Digging In - St. Lucia Channel Swim Part IV

Sometime around hour 5 or 6, all the recent feeds came up. I’d heard of swimmers throwing-up and continuing to swim, but I’d never actually experienced that. I puked what seemed like gallons, but felt so relieved to get all that out of my system. I didn’t want the crew freaking out over it, so quickly got back to swimming.

Nathaniel joined me for a support swim. He is so long and strong, I know it was difficult for him to swim slowly enough not to get ahead of me. It was nice to have the company, but also a little stressful as I tried to increase my pace to stay even with him. Plus, the waves were so crazy, it was hard to even see him most of the time. My view was either of the side of the boat or an oncoming wall of blue water.

It was more comfortable breathing to my right. I’m normally a bi-lateral breather but the wave pattern made that difficult. Every time I’d turn to the left to catch my breath, water would cover my face. I thought it might work better to swim on the other side of the boat, so as Nathanial returned to the boat after an hour, I swam over the other side. It didn’t take long for Paul to blow his whistle, which is how he caught my attention for feeds or other communication. He said the current was pushing me in the wrong direction on that side. Or he could have said he was eating a bacon burger with fries on the side. It was hard to tell. But, I got the drift that I needed to go back to my little corner of the Caribbean Sea.

I had the nausea station on shuffle play with auto repeat. I couldn’t stomach my regular feeds – the taste made me vomit, so I stuck to water or coconut water and sometimes that would stay down, sometimes it came back up. At one point, I asked for some Advil because my left shoulder was getting sore. I dropped one in the ocean – dammit! – and barfed up the one I managed to get down about 5 minutes later. I kept swimming. I found it kind of interesting that I COULD keep swimming. Nausea is a miserable feeling, but I felt a lot better after I vomited – of all the weird things, I was so happy that I could puke.

I hit the seaweed patches around 9 or 10 hours into the swim. They weren’t as bad as I was expecting – more like rosemary floating on top of the water. I thought it might be like thick beds of kelp. The stuff was full of sea lice and got into my suit, which was itchy, but I’d scoop out what I could and kept going.

People often ask what I think about on long swims. I tried to think of things that would take my mind off the misery of feeling so sick. I didn’t have a lot of songs memorized, but I ran through a jukebox in my head – parts of songs by The Cure, the Beatles, the Black Keys, some random techno beats and a few nursery rhymes. “This Old Man” was a horrible ear worm. I mostly thought “just keep swimming” and focused on my stroke, knowing that every time my hand dove into the water, I was a few feet closer to Martinique.

Finally, I could see Martinique, which was a huge motivator. I knew I must have more time behind me than ahead of me. But, like a lot of channel swimming stories I’d read about, the island didn’t seem to be getting any closer.

I wasn’t sure how much longer I could keep going. I went through periods where I thought the swim was doomed and then, 10-15 minutes later, I’d feel a little more confident. Except for a coffee flavored Hammer gel, I hadn’t had a normal feed in hours, just water or coconut water. My body tapped into fat stores and seemed to be running OK, so I just kept going. I appreciated the diluted mouthwash at feeds to freshen up my salt-coated tongue.

At a couple of points, the support boat was behind me. I didn’t know why it wasn’t next to me all the time. So, I gently suggested that perhaps they could move next to or ahead of me so I could better follow their lead. Paul translated my instructions (taking out the cuss words) and off we continued. Paul later explained that Martin was conserving power by stopping the motor as I was taking a feed. Note to self: let the captain run the ship!

I’d been in the water at least 12 hours and that island STILL looked miles away. I figured I must be fighting the current, but I wasn’t sure. I couldn’t really tell any difference in the feel of the water, just by the lack of progress. Paul said I only had about a mile left. That looked like a long mile and Paul is always lying to keep me going, so I was skeptical. But, again, there wasn’t much else I could do except keep on swimming. I was feeling very nauseous and didn’t want to take any more feeds, not even water. I stuck with a mouthwash swish-n-spit. It was reassuring to see Paul and Thalia or Lily always at the side of the boat. I knew this was a long haul for them and I really appreciated their vigilance.