I made the image below for my American Channel swimming friend and one of the MSF Rules of Marathon Swimming co-authors Elaine Howley. I’ve seen a few articles on coping with open water swimming fears recently, and I though I’d take a contrary and more visual tack. If you suffer from the open water heebeejeebies,…
It’s been a while since I posted any nightmare fuel for open water swimmers, so I thought I might collect a few of my favourites together. We’ll start gently. Close encounter with a humpback. One from years ago on the blog, the frilled shark, aka dragon shark. Remember Brutus the giant Australian salt-water crocodile? A…
In Part One I covered the physiological limiting factors in marathon swimming. The various environmental aspects of a swim are not insignificant. They are especially important in that they all lay outside the swimmer’s control and often even outside the control of the support crew. Water Temperature This is generally a known factor prior to a…
Ok, if you’re a regular here, you know by now I have an interest in these feckers, partly because we get a lot of them in Tramore Bay, I’ve been stung more times than I can remember (first two very minor stings of the year yesterday), AND they are fascinating. On one hand I like…
On my list I’d planned to write a post on the jellyfish life-cycle, since I’ve posted previously about how to identify them and how to deal with them. But then I found this fantastic and fairly short clip. It has fantastic HD video definition and you see the beauty of these creatures that some of us know so well, along…
Yes, our friends the jellyfish have returned. The other day I saw Common (aka Moon ), Compass (pictured) and Blue Stingers. The Common (Moon, below) is completely harmless, but all jellies cause most people to have a small freakout. So knowing when not to be afraid is useful. I mentioned previously about the late spring/early summer arrival,…
From the Jellyfish.ie site. If you see jellies, you can report them on the site. It started, (I think) as part of the Leatherback Turtle tracking project.
Yes folks, time to warn you all. Spring has been well and truly under-way in the ocean for some time now. The dead give-away is the deepening green of the water indicating the first and largest plankton blooms. (Note the banner colour of my blog again!). Early “action” isn’t particularly visible but the next most…
LoneSwimmer 