This is a guest post from Nuala Moore, a veteran open water swimmer and event organizer who hails from SW Ireland. In addition to many other swimming feats, Nuala was part of a relay team that swam around Ireland (830 miles – no wetsuits) over 56 days. She’ll also be making a local appearance next month during her 6th Chicago Triathlon. Welcome Nuala!

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My name is Nuala Moore, and I am an open water swimmer living in the SW of Ireland. We are surrounded by amazing beaches, and the water flowing through our islands is the fastest and the freshest in spirit that you can swim in.

The water temperatures vary from early 40′s to 60′s (Fahrenheit). A huge variable is the air temperature. We rarely get above 70 so that means that the air is whipping the heat from our bodies quickly.

I am a super fan of deep water swimming and love the jaunt away from the shore. One of the biggest challenges that swimmers face here is that of the power of the water. Sometimes you wish to swim one way but it may not be possible. So we time our swims with the tide.

Anxiety and stress can often be the main reason that swimmers don’t finish. I try to work with that. We really have to learn to trust the boat crews. Their job is soley to mind us, and actually handing that trust can be a huge issue.

This weekend we have a 6km swim and a 3km swim in a beautiful bay of Ballydavid. It is called The Massacre after the 1580 battle in Smerwick harbour. We swim to the base of the monument. -Dramatic name!!

(click for larger image)

We also have a regatta to contend with, so it’s limited to 30 swimmers. Due to the tidal flow and emptying of the bay, we swim in a direction south of our destination; and the tide leaving the bay will usually bring us to where we need to go. The tide should be turning to get us home the other 3km.

You could end up swimming 2km longer just by getting this line wrong. How bays empty and fill is so important to know and to study for safety reasons. Also, it’s essential to have swimmers who can adjust their plans as well and not get stressed when they see themselves heading somewhere else.

(click for larger image)

Challenges differ in all waters, but overall I love the open ocean. It is so rewarding seeing swimmers battle and get there. I am a fan of getting swimmers to regroup and swim in a pod. It is very responsible and gives the surge of confidence and energy to drive on. We always have BBQ and a hot chocolate afterwards – super to share the experiences.

I also host swims of 2km/3km and 5km. I think once you’re wet and you have no plans for the afternoon, we may as well forge away.

Swimming is such a liberation of mind and soul. All the voices in your head are quelled by your own bubbles.

Here’s hoping for a super Massacre and the hope that Mother Nature looks kindly on us! All my swims are charity based, and we are all winners.

Swim Safely,
-Nuala

This is a guest post from Bob Cavallo. Bob is an active open water swimmer who’s our local voice for the Indiana lakeshore. Welcome Bob!

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Hello from Indiana!

I swim during the week at the Hammond Beach, just Southeast of Chicago. It’s not the most beautiful beach on Lake Michigan, but it’s convenient and better than a pool. It’s situated between the Hammond Marina and the State Line Generating Plant.

The beach is about an 1/8 mile long between buoys. But if you get out early in the morning before the boaters, you can swim the full length of the beach (about 1/2 mile).

Tonight was the first evening I could get back into the water since last weekend. Between E. Coli (thanks Chicago), storms and cold water I haven’t done much. This evening the water temperature was comfortable to swim in and the lake was very calm.

Thanks again Steve, and in the future I will post about some of the other beaches along our Indiana lakefront!

There is a swim ban this weekend at all Chicago beaches due to “water quality issues.” This is because the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago (MWRD) opened the Wilmette and Chicago River locks at 2:30am on Saturday morning and released large quantities of sanitary sewage diluted in part by the sudden influx of stormwater.

Let’s examine how the sewage got there in the first place.

Chicago has what’s known as a combined sewer system. Under this design, all of the sanitary sewage as well as any incoming stormwater eventually makes its way to a shared outfall pipe or reservoir:

(Source EPA)

In contrast, many municipal sewer systems constructed after WWII collect and drain stormwater in drainage lines which do not mix with the sanitary sewage drainage systems. These are appropriately termed separated sewage systems:

(Source EPA)

As the first image indicates, sudden and heavy rainstorms can very often deluge a combined sewer system with excess stormwater. When this happens, the combined sewer overflows (CSOs) can overwhelm the shared outfall pipes and reservoirs and cause unwanted flooding and “backups” in both the sanitary sewage lines as well as the storm drain systems:

To prevent these occurrences – or to at least mitigate them – the city of Chicago and the MWRD designed and developed the Tunnel and Reservoir Plan, a.k.a. the “Deep Tunnel.” Commissioned in the mid-1970′s and still under construction, the TARP is essentially an expanded reservoir system for CSOs that take place during heavy rainfalls.

Unfortunately, an especially heavy rainstorm will still occasionally overwhelm the TARP.

When this happens, the MWRD will divert the excess CSOs to any number of permitted outfalls – most of which empty into the Chicago River, the Calumet River, and the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal.

However, under sustained storm conditions, CSOs from these permitted outfalls can actually overwhelm these river and canal systems as well. Under this scenario, the MWRD will open one or more of the river locks such as the Chicago Harbor lock, the Wilmette lock, or the O’Brien lock in order to prevent flooding.

And when these locks are opened, CSOs (combined sewer overflows) enter Lake Michigan and contaminate the water.

The good news is that this doesn’t happen very often. And theoretically, this shouldn’t take place at all once the TARP is fully completed and operational by 2019 (estimated).

But in the meantime, you might want to educate yourself on the risks E. Coli exposure and be wary of the conditions at those Chicago beaches more prone to pollution .

Biking south along an already flooded lakefront path, I feverishly hoped that the dark clouds hovering over the skyline would not be storm clouds. But this dream was immediately shattered by a large clap of thunder and an enormous bolt of lightning.

So I headed out to L1 and took shelter under the chess pavilion as the storm intensified. I waited until 7:30am and took off when the lightning persisted. (It’s now 8:45am, and it looks like the storm has passed – perhaps I should give it another shot?)

This morning’s video:

Fallen tree over the bike path

Art deco lantern

Street flooding with overflow popping off the manhole cover

Like the Goliath Tigerfish, for instance…

Be sure to check out Metaphors of Mind and Money over at the Psy-Fi Blog. It’s a great overall read, but what caught me was the section, “Humans Aren’t Stats”:

This probably doesn’t seem like a big deal, but psychology embraced the concept wholeheartedly and great swathes of the subject were suddenly devoted to assuming that the human mind worked the same way as laboratory based statistical analysts did. Economics meanwhile was already set on a path that saw humans as rational processes of great swathes of data and embraced these ideas with alacrity. A tool for data manipulation was transformed into a metaphor for the human condition and from. People became all powerful manipulators of data, the mind a metaphorical statistician.

As Gigerenzer has pointed out on many occasions (see, for example Where do New Ideas Come From?) this probabilistic revolution is simply infeasible when implemented in the human brain. Once you leave the confines of the laboratory and expose people to the wide ranging set of stimuli in the real world it’s impossible to process data in the way that these models require [ed. emphasis mine]. Sure, it’s possible to use the metaphor to generate some interesting ideas, but going the further step to assuming that the mind works in the same way is close to crazy.

Bottom line, most of us are way too analytical for our own good, and we rely way too much on rational thinking and modeling to describe our environment and react to it. We’re able to be this way because we live in a very structured, sanitized, and (relatively) predictable environment.

But nature in its true form is neither neat nor predictable - and it often does a very good job of debunking human analysis and rationality in very sudden and powerful ways.

The key is, recognize that you have the luxury of living in a very unnatural world defined by several structured layers of comfort, security, and predictability – all of which are based on some type of dependency relationship. In short, stay sharp and don’t be oblivious to what lies just beyond the fringe of our neat little world.

As much as I enjoy swimming outdoors, I have to admit that it’s not always a pleasant experience. Unlike a swimming pool (well, unlike MOST swimming pools at least), the lake is not a sterile and antiseptic environment.

So at any given time, you might find some or all of these niceties in the water:

- Algae
- Pollen
- Bacteria (especially E. Coli)
- Viruses
- Parasites
- Fungi
- Mold spores
- Sewage effluent
- Heavy metals
- Pesticides
- Runoff from agriculture and urbanization
- Air pollution particulates

These water contaminants – whether naturally occurring or artificially created – unfortunately wreak havoc on our bodies if they’re allowed to remain in our systems for extended periods of time. When left unchecked, they can cause allergies, mild to severe ear infections (i.e. swimmer’s ear), sinus infections, and flu-like illnesses due to water-borne contaminants.

So while many of us do what we can to keep our beaches and swim areas clean and contaminant-free, we have to accept the reality that it’s impossible to completely eliminate these health risks whenever we swim in the lake.

But what we can do is mitigate their impact on our personal health.

Here are a few tips and techniques I use to stave off the effects of swimming in any outdoor body of water where any of the above contaminants might be present:

Pre-swim

Prior to entering the lake, I irrigate my ear canals with a solution containing 50% white vinegar and 50% isopropyl alcohol:

Post-swim

As soon as I get out of the water, I once again irrigate my ear canals with the vinegar/alcohol solution. When I return home, I immediately get in the shower and clean myself with an antibacterial soap. I also irrigate my nasal passages with a warm water solution containing 1/4 teaspoon of sodium chloride (salt) and 1/4 teaspoon of sodium bicarbonate (baking soda):

To administer the vinegar/alcohol solution, I use a small pump spray bottle. For the nasal irrigation, I use a neti pot:

I used to get swimmer’s ear and have sinus problems all the time post-swim. However, I’ve never had any problems since I started with this pre/post swim “maintenance” program. So feel free to try this out if you think it can help you!

I biked out to L1 and arrived at 5:20am just in time for the sunrise. And let me tell you, it was a quite a grand showing! Not to be outdone, the lake gave us mirror flat swimming conditions, Caribbean clear water, and a 71F water temperature.

This perfect storm of perfect conditions brought out quite a crowd of both current and newly minted Lake Monsters. Congrats to all the L1 first timers!

Sunrise video

#64 – Jamie

#65 – Jim

#66 – Marsha

#67 – Todd

#68 – Kimberly

How about that sunrise again?