The Dakar-Goree challenge: Day 1

It's been a topsy-turvy kind of couple of weeks and so in a effort to get myself focused on something, take my mind off absent friends and dysfunctional relationships, I have decided to go into training. In one month's time I will be swimming the Dakar-Goree swim, a 5 kilometer cross-the-ocean marathon, from the mainland to Goree island.

All of this is Julia's fault. Julia is from Norfolk, an English teacher and sports freak, who I have taken to hanging out with because she also makes me laugh, a lot. But she also apparently gets me into sporting situations I might not otherwise have found myself in and here I am, buying goggles and swimming hats and trying to source talcum powder (because all new sporting activities start with the purchasing of expensive and pretty outfits- I also now need a new bikini) and going swimming, every day.

This morning I went with Julia to the Olympic Swimming Pool. I swam 20 lengths, which is a kilometer, and it wasn't too painful. Tomorrow the pool is closed so I have 6 days to prepare myself for our first sea-swim, which is to swim to Ngor island, 700 metres. It doesn't sound like much but it's the sea, and there are fish, and there's no stopping after 50 metres to get the steam out of the goggles. Also, Julia has just announced that she's going away tomorrow, for a month. She'll arrive in Dakar on the 18th September. The Dakar-Goree swim is on the 17th. So she got me into it because she needs someone to experience it for her- she's not going to be here.

When she roped me into it, she told me it was 3km. I can do 3km, it's not all that bad. But today when I went to the pool I asked the life guard for some info and he left all the little kids foundering in the water to tell me about it.

"To keep in line with international swimming standards, we have changed the course of the swim- it's now 5 kilomters."

Now 5 klicks I really don't think I can do. Today I tried doing front crawl but breathing on the left hand side and I got so tired. It turns out I am really weak on that side, which poses a problem, because only half of me is fit.

"But there will be firemen and the military to pull you out and into a boat if you get tired."

That sounds better to me. Naomi and Now promise they will come along and bring peanut butter sandwiches for me, and moral support. I reckon I can do 3 klicks, and it's not a race and it's not for sponsorship or charity, so I am aiming for 3 and anything else will be a bonus.

Wish me luck!