Open Water World Championships

On July 15th the USA Open Water National Team loaded up in a big bus and drove from Lake Placid to Montreal, Canada. We had a few days to practice on the race course. The course was in the rowing basin from the 1976 Olympics in Montreal. Each loop was 2500meters so the 5K racers did 2 loops, the 10K did 4 loops and the 25K did 10 loops. It was very “spectator friendly”. The 5K race was on July 17th…the women started around 9am. It was a great race; I was in great positions from the start to the finish. The other American in the race with me, Margy Keefe, pushed the pace after the first lap. I was struggling just to hang on to the feet in front of me. By the last 500 meters there were only 4 girls in the lead pack, Margy, the reigning champion from Russia, a famous chick from the Netherlands, and me. Unfortunately, I realized in those last 500 meters that I no longer have the finishing kick that I had when I was a competitive pool swimmer!! I was very happy with the 4th place finish, especially since my teammate took home the silver!
A few hours later that day, one of our American guys, Chip Peterson, got silver in the men’s race! It was a great way for the USA to start the open water world champs!
Two days later it was time for the women and men’s 10K race. This time we started a bit earlier in the morning…since the race would take a bit longer! This time my American teammate was Erica Rose, a very experienced open water swimmer. We both had great races, at one point we were hitting each other for position:)! I focused on drafting as much as I could but still could not dig up a finishing sprint and touched the pads at the back of the lead pack again. This time it was in 11th place and Erica was a bit in front of me in 9th place.
Again, a few hours later in the men’s race it was all Chip! This time he pushed the pace majorly with about 2000 meters to go and ended up holding off the favorite from Germany for the GOLD! It was another great day for the USA…we had fun celebrating that!
In the next few days the women, and then the men, swam the 25K. I walked MANY of the loops with our swimmers waving a huge USA flag for support. Erica was awesome, getting another 9th place and John finished 12th in the men’s. I was also keeping up my triathlon training during the off days…I was able to find a really great bike path outside of the city with great views and no traffic. Since most of the time we were at a swim meet…which means all we get to see is the hotel and pool…I was really thankful that I was able to get in a self guided tour of the city. On the 24th of July, we all said good-bye to Canada and flew to our respective homes…mine being in Colorado Springs...and resumed training for our next competitions!