An AUGUST Week

A week ago on Sunday, I spent the morning swimming in Lake Ontario while Alex and Fifa played in the surf. It was a really fun day and I wanted to do a blog post about it but I worked on Monday AND Wednesday this week and didn’t get it done. Today Alex came to Lake Ontario with me at dawn so I could get in a long swim before the conditions got too bad. It was already windy and choppy when we arrived, but the “official” small craft warning wasn’t until 10 am. Since Fifa didn’t get to come to the lake today we took her to the farmers market in our local park to make it up to her. Now I am settled on the couch, watching the Women’s Olympic Marathon. I watched the Men’s marathon yesterday but I fast-forwarded a lot, I’ll watch the whole 2+ hours of the women’s and write at my leisure.

Sunday, August 4th I went up to Porter Town Park on Lake Ontario for the Buffalo Triathlon Club open water swim. Alex came with me and we brought their SUP and Fifa.

It was a beautiful morning and the lake was fairly calm when we arrived but the wind quickly picked up and soon after I started swimming there were whitecaps.

Just after we arrived my friend Mark showed up so we recruited him to take some photos of us.

Fifa loves to retrieve in the water (as opposed to in the yard where she gets bored quickly) and will do so for hours.

My plan was to swim for 90 minutes, which I did, but I expected to get a lot more yards in. The swells really slow my swimming pace as so much energy is spent going up and down versus forward.

In flat water, I have been managing close to 1:45/100yd in a wetsuit so quite the difference with big waves. Ironman Florida is in the Gulf of Mexico so it has a good chance of being choppy so I am glad to train in challenging conditions.

When I was done swimming I sat with Fifa while Alex did some Stand Up Paddleboarding. The waves made it challenging, I wouldn’t have stayed upright very long!

On the way home we stopped at Wegmans, there was a sign warning me about having left my kid AND dog in the car! And my watch alerted me about Fifa (she has an Apple Airtag on her collar).

I worked on Monday and got home just in time to get Fifa walked before a deluge came down (not related to Betty, that wouldn’t reach us until Friday). There was actually a tornado downtown!

The bald eagle hasn’t been back to our pond after the three days it visited us but this nice Great Egret showed up on Tuesday.

The next day Alex saw this beaver. We had one in our pond a few years ago and it damaged a lot of people’s backyard trees. Luckily we have a fence.

On Thursday I was excited to watch the Women’s 10K swim in the Seine! I have done two 10K swim races (anything 10K or over is considered a “marathon” swim). They took me about 3:15 in a wetsuit. The winning time for the Women/Men was around 2:00/1:50. They don’t wear wetsuits but less assisting speed suits.

The Seine had a strong current so when going downstream they went fast in the middle of the river but upstream they hugged the edge where there was the least current to fight. I loved the feeding station on each lap, the swimmers found their drink by national flags and had to swim one-armed backstroke while drinking to avoid the current pulling them the wrong way around the buoy.

Friday I watched the Men’s 10K swim while biking (virtually) in Mt. Tremblant, Canada.

I biked for longer than the race (but not as long as I would have liked to as I had to go somewhere by 10 am).

As it was the last day of the camp where Alex had worked this summer they had gotten special permission to have me bring Fifa to meet their campers. I found Fifa’s “support animal” vest that I had gotten her certified for many years ago.

Fifa did a great job and had a wonderful time.

Luckily the rain held off until we were heading back to the van. This was Tropical Depression Betty. It just barely reached us but dropped several inches of rain further east in Albany.

Saturday I was signed up for a sprint triathlon but while I had planned to just swim and bike, my broken ankle had been painful all week and even the limited walking involved seemed a bad idea. So I took a rest day and watched the US Women win against Brazil in Soccer and then watched the Men’s marathon.

Alex noticed this strange motion in the pond (it was not raining) and when we investigated it looked like tiny fish under the surface. Some research has me believing they are bullfrog tadpoles that just hatched.

And now it is Sunday again. It was a beautiful drive to Lake Ontario this morning.

The lake was already choppy when we arrived but there was a perfect view of Toronto. The Whitecaps didn’t get bad for an hour. I swam a full two hours but only 5K.

Alex took some good photos of me swimming.

By the time I finished, there were a lot of whitecaps and that sailboat was moving fast.

When we got home we took Fifa to the farmers market.

Wow, perfect timing. There is only 1 Kilometer to go in the marathon. There are 3 women in the lead pack (there were 4 until a minute ago). Wow, Hassan from Holland won, she also won Bronze medals in the 5K and 10K races! Assefa who finished in second place is the world record holder.

She also set an Olympic record despite it being hot and a very hilly course.

Watching the Men’s, Women’s and Mixed relay triathlons and the marathons has me feeling a little discouraged about the continued pain in my ankle. It really felt better after swimming today but the amount of pain this past week has me worried that the fracture is not healed or is even possibly displaced.

I am trying not to be too self-pitying about my situation but at 3 am I invariably lie awake and worry that I will need surgery and will have to cancel my plans for Ironman Florida in November. I have a follow-up x-ray scheduled for this Thursday so just need to wait patiently and hope for the best… but I am not good at doing that.

In the past two weeks one of the few high school friends I am in touch with lost her husband unexpectedly, a medical school friend similarly lost their brother to a sudden illness and, Alex’s childhood babysitter’s 6-year-old daughter had a bad head injury in a car accident. I realize that my ankle is VERY insignificant compared to their tragedies.