Choppy! Choppy! Choppy!

Tonight I went swimming with the Tri Club in Lake Windermere!

I must admit I did have second thoughts about going - It has been freezing cold, windy and wet all day!  Not ideal conditions to swim in Open Water!

Anyhow I decided to "man-up" and give it a go!

Luckily by the time we got to Windermere at 6.30pm the rain had stopped - we just had the wind and cold to contend with!

I struggled to get into my rhythm tonight!  I think both the cold and the choppiness got into my head and my confidence vanished!

I have been told many times at Tri Club training sessions to practice breathing on one side only - I struggle to do this at the best of times in a warm pool but tonight I desperately wanted to succeed as every time I breathed to the right I got slapped in the face by a wave - it felt like I was swimming in the sea not in a lake! It wouldn't of surprised me if my Garmin had registered the waves as elevation gain!

I did settle into it a little but never felt comfortable and I only managed 600 metres before deciding to call it a day!  I felt really scared at times and freezing cold!

Hopefully I won't have to swim in such rough waters again anytime soon!

I was actually blue with the cold when I got out - thankfully a roaring log fire, a steaming mug of coffee and a big slice of cake made the cold choppy swim seem much more bearable!