Pier to Pier Sea Swim

I recently took part in the Lowestoft Pier to Pier swim which is a 1,000 meter swim in the North Sea.

It was actually quite warm air temperature at 9am and waited until a few minutes before the start to fully put on the wet suit in the heat, even so I was glad to get in the cold north sea. It was ideal swim conditions with only small waves and it was sunny.

It started from the beach which for some reason I started near the right side which was the shortest distance to get past the end of the groyne. There was quite a few lifeguards on patrol on various canoes and surfboards in case anybody got into trouble.

When running in to the sea I was surprised there was not that many fast people on this side so I was able to get in to my swim rhythm quickly with only getting hit a few times. Once I reached the end of the gryone it was almost a 90 degree turn to the right to head towards the other pier, luckily this was easy to sight.

I was going at a good pace for me and was surprised how quickly I had got to the pier, there was a person in a canoe there to prevent you swimming in to the pier which I managed to avoid. At this point I knew there was somebody close to me as I was getting hit a bit as we turned round the pier. At this point I kicked a bit more to get some separation until I could not swim any further on to the shoreline. I then started to run up the beach about 20m to the finish. I was concentrating on the finish line and nearly fell over down  a dip in the sand but I could hear the person behind me was close so I took the racing line, looking at the results he was given the same time as me.

I finished this in 19:41 and was 19th out of 41 who entered and was 7th in my age category. I enjoyed this low key sea swim/race and will do this again.