harbor bright and early to be ready to launch around 7 AM. Our launch spot was an abandoned gravel ramp which was clogged with driftwood and other detritus. A little bit of a challenging launch, but not too bad. We "Zone 4" kayakers paddled out and wound up killing a bunch of time, as the race start ran late, in part because they had to hold off the start while they rescued someone who had fallen out of a kayak (did I mention that the people in the other zones weren't exactly skilled kayakers?). At one point I got tired of bobbing in place and started paddling laps around the little launch bay area, inadvertently causing consternation on shore. I heard them on the marine VHF radio saying "Is that guy one of ours who's lost? Or just some random kayaker paddling through?" Neither, sir. I was one of yours, but I wasn't lost. Just restless because of your dawdling.

Launching - the little beach was gone when we came back (higher tide)

Anyway, once the swimmers got under way it was a pretty easy swim support. Triathletes are typically great runners and cyclists but relatively poor swimmers, so supporting a triathlon involves a lot of active support - people want to rest holding onto your kayak, or they're in distress, or they're lost. The participants in this event, in contrast, were swimmers in an open water swim training program and were really proficient. Through the whole event no one was in distress or too tired to continue. They did, however get lost. 

Kayakers with our "rescue tubes"

Swimmers

I guess it's really hard to see where you're going from water level, or even to see the brightly colored eight foot tall markers. I also guess that not everyone understands compensating for current, because swimmers went every which way, particularly as they came around the turnaround point at the Virginia side of the river. So, most of my work was in chasing down swimmers who were heading off in random directions - north to the Wilson Bridge, south to the sea - and getting them pointed back in the right direction. I wound up escorting in the very last swimmer to finish. He was trying, frequently stopping to sight where he should be going, but as soon as he'd resume swimming he'd veer way off course to the left - I think the current was spinning him to the left. So I just paddled alongside him and whenever he'd pause to look around I would redirect him. As we got close to the finish other kayakers joined us (since there was no one else left on the water for them to track) and the group got a good cheer from shore when he finally made it to the finish.

Collecting the course markers at the end of the event

After the race Rob, Tall Tom, and I helped Michelle pack up and load her stuff into her car, then I headed home. I got home just in time for a shower and a short nap before heading back to Maryland with Valerie for a backyard concert/jam session/party.

Later that afternoon, jammin' with Bobby and company ...

The three of us had a good experience and we mutually agreed that we'd like to support more of this organization's swims. So, perhaps more swim support reports to come?