Okay… it was a bit colder than nippy… it was 46F / 8C! The huge storm we had last night took down giant trees and the massive thunder storm knocked out the lights and cancelled the Town’s “Midnight Madness”… but more importantly… it rolled the Lake over!
So we started the season very slowly this year, temperature-wise. On June 1 it is usually around 60F… but this year because the long, cold spring, it was only 48F for our first swim on June 1. Then by July 1 weekend the Lake usually has warmed up to the point where we get our first “roll-over”. But again, because the weather was behind that didn’t happen until last night.
So what’s a “roll-over”?
Well, the first time I experienced it was in 2006 when I was training for the English Channel in Lake Ontario. My daughter, Maisey, and I went down to the Lake to measure the temp one evening… it was 72F. About as nice as it gets in Lake O, or in our corner of it at least. That was great, because I was planning a 5 hour training swim for the next morning, so conditions where ideal. Only problem was… the next morning Maisey and I showed up again and I told her to go and check the temp again while I got my cap and goggles on. She walked back towards me and said it was 55F?! I told her she was crazy and to go do it again, she must have screwed up somehow… although it’s pretty hard to screw that up. She said she had screwed up… it was 48F! What?!?! I walked over… left the thermometer in the water for a while and it was… 46F?!?!? WTF?!
Well, what happened then… and last night… was that we got a strong wind (huge storm, in fact last night that took down a bunch of trees in the neighborhood even). The catch is… the wind was from the North. And a north wind blows all the warm surface water across the lake… towards Rochester. Of course the water has to be replaced somehow… so the water creates a circle (a convection current) and as it goes across the top… it pushes the water across the bottom towards Oakville. The catch being… the water at the bottom of this Lake is very cold!!!
Odd, but the wind is probably the biggest factor in determining the temp of the water here in Oakville.
You knew it was bound to happen though, or at least I did. We’ve had incredible heat here recently… 38C / 100F… plus humidity… taking it to 47C / 116F!!! Warmed the surface water up nicely… in fact, some of the LOST Boys went for a beautiful sunrise dip on Wednesday morning… the water was unusually warm… about 76F / 24C!!!
So you can imagine everyone’s surprise (except for the wiley ol’ vets who knew better!) this morning when it seemed a bit colder. I walked in up to my ankles and yelled out to Bill and Mel in the zodiac that I thought it was about 55F… Bill said “umm… I don’t think so”. After standing in the water to measure the temp for about a minute I knew he was right, even before I checked the thermometer… 46F / 7C!!! Yikes.
But… what the hell… we still went in. We didn’t have official check in this morning… as we knew nobody was going to be in long enough to worry about it. But there was probably about 60 swimmers (or dippers, as the case may be!). About half the crowd realized it would take longer to get into their wetsuits than we’d be in the water, so didn’t bother… but stuck around… for a good laugh!
We swam maybe 50m out and 50m back. It was cold. “Stupid Cold”, as I like to call water in the 40’s. But there is still something to be gained from swimming in water that cold, believe it or not. It does give you some confidence, let’s you know you can swim in Stupid Cold water and gives you a base line for what cold water really is. It also builds up your tolerance and conditions you to the water… both mentally and physically. And based on the logic of the great Freda Streeter (the “Channel General” of the English Channel swimming in Dover), the best thing is to go in twice. And of course, she’s right. Because it again gets you over your fear and shows you what you can do. It really isn’t as hard the second time. Which makes you mentally and physically tougher and better conditioned.
Having said that… yes, some of that was bullshit. We also just felt like seeing if we could do it. For the fun of it. And, in a twisted kind of way… yes, it was kinda fun!
Cheers,
Rob