Reflections on the Channel

Putting in a Good Word with the Weather Gods

With my bags packed and ready to go, the day before I was set to leave San Diego, my Captain Peter Reed sent a note saying that the weather for the swim window looked concerning. He asked whether I could wait to swim on the neap tides from September 2-7th.

Knowing how unpredictable the English Channel weather can be - I decided my best move was to still go to England the following day and take a chance on the original window. If we were out of luck, then I would have to see about staying longer.

When I arrived in St. Margaret’s Bay, the weather forecast did not look any better. Everyone kept saying that up until I arrived, Great Britain had had the warmest summer (a fellow Californian even referred to it as San Diego-esq weather). But everyone was quite clear that the extreme heat had passed and British summer, the fickle thing that it is, was back.

The rollercoaster of emotions shifted into high-gear: the thought of not having the chance to try was so devastating that it temporarily relieved the on-edge nerves of a first-time marathon swimmer.

By Saturday, the first day of the window, the projections for the week started to look a bit more promising. An Atlantic cold front forecast over the weekend meant that no boats would go out. The Captain hoped to take his first swimmers, a four-person relay, on Monday and thought that the second relay might go either Tuesday or Wednesday. He recommended that we pencil in Thursday. He added that we would only go Wednesday, if the others had completed their swims and the conditions on Thursday were starting to look too rough.

The emotional highs and lows continued on Sunday and Monday, along with consumption of a fair amount of Ben and Jerry’s Double Chocolate Fudge Dairy-free Ice Cream. As I cheered on the first relay, I anxiously awaited word on whether the second relay would go Tuesday. Finally Monday night, I heard that the first relay had made it to France and the second relay was heading out early the next morning. I was overjoyed. I might have the chance to cross the Channel after all. I recalled the credo in from Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist “When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it.” I had joked to a few friends that we needed someone to put in a good word with the weather gods. The nerves came back—this time in full force.

As Tuesday progressed the weather projections for Wednesday looked warm and sunny with slightly lower wind projections than Thursday. Meanwhile, the predictions for Thursday were starting to deteriorate with expected rain and higher winds. It seemed Wednesday was going to be the last decent day before another spate of bad weather that would last through the end of the swimming window. When I called to the Captain at 2:00pm while he was still in the Channel with the second relay, he wasn’t optimistic about the forecast on Wednesday.

I was crestfallen, bewildered, and frustrated. I couldn’t imagine having come all this way and trained full-time over the summer, not to swim. Intellectually, as the third swimmer, I always knew this was a possibility, but when it came down to it emotionally, I was not prepared for the outcome. Although my parents kindly offered to stay in Dover longer, I would have lost my crew, our housing, it would be a major imposition for my parents, and I was backing up on the start date of my new job. Fortunately, by 5:00pm the Captain agreed that Wednesday was the best we were going to get. He thought it was far from perfect, but would leave it up to me to make the final go or no-go decision.

Green-light. Let’s Go.

We had done much of the necessary organizational prep on Sunday to make it easier on ourselves the night before the swim. Once we had the go ahead from the Captain, the team split up assembly-line style to tackle the final details. I mixed bottles on the floor, Anthony ran to the store to pick up a few last-minute items, Mom and Dad helped organize the bins for the boat, and Erin reviewed our pre-swim checklist. Before going to bed, we packed the car.

I set my alarm for 4:20am. As often happens before a big race, I woke up well before my alarm. At 4:00am on a Wednesday morning in August, our house was the only one abuzz in tiny St. Margaret’s Bay with its three pubs, one hotel, and two churches. By 5:15am, we were out the door. On the walk to the car, the air at first seemed still - a great sign for a Channel swim. Suddenly, a big gust of wind rattled the morning’s calm.

We set out for Folkestone leaving time for the inevitable wrong turn on a roundabout - even on a route we now knew quite well - and to unload before meeting Captain Pete and his team at 6:00am. We found the Captain and boat as we watched a pink sunrise looking out over the Channel. The loading process happened quickly as my mom lathered grease on my shoulders, neck, underarms, and such.

Less than two minutes later, we had pulled away from the dock and were speeding towards Shakespeare Beach. My dad turned to me and said “Did you ever think you would be here?” It hit me. The past 12-hours had been surreal. My dream to swim the Channel unfolding before my eyes. In a few minutes, I would have to jump in and swim. Before I knew it, Pete Jr (the Captain’s son) gave me the 5-minute warning.

Jump in and Make Waves

I slid down the side of the boat and into the water 50-80 meters off-shore. I could feel the cold for my first few strokes and then was distracted by the larger-than-expected waves. I had to work to get in to the rocky beach. I stood up, waved, and the Pete Jr. indicated it was time. I dove in. My Channel swim had begun.

I warmed up after a few minutes and tried to concentrate on the task at hand. The waves were larger than I had expected as we hugged the British coast. I focused on swimming along-side the boat and finding a rhythm. My mind sped through the songs and topics I had pre-planned as entertainment more quickly than a kid with a View-Master. I consciously tried to slow down my psyche and recalled prior training swims. Each time I set out to do a long swim, I found the first hour to be the most challenging psychologically. My brain would play cruel mind-games: you feel fine now, but do you feel strong enough to keep going for hours on end? You’ve only just started. Can you really keep going? I forced my thoughts to center on San Diego Channel Swimmer, Tom Hecker’s mantra, “Keep it simple” with “Right, Left, Repeat Until Complete.”

Occasionally during that first hour, I caught a glimpse of a second boat out with another solo swimmer, who started a few minutes after me. Quickly, the second boat pulled ahead, the swimmer seemed to be moving at lightening-speed and disappeared from my goggle-and-wave inhibited view. At my first feed at 1 hour 15 minutes, I joked that the other swimmer must have been wearing a jetpack!

Good news. I thought to myself, I will never have to wait so long for a feed again. Only 44 minutes until the next one and then only 30 minutes between feeds after that. Look at that progress! Before the second feed, I swam hard and fought to keep pace with the boat. Waves would engulf me, I would flip over on my back, and then have to roll on to my stomach. When I mentioned the rocky conditions at the 2-hour feed, my dad reported that the Captain thought it had been rougher for the second relay the day before. I mulled that over as I contemplated whether I could hold this pace in these conditions for twelve plus hours. In hindsight, now that Dad has seen the data, he was blown away by the high winds in those early hours that reached up to 25 miles per hour (mph) with 5-6 foot waves.

The esteemed Channel swimmer and Wellesley Swim & Dive Dad, Steve Walker, told me during a training swim in the San Francisco Bay that the rollers in the Channel would be larger than I’d ever seen. He was right. I had expected the rollers to be like a larger versions of rolling waves that characterize the swim between the La Jolla Cove and Pier. Did I mention, he was spot on? The rollers were nothing like I had experienced before. Although the wind was coming from an overall favorable direction of South Southwest in terms of navigation, it meant that the waves kept hitting me cross-ways (and sometimes with such strength that I did a 180) as I tried to swim forwards. One after another. Wasn’t there supposed to be a break between rollers? Isn’t that the whole concept? These were tight sets that didn’t seem to end.

I thought about my Wellesley teammate and English Channel Swimmer Ika Kovacikova and her mantra “I am warm, I am strong, I am patient, and I can do this.” In training I had adapted her words, “I am warm, I am strong, and I am confident that I can do this” to buffer myself against any creeping doubt. While Ika’s mantra was helpful, I also remembered that she had used it at the end of her English Channel swim. Here I was whipping it out the beginning. If I’ve already thought of so many of my planned topics and invoked the powerful mantra, what am I going to use later?

I-Spy the British Shipping Lanes

Wahoo! The moment I spotted the first container ship headed south felt like victory! I had been in the water for about three hours and this was proof that I was making real progress. Usually when I spot a container ship, I’m grateful that it’s far enough away and brace for the water to get a bit rougher. This time, I was ecstatic! Since the Channel has few fixed landmarks, the British Shipping lane felt like the first hurdle I’d successfully cleared. Other ships may have passed us, but I barely noticed. I had found my groove. Swim. Feed. Swim. Feed.

Grooving in the Garbage Patch

I’d heard other Channel swimmers describe the space between the British and French Shipping lanes as the “great separation” or the “garbage patch.” Rose Levien, a Channel swimmer I met while training in the San Francisco Bay Area, reported stories of an array of goods (bags, televisions, you know common items found in the ocean) that had fallen off the tankers speeding by on either side. I didn’t see any notable tchotchkes during this portion of the swim. But as my Mom has always said, one person’s tchotchkes are another’s treasures. And treasure this time I did. The wind had died down a bit making the waves much more manageable. I felt good. My left shoulder hurt a bit, but I adjusted my stroke to a shallower pull and less painful way to propel myself through the water.

I can do this. I am doing this. I felt great in this portion of the swim. The sun came out around hour four (roughly 10:30am). I thought about my good fortune to have the sun shining and the relatively warm water. After all, it was 18.5C / 65.3F! That’s more than two degrees warmer than the average recorded temperatures in the past two Augusts. Every so often, I would spot the long tentacles of a jelly fish flowing in deeper water and luckily avoided any direct contact. I remembered The Alchemist quote turned positive-affirmation, “all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”

At the 5-hour feed, I got my first caffeinated Gu an hour before we had planned. My dad said in a concerned voice, “You need it. Your stroke rate is dropping.” While this in another scenario might been concerning (since stroke count is one of the key indicators that your crew uses to determine whether you need to be pulled out of the water), I wasn’t worried. I had intentionally slowed down my stroke rate to swim at a sustainable pace instead of racing to keep up with the boat as I had in the first three hours. In fact, I saw the development as a major upgrade in flavor: Chocolate Outrage (a flavor I've always loved and used to count on for marathons) instead of Smores (sounds tasty, right, unfortunately, it does not live up to its name).

Caffeine kicking in, I sang my way through the next portion of the swim. In my training, I had been impressed with my alter ego, Disc Jockey (DJ) Kaplan. Out of nowhere, I would start singing songs I hadn’t heard in years. “Why do you build me up, build me up, buttercup baby, just to let me down, let me down, and mess me around…” or “Doe a deer, a female deer, Re a drop of golden sun…” from the Sound of Music. Eclectic oldies on repeat. At one point, I realized I was singing “Freres Jacques, Freres Jacques, Dormez-vous, Dormez-vous…” Bonus points to DJ Kaplan for relevance: I was tired and heading to France! Unfortunately, not even the first views of the French Coastline could jog my memory of the lullaby’s second verse.

At some-point in this part of the swim, I stumbled upon a new form of entertainment: recalling notable speeches. Initially, I remembered Claire Ayoub’s 2011 Wellesley College graduation speech. After chuckling to myself recalling my favorite lines such as “No one leaves Wellesley a fully formed Hillary Clinton,” and “we are women with to-do lists,” I dug deeper. Having watched the video innumerable times, could I remember the whole speech? Word for word? I got pretty close and then racked my brain for other examples. What other speeches could I use as a distraction? I recited my good-bye speech from The Cohen Group and then moved on to client briefings that I had presented in past years. Finally, I pieced together the scenes and speakers in the Wellesley’s This Is The Place 2016 Capital Campaign video. These familiar words comforted me in unfamiliar waters.

The French Side of La Manche

To be honest, I can’t recall what came first: seeing a container ship heading north or my dear friend, Erin Yang, jumping in the water.

I saw the outline of a large ship on the horizon and did a double take. Was it a container ship? Was it heading north? The answers were yes and yes. I had made it to the next landmark: the French Shipping Lanes. I was getting closer to what I termed ‘English Channel B-I-N-G-O!’ After hearing countless stories from past Channel swimmers, each time I encountered a new element of the swim it was as though I was one stroke closer to yelling B-I-N-G-O!

For the past 8 hours, I’d heard the smack of waves crashing against the side of the boat. All of the sudden, I heard a different kind of splash. Erin landed in the water near me. She is my teammate three times over. First swimming for our common alma mater Wellesley College, second from our Washington D.C.-based Dunbar Dolphins team, and third from the Channel! In addition to being a crucial member of the support crew and giving me thumbs up signals, she hopped into La Manche to keep me company as the wind picked up. The strong winds rocked us back and forth as we tried to avoid colliding with the boat.

As I swam beside Erin, I peered intently at her hands and feet to asses my pace. Were her fingers touching or spread apart? Was she kicking or coasting? I couldn’t tell. These cues would have given me an indication of my own speed after 8+ hours in the water. A few times we even came close to colliding, which would have disqualified my swim under the Channel Swimming Association’s rules. In the moment, I yelled at her to swim farther away from the boat. I’ve since apologized and want to give her a shoutout for being an awesome pacer and crew-member.

All in all: it was a useful distraction as my body transitioned from burning CarboPro’s complex sugars to my own fat stores. Although that I’d heard that this metabolic shift could be one of the most difficult parts of the swim, it was less painful than I anticipated (spoiler alert: that comes later). I’d been swimming for 8 hours. I was entitled to be a little tired, but had things to look forward to: M&M candies in my 8:30-feed and the true prize: more anti-inflammatories would come at 9 hours.

Hours 9 and 10 passed fairly quickly from feed to feed. France was clearly in view and I felt as though I was progressing. The winds had continued to pick up-so the conditions were quite rough, but the tide was changing in my favor. Moving from slack tide to an ebb tide meant that the current would give me a ride towards my destination: Cape de Gris Nez. I was optimistic that I could make it to French soil in approximately 12 hours if I surfed the current like the giant sea turtles in Finding Nemo. The change in tide was exactly what I needed - a little force multiplier. I swam and swam, composed acrostic poems about England and France, and waited for the ebb tide to strengthen. Eventually, it did. Meanwhile, my patience and anti-inflammatories were wearing off.

France: So Close and Yet So Far Away

I’d had a tough swim in terms of wind conditions, but overall felt good up through 11 hours. While some marathon distance swimmers are challenged by hours 5-9, they often get a second wind once they recognize the great distance they have covered and push through in the final hours. For me, the greatest challenge came in the 4th quarter.

In channel swimming, there is no fixed end point or finish line. The landing point depends on the tides and your speed—both of which are subject to change. In light of these uncertainties, it’s a standard practice for the crew to not give you a straight answer on how much farther you have to go. My Dad and Erin knew the drill. However, I lucked out when the CSA Official hadn’t been read in on the protocol. When I asked, he answered “we are 4.3 miles from the lighthouse.” I had hoped to only have 1 more hour to go, but quickly calculated that even with the support of the ebb tide, I still was roughly 2 hours away from touching the sand. I couldn’t show my disappointment, after all, I’d asked the question, but it did help to have a realistic sense of where I was and how much farther I had to swim.

My shoulder muscles were less than pleased. The left one had a low grade ache that began in hour 3, but at this point real fatigue had set in. I kept moving my arms forward and started to kick harder. For English Channel Swimmer, Ironwoman Extraodinaire and Streamliners Coach Ahelee Osborn’s sake, I must say that I did kick throughout the Channel crossing. There’s photographic evidence. Nevertheless, it’s also true that after a dose of reality during 11-hour feed, I dug into the Neptune kick sets that I practiced all summer.

In between feeds from 11-12 hours, I tried to distract myself from the pain. It was hard. New anti-inflammatories weren’t in the cards for another hour. France was so close that its hills were staring back at me. I remembered the mantra from Steve Walker, “pain is temporary, success lasts forever.” Pain is temporary, success lasts forever. Pain is temporary, most of it will go away within in a few days, success lasts forever. I had taken a huge risk in chasing my life-long dream to swim the Channel. I had to keep going.

At the 11:30-feed, I heard that I was making good progress with the support of the ebb tide. The winds and waves were still high, but the tide was helping carry me closer to the lighthouse. We were on course. This news was a huge relief since this is often the point in the swim when concerns arise about being pulled too far south by the ebb tide and missing the Cape — typically tacking on several hours to the swim. Just before I put my head back in, my Dad yelled, “Do you remember that speedy guy from the beginning? He threw in the towel and quit a while ago. His comment had the desired effect - it resonated in three ways: 1) Perseverance: Giving up in our family is not an option. We believe in “Finish[ing] No Matter What.” Under my own power, I would not stop swimming. I took a moment to reaffirm that in my mind. 2) Competition: Like most athletes, I’m slightly competitive. Jetpack man had run out of fuel. 3) Reinforced the challenge: When I heard that another strong swimmer had truly struggled, it underscored the tough conditions. I did my homework, I was prepared, and the Channel responded in kind by raising the bar.

At the 12 hour feed, I slurped down my coca-cola. It was the second time I had coke during the swim as a way to settle my stomach. My Dad asked if my stomach was hurting and I invited him to come down and see for himself. We were about 1 mile from France. I listened to Pete Jr. lay out the plan, I was to swim for another half-hour at which point I would be in the shallows; next, he would bring out the dingy; and FINALLY, we land on the beach a few hundred yards north of the Cap Gris Nez lighthouse.

I turned over to start swimming again and couldn’t move my right arm. For the last 8 hours, my left shoulder was the one in pain. To compensate, the right shoulder had taken on an extra burden. But now, it wouldn’t move. I tried again. Still nothing. I yelled up to the boat, “my right arm won’t move. I may have to swim breaststroke into the beach.” I did a little breaststroke, one arm freestyle, kicked as hard as I could. The good news was that we were on course, we were close enough to France and doing okay on the time (the Captain told me not to worry about the tide sweeping us back out from the coast). After about 20 minutes of these series-of-unfortunate-strokes, I was finally able to swim freestyle again. The pain killers had kicked in.

LAND-HO

At 12 hours 30 minutes, I heard the magic words, “This is your last feed.” I took a swig of the CarboPro and only one bite of the cliff Mocha Gu with 50 mg of caffeine (the only time we went above 32 mg). Erin jumped in to swim with me. We were going to FRANCE! After having asked many times when it would be time, I was delighted a few minutes later when I saw the dingy come out. That’s when I knew we were REALLY close. My googles were very foggy and as the light started to dim at dusk, it got harder an harder to see. It didn’t help that a few minutes before I had accidentally touched my shoulder (covered in Channel grease to prevent chaffing) and then touched my googles. And I did it more than once. This was a rookie mistake that Steve Walker warned me about. I did a pretty good job of heeding his advice until the very end.

Every few strokes, I looked up. I drifted to the left and had to overcorrect by swimming to the right. Pete Jr. told us to aim for the yellow buoy beyond the buildings nestled below the cliffs. In spite of my best efforts, I didn’t seem to be progressing. On the boat, they said the last mile would be easier thanks to the coastline’s protection from the high winds. The large waves had subsided, but the Channel was not ready to give up its fight. I contemplated stories of swimmers who made it within 300 yards of the French coast and were pulled out either because they had lost consciousness or the tide had changed.

I re-focused on the here and now. The currents were still strong, but I was close and thankful to the Captain for his excellent navigation. I found Pete Jr. in the dingy and Erin and we all stayed close together for the home stretch. Finally, Pete Jr. said we could aim for the sandy beach instead of the buildings. I’m sure that may have been his plan all along. In light of the stories of other successful Channel swimmers falling after standing up after 13 hours horizontal, I had planned to crawl in on all fours. In reality, I wasn’t sure my arms would hold me.

I saw pilings of an old pier a few feet underneath me. This was it. The water depth must have measured between 6-10 feet. I could clearly see the bottom. A few more strokes and I would be able to stand. Forgetting all about my bright idea to do a backwards crab walk (and thus engage my legs to do most of the work while not losing my balance), I stood up and walked. My legs felt strong. I walked a few more paces. I even ran a beat before thinking the better of it. I had a peaceful moment on the oh-so-welcome sandy beach after clearing the water by the one-meter required by English Channel swimming rules.

I raised my arms up as high as I could for a victory cheer while Erin captured the Kodak moment with Anthony’s water-proof camera. However, my arms didn’t raise past my elbows. They stayed pinned in that position for the better part of the next 72 hours. It would be a whole week before I could fully extend my left arm (but I didn’t know it at the time).

I sat down on the sand for a second out of sheer exhaustion. The gravity of what I accomplished had not really sunk in. Then what felt like 30 seconds later, I started shivering. Although I had not felt cold during my swim save for a few minutes at the beginning and one or two cold spots during the crossing, the shivering meant it was time to get back to the boat. I waded out to the dingy as far as I could stand and kicked the last bit. Grabbing my upper body, Pete Jr. lifted me into the dingy. Erin provided the comic relief in the moment. After having waded as far as she could, she stood there waiting for the dingy to reach her while holding Anthony’s camera as high as possible over her head. Once we were both on board, we motored back to the boat and everyone helped me climb up the boat ladder. I made it. We were headed home.

The Boat Home: Home Bonnie-Jean

All I could think of in those last two hours of the swim was the luxury that awaited me to sit on the boat. Nearly as soon as I got on the boat, all I could think of was getting off the boat and onto dry land. I couldn’t lay down on the boat without getting splashed, so I rested in a comfy beach chair wrapped in warm blankets and my swim parka. I couldn’t find my hat, so we put a blanket over my head like an old world kerchief. While it appeared to be dusk when we landed in France, once we returned to the boat, the light very quickly faded away. Any items that couldn’t get wet were moved out of the splash zone by Pete Jr and the crew.

Night set in, as we set out. Erin brewed her famous Ginger tea while my Dad did his best to provide comfort and give me anti-nausea medication. Though I rested, I didn’t feel well and couldn’t find a comfortable position. As the ride continued, I started to feel faint. Instead of passing out, I vomited up the Ginger tea and immediately felt better and even hungry. To satisfy my appetite, I tried to eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich square (1/4 of a full sandwich on the smallest, most processed white bread that Tesco had to offer). Someone handed me my phone and I tried to take in the incredible messages of support as a distraction. We also laughed when friends were still texting me, “You’re almost there. You can do it! The last bit.” Since the boat had the tracking device and it never touched French soil, friends watching online thought we were still there lingering on the edge. We had a good laugh about the lapse in technology (and the fact that the fancy SPOT tracker we planned to use didn’t work). Not too long afterwards, I had my second taste of the very same PB&J.

The remainder of the boat ride back to Dover was a mix of trying to keep the blanket on my head, falling asleep, and gazing at the parade of other vessels illuminated on the water (the P&O ferries, container ships, maybe even a cruise-liner as we got closer to England). I made light of the fact that for so many hours, all I’d wanted was to arrive in France and now I wanted more than anything to crawl onto British soil. I got my wish around 10:30pm.

Epilogue: R&R

The team quickly unloaded the boat and after happy reunions with Anthony and my mom, I climbed into the front seat of our rental car. We were off to a hotel in Folkestone. We had decided it would be closer than going back to the village of St. Margarets at Cliffe that same night. The only problem was we had only driven to the hotel in the daylight. In the dark, we got lost and switched drivers. We finally made it to the hotel where I headed for the bathtub. A hot bath! Finally, I didn’t have to feel guilty or worry about the warm water messing with my acclimatization. I had done it!!

I am so thankful to my Mom, Dad, Anthony, Erin, Pete, Pete Jr. and Aaron for going above and beyond in the days leading up to the swim, the swim itself, and the long recovery. That first night, I took two baths and a shower and slept maybe a total of 3 hours. Once again, thanks to the wise counsel of Steve Walker, I knew that this was a possibility, even likely. But I wasn’t prepared physically for the discomfort of laying down on my back. The pressure on my shoulders was immense. It took more than a week (8days) before I could sleep through a full night.

The recovery process was slow as I had to pace myself between exploring Paris, London, and much of Ireland after the swim. Finally, I returned to San Diego and 15 days after my swim, I showed up for practice at UCSD with Sickie. I did a 40-min stretch out swim in the 50M pool, mostly freestyle with a little backstroke and kick mixed in. At the end of practice, Sickie asked, how far did you go? I responded 40-minutes. He laughed and joked that I was now at a point in the training cycle where I no longer needed to track my yardage. I laughed, too. The English Channel adventure of 2018 had come to a close.