September 2012 - English Channel World Record!

Hi Friends,

 

 

Wow - what an absolute whirl wind the past two weeks have been. I'll try and start from the begining... I arrived in London late at night on the 27th of August with my coach Harley Connolly. I'd just competed in a different marathon every weekend for the past 6 weeks so I wasn't feeling too crash hot. When we arrived we picked up our hire car and drove to our first hotel in Folkestone. We arrived at around 11pm so as soon as we got to our room we crashed straight away. It wasn't until the morning when he woke up that we discovered just how dodgy our hotel was. The room was tiny and I could hardley even fit my bag in there - there was no shower so we had to take baths all week and the beds must have been about as old as the run down hotel. As disappointing as it was we tried to stay positive because we were only going to be there for about a week before switching to the Varne Ridge Holiday Park. I had been told before coming over from a friend and fellow channel swimmer that the best place to stay over there was the Varne Ridge. It didn't disappoint. David and his wife Evelyn who own the place were great they did everything they could to make us feel welcome. All the people that stay at the Varne Ridge are channel swimmers, so it was cool just to walk around talking to the other swimmers and finding out their story and why they wanted to swim the channel. It was like one big family, everyone was so supportive of each other.

 

 

Pretty much everyday I was there before I actually swam the channel was exactly the same. Wake up in the morning have breakfast, go training, rest, have lunch, rest, go training again, then have dinner... It was very repetitive and boring but that's what we needed to do to swim fast. I swam at the Dover pool for most sessions and the lifeguards there were great. When they saw me come in they'd clear a lane for me so I'd always have a lane to myself. The other public swimmers were also great they all knew I was going for a record attempt so they didn't have a problem with me having a lane to myself. Some days in the lanes either side of me there would be up to 6 people in each lane. I did train in the Harbour at least once every three or four days to get my body ready to the cold water, but I much perferred to train in the pool. The first day I swam in the Harbor nobody else was in there and I was too scared to swim too far by myself so I just decided to swim about 100m back and forth very close to shore for about 45 minutes. I absolutely hate swimming in an ocean by myself. It was very weird that no one else was in the Harbor at that time because there are normally other channel swimmers in there all the time. The next time we swam in the Harbour I made my coach Harley hire a kayak and paddle next to me. Thankfully the third time I swam in there my support swimmer Damian Blaum had arrived by then and it was much better having someone else to swim with out there. Damian arrived in on the 5th of September. For anyone that doesn't know Damian has been one of the best marathon swimmers in the world over the last 10 years now. He finished second to me this year in the 2012 Fina Grand Prix ranking. I was very lucky have him there helping me out!

 

 

It was on Thursday the 6th of September when I was half way through one of my training session when I got the call from my pilot Mike Oram saying he wanted to meet up to discuss when we should plan to swim. We met up an hour later on his boat down in the harbor. He gave us all the information he had on what the weather conditions were going to be like that week and we decided that Saturday morning at 5am would be the best time to swim... I had been dreaming of this day for so long and now it was going to finally be happening. That night I didn't get much sleep at all because I was far too excited so I spent the early hours of the morning reading my Bradley Wiggins book I'd bought earlier that week. Bradley Wiggins was the guy who won the Tour de France this year. Friday I made all my drinks/feeds and we picked up some last minute things we needed from the shops. I had already packed my bags with everything I needed a few days before because I knew I could get the call up anytime and I wanted to be ready. My sleep Friday night wasn't much better than the night before. I was still far too excited to sleep so again I was up in the early hours of Saturday morning reading my Bradley Wiggins book knowing it was only a matter of hours before I'd be swimming the English Channel!

 

 

After getting to the boat at 4am and speaking with Mike, he decided it would probably be best if we pushed our start time back to around 6.30am. This gave us time to head back to the Varne Ridge for  about an hour's more sleep before driving back down to the boat. After getting some last minute advice from Mike, I put my suit on and started greasing up. We got to the start line around 6.30am and Mike said be careful when you jump there is only about a meter of water under you. Not wanting to dive too deep I did a kind of retarded side roll into the water then swam to the beach about 50 metres away. I did a few arm swings, a last minute pee and then stuck my arms in the air to let Mike know I was ready to start. I got the count down from my crew, then once I heard the horn I ran into the water and started swimming. I can't really remember too much more from the start of the swim . I was kind of having an out of body experience. I just remember thinking this is the coolest thing ever, I'm swimming the English Channel!

 

 

I was feeding every 20 minutes and my crew was constantly communicating with me the whole way via a white board and pen. After the first hour I was told by my crew I was 3 minutes under the record. I couldn't believe I was that far under after only an hour. I felt very comfortable so decided to pick up the pace. This whole time my crew was writing me motivational comments on the white board and letting me know some messages my parents and friends were sending me on twitter from back home. When I took my 3 hour feed my crew let me know I was now 7 minutes under the record! They kept reminding me to relax, stay strong and keep in rhythm. At the 4 hour 30 minute mark I was told I still had 7 minutes up on the record and I was holding the same pace Petar had. This was great -while I wasn't gaining any more distance I wasn't losing any either. This is where I started to fall apart. After 5 hours I was struggling mentally and physically was starting to really hurt. I was getting annoyed and distracted at every little thing. I could feel myself slowing down and there was nothing I could do about it. My crew could see I was going through a rough patch and they tried to help, but all I did was get more angry and I even yelled at them a couple of times - which I'm very embarrassed and ashamed of now. I'd been swimming as fast as I could for 5 hours and now I had lost it mentally and was trying as hard as I could to hold it together. I think there were two things that happened around the same time that helped me through this hole I was in. The first was my crew had let me know Petar Stoychev was on the phone to Mike my pilot. He was checking how I was going... The second thing was that my crew had held up a sign letting me know I only had 4.4kms left to swim in under one hour ten minutes if I still wanted the record. My next sign said I had 2.7kms to swim in under 44 minutes. With about 35 minutes left to swim I told Damian, my support swimmer I wanted him in with me. Just after Damian jumped in I got another sign saying I had 1500m to swim in 30 minutes. I was in a world of pain by this stage. My stroke had gone out the back door well and truly by this stage and I was just throwing my arms over as fast as I could. The next sign said 500m to swim in under 10 minutes. It wasn't until this sign that I knew the record would well and truly be mine. As I got to about 10 meters from the French coast I started lifting my head to look for a good rock to climb up on. The clock doesn't stop until you are standing up on both feet stably. When I found my rock I grabbed it and pulled my body up. It was so hard to get my feet up because it was a little slippery and really sharp. I have quite a few cuts and bruises on my feet, legs, elbows and hands because of it, but when I finally got up I stuck both hands in the air to let my boat know to stop the clock. After I did this I heard a loud horn and I knew I had finished. I didn't really know what to do after this. I didn't know what to think or feel so I just sat down on my rock and stared into space for a few minutes. I was having another out of body experience. Damian was there trying to talk to me but I couldn't hear a word he was saying. I just sat there wondering how I should be feeling. When we finally got back to the boat everyone was congratulating me but again I wasn't taking anything in anyone was saying to me. My offical time was 6 hours 55 minutes flat. The boat ride back to England seemed to take forever and I was getting really boat sick. At one stage I had my head between my legs but I ended up being alright. When we pulled up at the dock in Dover I thanked Mike again and he gave us a copy of the course we took. There was one journalist there waiting for us and after the quick interview we were all in the car on our way back to the Varne Ridge.

 

 

Once we got back to the Varne Ridge David and Evelyn were there waiting with a heap of the other swimmers with champagne for us. It was awesome. A couple of days before David told me if I did break the record he'd put my plaque in the prime position just above the office. When we got back there was a piece of paper over the old plaque that was there saying 'Trent Grimsey World Record holder - 6.55' !  It was unreal! Again I was still having a bit of an out of body experience, so I can't really remember too much more from then. I was up all that night with interviews and reading all the tweets, emails and support I had received from everyone. I've been having interviews from Saturday afternoon to right up till now, it's been every tiring but I've loved every minute of it. I returned back to Australia early Wednesday morning to about 30 or 40 little kids and their parents from my swimming club and lots of family all cheering for me at the airport!!!

 

 

Below I have some pictures from the trip:

  

 

 

After my first swim in the Harbor

 

 

 

 

My support swimmer Damian Blaum and I

The Gallivant

My coach Harley Connolly, myself and Damian Blaum

Greesing up to stop chafe and try to keep me a little warmer

Last minute carbohydrates

The sunrise just minutes before I started my crossing

The duck tape is to keep me from losing the swimming cap

The start line (Dover, England)

The White Cliffs of Dover in the background

One of my 28 feeds, they only took 2 or 3 seconds each

I saw this picture being taken so I thought I'd smile

Mike Oram giving me a mouth full when I started to fall off the pace!

France!

Damian Blaum and I just as we got back on the boat

The offical paper work

My whole crew - Donal Buckley, Harley Connolly, myself, Owen O'Keffe and Damian Blaum

The kids from Lawnton Swim Club

Here are a couple of cool articals and vidoes post swim:

Daily News of Open Water Swimming

Channel Swimming & Piloting Federation

Channel 9 News

Today Breakfast Show

Channel 10 News



I have so much respect for my pilot Mike Oram he definitely lived up to his reputation of being the best pilot. My crew which consisted of Harley Connolly, Damian Blaum, Donal Buckley and Owen O'Keefe were absolutely awesome and I couldn't have done it with out all of them.

I would like to thank all my sponsors for the support they have shown in me this year: FINIS, Straphine Physio & Sportscare, Premax, The College of Health and Fitness, Genesis Fitness, Belgravia Leisure, Juice Plus. Swimming the English Channel is a very expensive thing to do so I need to say special thanks to BWO Group and 1Vigor for their financial assistance they gave me with my crossing!

Now I'm back in Australia I will be having a two week break before starting my training up again. It's going to be awesome to just be a normal person again and relax. I plan on spending most of my time in bed sleeping and watching TV!


Peace'

Trent Grimsey

2012 Grand Prix Champion
English Channel World Record Holder

www.trentgrimsey.com
 

August 2012 - Seven marathons in eight weeks

 

Hi Friends,

Today I have some spare time on my hands so I thought it was a good time to do up my next blog. I'm currently in Dover (England) waiting for good enough weather to swim across the English Channel, from England to France. This has been a dream of mine for a very long time. As training for this and getting my body ready, I've competed in a different marathon every weekend for the last six weeks now...

Marathon number one: Trans Tahoe Relay 18km (California, USA) 21/7/12

 

 

This was an awesome race and is probably one of my all time favourites. It's a six person relay race across Lake Tahoe. For anyone that has never been to Tahoe it's the most beautiful place in the world. I competed in the 'Sydney Tattersals' team, Codie and Ridge (my two younger brothers) were also in the team along with our captain, Peter Theil, Alex Studzinski and Yoelvis Pedraza. We ended up winning by seven minutes and we also broke the old record. The Olympic Club organise this event and they did a great job. Click 'here' for the post race story.



Sydney Tattersals - Team Australia!

 

 



Lake Tahoe!

 

 

Marathon number two: Lac Saint Jean Grand Prix 32km (Quebec, Canada) 28/7/12

 

After Tahoe, Alex and I travelled together to Roberval to compete in the Lac Saint Jean Grand Prix. This is the most prestigious marathon of the year, it's worth the most amount of points and prize money on the Grand Prix circuit. Lac Saint Jean is known to be very cold and the conditions can be quite tricky too. For this race Alex and I stayed with Alain and Annabelle Ross. They were a fantastic host family and did everything they could to make us feel welcome. I also stayed with the Ross family last year for the same race.

This race is a very tactical race and it always starts off super slow. Sometimes it's just as hard to swim slow as it is to swim fast. Swimming slow in cold water makes you more cold and the more likely chance that you'll get hyperthermia.

I made my break after four and a half hours and ended up winning by seven minutes. After the race I dedicated my win to Francine Harvey, Alain Ross's wife who passed away one month before with cancer. I know she would have loved to have seen this race! Click 'here' for the post race story.



Winning Lac Saint-Jean, the most prestigious marathon in the world!


 

My coach Leandre and me in our Mustang at the post race celebrations!

　

Marathon number three: Lac Magog Grand Prix 34km (Quebec, Canada) 4/8/12

 

After Roberval, Alex and I picked up a new travelling buddy, Anna from Russia. The three of us somehow managed to squeeze into our tiny car with all our luggage and drove to Magog. Peter and Jackie were our host family for this race, they were fantastic! The water temperature for this race is a little warmer than the week before but it's 2km longer. Again this race always starts off so slow. I remember my coach holding up a sign after two hours letting me know that we had only swam 7.5km, no one wanted to lead. I ended up breaking away at the half way point (three and a half hours). I won this race by six minutes. I also won the 2km sprint race they had on the day before! Click 'here' for the post race story.



The last few hundred metres of Magog!





Our secret training pool in Magog!

Marathon number four: Lac Megantic World Cup 10km (Quebec, Canada) 11/8/12

 





After Magog, Alex went back to Germany - so it was just Anna and I travelling together to Megantic. I didn't have a good preparation leading up to this race. All week I'd had trouble sleeping and I had niggles in both my shoulders from the race the week before. I knew my speed would be affected from the two marathons I'd already done so if I wanted to win I had to take a big risk. Just after the start I took a different line from the pack. It didn't quite pay off for me, I ended up 4th but I was still happy with the result. For this race my host family were Marc and his partner Martine - they were great hosts. On my last day in Megantic, Marc and I went fly fishing, I'd never been fly fishing before so that was pretty cool... I didn't catch any fish, just a log! Click 'here' for the post race story.

 

 





 

The parade before the race we were all given different cars with our country flags!


 

 

Marathon number five: Lake Ohrid Grand Prix 30km (Ohrid, Macedonia) 19/8/12

 

 

After the twelve hours in transit I finally arrived in Macedonia but I was unsure whether or not anyone from the organising committee would be there to pick me up from the airport... lucky for me someone was there! I had never been to Macedonia before and I never even knew it was a country until three years ago when I met a Macedonian but it's a really beautiful country. Everything is cheap!

 

I placed second in this race to Petar Stoychev. There was a pack of five of us until about five hundred metres to go when Petar started his sprint. I just didn't have the speed I needed to match him. Click 'here' for the post race story.

 

Because this was the last Grand Prix race of the year they also awarded the overall point score winners and as I finished on top I was awarded the 2012 FINA Grand Prix Champion. Petar Stoychev is the only other person to have ever won this award! Click 'here' for the story.

For all three races in Canada and also this race I had Leandre Lapointe as my coach/feeder. Leandre was my coach in these races last year too. We make a great team and I'm very lucky to have him!

  

 

 

During the race in Ohrid

 

 

 

 

2012 FINA Grand Prix Champions!









My coach Leandre!

 

Marathon number six: BCT Gydnia Marathon 18km (Gydnia, Poland) 25/8/12

 

 



I travelled from Macedonia to Poland with my friend Pilar and her father Mario. Here I met up with my home coach from Australia, Harley Connolly. This is the first year this race has been run and the organisers did a great job with it. We swam the 18km from Hel to Gdynia in cold water passing millions of jellyfish. Again I placed second in this race to Petar, I just didn't have the speed to go with him. While swimming all these marathons has improved my endurance it's also taken away my speed, after each marathon I've done this last six weeks I can feel my speed has slowly been disappearing. I would have loved to race Petar in Macedonia and Poland when I was fresh, I think the races would have been a lot closer than they were! Click 'here' for the post race story.

 

 

 

Thomas (race organiser) and me!





Gdynia Beach- After the race!

 

 

Swimming the English Channel is quite expensive and trying to find sponsorship proved to be very difficult but I would like to thank DWO Group and 1Vigor for both contributing. At the moment the weather is not too good over here but hopefully I'll be able to swim the channel in the next few days. My fingers are crossed!

This is the cake my swimming club made for me just before I left Australia!

 

 

Peace'
 

 

Trent Grimsey

 

 

June 2012 - Capri-Napoli Grand Prix, Italy

Hey Everyone!


I returned home this morning from Italy. It was a super long trip, 30 plus hours in transit, Ahhh...


This was a very successful trip for me as not only did I win the race but I also broke record for the fastest ever crossing, it was set back in 1982 by Paul Asmuth in a time of 6 hours 35 minutes. I swam 6 hours 29 minutes. The next day Paul sent me an email congratulating me, which was very nice. Thanks to everyone for their messages of support this last week, I've really appreciated it!


The Capri-Napoli Marathon is one of the most prestigious on the Grand Prix circuit. It's from the Island of Capri to Naples (the mainland), 36km. It's a beautiful race, water is clean and the scenery is awesome.


During the race I was involved in a three person break away early in the race with two strong Italians - Andrea Volpini and Edoardo Stochino. We worked really well together and managed to open quite a big lead over the rest of the field. At the five hour mark I stepped up the pace and the two Italians both fell behind. I end up winning by 3 minutes from Edoardo, then Andrea was in third. Click ‘here’ for the post-race article.



I'm now ranked third on the overall Grand Prix rankings. I've only competed in two of the four races so far this year, the two in front of me have competed in all four races but I'm not far behind them on points. A strong performance next month in Lac Saint-Jean can potentially move me to number one. Fingers crossed!

For this race I had one of Italy's best ironman triathletes Edith Niederfriniger as my coach/ feeder. She did a fantastic job, I couldn't have done it without her. Thanks Edith!

Edith (my coach), Pilar and me

As usual for most Grand Prix races some simple Fina rules were not followed. No lead boat was provided even though I brought up in the pre race meeting that they should have one. The race was also started before all the coaches had boarded their support boats. My coach was one of the last to get let onto her boat which meant I didn't get my first feed until about 45mins into the race, most other swimmers have had three feeds by that stage. The race should never have started until every coach had been let on their support boat. Other than these things it was a great race...

Over the next four weeks I'll be doing a lot of hard training and big kms with my brothers - Codie and Ridge, before my next trip away to compete in the World Cup and Grand Prix races in Canada. I leave Australia on the 17th of July.




Preparations for my English Channel attempt are coming along nicely, everything is starting to fall into place. I'm swimming really well and putting on some decent weight. The races in Canada are going to be very important for me to get my body used to swimming in the cold water for long periods. Click 'here' for the latest news.


Special thanks needs to go to my physio Dean Sullivan for seeing me the day before I left for Italy. I'd hurt my neck and couldn't turn it. It was a public holiday but Deano still made time to see me!



Below are some cool pictures from Capri and Naples...

Here are a couple of youtube clips during the race:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnI0T1w7Mx8&list=UUQh95m0OuYA6jzF1T2rjiuA&index=1&feature=plcp

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xh_LmRRr2As&list=UUQh95m0OuYA6jzF1T2rjiuA&index=2&feature=plcp

"No person was ever honoured for what he received. Honour has been the reward for what he gave." ~ Calvin Coolidge

Peace'


Trent Grimsey

June 2012 - Oceania Championships, New Caledonia

Last week I travelled with the Australian Swim Team to compete in the 2012 Oceania Championships that were held in New Caledonia. I was lucky to be able to compete in both the pool and open water events.

The last few trips I’ve done lately I’ve travelled solo so it was good to be part of a team environment again. It was a slightly younger team that was picked for these championships, so it was great to meet some of the new up and coming swimmers Australia has.

The first day of these championships was the 5km open water event. In this race I finished second, 4 secs behind my fellow countryman, Rhys Mainstone. When it came down to the final 200m sprint, I just didn't have the change of speed I needed to go with him.

The next day was the 1500m free. We didn't have to do heats and finals for this race - just a final. I placed second again in this race but this time to teammate Jarrad Poort. It was hard having to back up from the 5km the day before, but I still managed to swim 15.32. Jarrad swam 15.30... In the 400 free I picked up my third silver medal of the championships.

The last day of these championships was the 10km open water event. Again it turned out to be a battle between Rhys and I until the last lap when I managed to break away and ended up winning by two and a half minutes. Swimming the times I swam this week after the big kms I've been doing lately, i'm very happy. Everything is starting to come together nicely!

Finishing off the 10km race - Oceania Championships

Two weeks back I received my pair of the new Finis straples spaddles. These paddles are great. The advanced design of these paddles helps teach swimmers the correct palm position. Due to the paddles strapless design, incorrect technique will cause the paddle to fall off your hand. I've been using these paddles every day since.

I leave in just 10 days for the Capri-Napoli Grand Prix in Italy. It's a 36km marathon from the Island of Capri to Naples. I'm really looking forward to this race!

"I'm going to work so hard that it's a pure guts race at the end, and if it is, I am the only one who can win it." - Steve Prefontaine

Peace'



Trent Grimsey

May 2012

I had some free time today so thought I’d do up my next blog to let everyone know what’s been happening lately.

Training’s been going really well, my brothers and I have been putting in some big kms recently as this is going to be my last real ‘big’ block of training I’ll get in before my record attempt of the English Channel in September.

Normally when I’m in big blocks of training like this I always lose weight. This block of training I’ve been trying harder than ever to put weight on. It’s ridiculous how much food I’ve been eating! I’ve put 3 kgs on since March and I’d like to put at least another 6 or 7kgs on before I take on the Channel. Everyone I’ve ever talked to who has swam the Channel in the past has told me the most important thing is to put on extra body weight in the lead up. Obviously the more body weight you have the warmer it’s going to keep your core body temperature and the lesser chance you have of suffering from hypothermia.  When you’re swimming in cold water (16 degrees) for close to 7 hours, suffering hypothermia is a real chance!

Five weeks ago Ridge (my youngest brother) and I started our Personal Training course - Cert III and IV in Fitness at The College of Health and Fitness. It’s an eight week full time course, so we only have three weeks to go, the finish line’s in sight! Doing this course has honestly been the best thing I have ever done. I’ve learnt so much about the human body that being a professional athlete I guess I should have already known.

Two weekends ago I competed in the Eyeline Noosa Blue Ocean Swim. Now this is the richest ocean swim in Queensland at the moment so the competition is always tough at this event. For the third time this year my brothers and I got a clean sweep of the podium - Ridge was third, Codie second and I won! Click ‘here’ for the post-race article.

Mel Groman and I after the Noosa Blue Ocean Swim

The next day was the Byron Bay Ocean Swim. This year the race drew around 2000 competitors. This is normally a great race and organized really well, however this year the organizers had waited until everyone was on the start line in togs with cap and goggles in hand before they announced the race would be called off due to bad conditions. You can’t have close to 2000 competitors on the start line before you call off a race and not expect them to still swim. In true ocean swimming sprit about 1000 people still swam regardless… I was one of them.

I’ve had a few changes lately. As of last week I have started with a new strength and conditioning program. I’ll now be doing all my strength and conditioning out of The College of Health and Fitness, being overseen by Tony Attridge and his team.

I have also teamed up recently with Glen Duggan from VoloSport. Glen will now be looking after my management side of things, while I can do what I do best… race hard!

Next week I’ll be traveling to New Caledonia with the Australian Swim Team to compete in the 2012 Oceania Championships. I’ll be racing in the 5km and 10km Open Water events as well as the 1500m freestyle. For me Oceania is not super important so I’ll be training through but it is always good to have a hit out while in hard training to see where you’re at. I think i'll still swim pretty fast though!

The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man’s determination -Tommy Lasorda

Peace’

Trent Grimsey

Persenting the Trent Grimsey trophy at Lawnton Swim Clubs presentation day!

March 2012 - Australian Surf Life Saving Championships

It’s been six weeks since my last blog and what a busy six weeks it’s been. After our Australian Open Water Nationals I returned home to Brisbane to have a week off swimming completely. For that whole week I did absolutely nothing, it was great. I just laid in bed and watched tv… The most exercise I did in that time was walks to the kitchen to get food!

The week after I started back training but only once a day. I’d train in the mornings so I could then have the rest of the day free to relax. I think this break was exactly what my body needed, especially after the marathon in Argentina earlier this year where I got sick from swimming in the dirty water over there.

As much as I would have liked another week just training once a day that couldn’t last so the next week I was back into full training again. At the end of this week was a race in New Zealand that I thought I’d do to see what level of fitness I still had. The race was in Mt. Maunganui and was part of the New Zealand Ocean Swim Series. I really like competing in this series as the races are ran well and the distance of the races are only 3km, still a sprint. I won this race by 30 seconds over New Zealand’s top open water swimmer Kane Radford. Click 'here' for the post race artical.

The next weekend was another ocean swim. The Mooloolaba Eyeline 1000 Ocean Swim. This is a race I have won the last 3 or 4 years.  I knew this race was going to be tough as I had both my little brothers (Codie and Ridge) in the field trying to also win it. I ended up winning with Codie and Ridge in second and third. It was a Grimsey top three finish which was pretty cool. We did the same thing in that race last year too! Click 'here' for the post race artical.

There was also an olympic distance triathlon up at Mooloolaba the next day that Codie thought he’d enter having done no cycling or running what so ever. He rode the 40km bike leg on my 15kg mountain bike, it was a very hilly bike course too which made it was hilarious to watch. Needless to say his overall ranking was way back. Classic Codie!

This month I have been lucky enough to get two new sponsors on board which is great. They are Premax and Legal Muscle:

Premax is an Australian company that manufactures premium quality Sports Performance and Massage Products. The Sports Performance range includes Sweatproof Sunscreen, Sport and Muscle Cream, and Anti Friction Cream. A link to their website is here: http://www.premax.com.au/

Legal Muscle is now going to be supplying me with all my supplements. They have a huge range of supplements and deliver to anywhere in Australia. Check out their website here: http://www.legalmuscle.com.au/. Remember to support the people who support me!

The Australian Surf Life Saving Nationals were last week and tragically a young 15 year old boy lost his life while competing in one of the events on the first day of competition. My thoughts are with all his family and friends at this time, it’s absolutely devastating.

I have raced surf a couple of years earlier but never any big carnivals. Late last year I joined Northcliffe Surf Club. This was my first Aussies and I was excited to race and see what I could do. I had three big races there: the surf race, surf team race and the taplin relay. Unfortunately none of these races really went to plan for me. There were a few events that got cut from the program on the last day because there just wasn’t enough time to run them and the final of the surf team was one of those events, damn!

In the individual surf race I placed 4^th in the final, which I was disappointed with. I had a great start but swam too far wide on my way in (back to the beach) however I don’t want to take anything from the other guys in front of me, they are all quality swimmers. In the Taplin relay I was in the A team with Mark Bint, Shannon Eckstein, Dev Lahey, Joel Simpson and Tate Smith. The Taplin relay is the blue ribbon event at Aussies. There are hundreds of people watching and cheering, the atmosphere was awesome. After the surf race I was adamant I wasn’t going to make any more errors than in my swim leg of the taplin I swam around one too many buoys, ahhhhh. Even though I cost my team around 15 meters we were still good enough to win with my clubs B team coming in second. Apparently that’s the first time a club has ever gone first and second in a Taplin relay at Aussies. I would like say a big thank you to the McDonald family for letting me stay at their place while Aussies were on. It saved me having to constantly drive back and forth from Brisbane to the Gold coast every day.

My next big race is not until the Italian Grand Prix in June. The next 3 months are going to be a really solid training block for me. I’m going to be even more of a hermit than I normally am; whenever I’m not training I’ll be at home resting. This block of training is especially important as it’s what is going to set me up for the English Channel attempt I have coming up in September. I'm really looking forward to it!

For those that don’t know my brother Codie has moved back up from Melbourne and we are training together again. We are always pushing ourselfs to new limits when we train together as be both hate being beaten. If you’re one of our competitors this is worst case scenario for you…

“To achieve something out of the ordinary, one needs to accept that they must be a bit different!”

I'm off now to play with my new GPS Hydro Tracker from FINIS!

Peace'

Trent Grimsey

Argentina Grand Prix Races and the 2012 Australian Open Water Championships

Wow what a busy few weeks it’s been. I went to Argentina to compete in the world’s two longest marathons swims. The Santa Fe – Coronda Grand Prix (57km) and the Hernandarias – Parana Grand Prix (88km).  After that I flew back to Australia to compete in our Australian Open Water Nationals in Perth.

One week before I left for my Argentina trip my friend Pilar Geijo emailed me with a few tips and advice. One of the tips was that I need to be very flexible with things in Argentina. I didn’t fully understand what she meant by that at the time but now I look back and can see it was some of the best advice I’d ever been given.

Below is a picture of the pool we trained in the days leading up to the first race. Needless to say my FINIS snorkel was given a solid work out that week, as there was no way I was opening my mouth in that water. When I touched the bottom of the pool with my feet, all I could feel was slime. I'll never complain about the Lawnton pool being dirty again after having to swim in that...

Training pool in Santa Fe

The first race I had over there was the Santa Fe- Coronda 1.5km sprint race. These sprint races are put on to get the city excited about the main race and to keep the sponsors of the race happy. The race came down to a sprint finish between me and an Argentinian. I had a feeling I'd touched first though all the organisers said the Argentinian had touch before me. Fortunately for me one of the Russian coaches had taped the finish and it showed I'd touched first. When the organisers saw the video they too agreed I'd touched first, then they went and had a little meeting. When they returned they told me 'we are changing it to the swimmer who swam under the touch pad first wins and that was the Argentinian'... Now I was starting to realise what ‘be flexible’ meant.

In the Santa Fe - Coronda Grand Prix (57km) race I finished 5th in a time of 8 hours 36 minutes, only 12 seconds behind first place. With three hours to go in this race I made a few silly mistakes that took away from my sprint at the end. It pains me to think what could have been had I just stayed patient. I really learnt a lot from this race though and I don't think I’ll never make the same mistakes again.

During the Sant Fe- Coronda race

Above is a picture during the race. As you can see the water is very brown, you couldn't see anything when you had your head under the water, just black. A few of my competitors say they prefer the water being brown as if it was clear you'd be able to see all the creatures that you're really swimming with, if people could see what was is in those rivers they'd never get in it. Also in these rivers there are so many germs and bacteria. I, along with many of the other competitors, picked up bad gastro after the race. I was running to the toilet every hour, this lasted about three days until I saw a doctor that gave me some gastro pills. Thank god they worked!

My next race was the Hernandarias - Parana 1.5km sprint race. After everything that went down the week before in the sprint race I decided I had to win comfortably just to make sure there would be no rule changes or confusion at the end. I won this race by 23 seconds…

Two days later was meant to be the Herandarias- Parana Grand Prix (88km) race. The organizers had waited till everyone had gotten there togs on and greased up before they told us the race would not be swam that morning due to bad weather. To make things worse I even missed my sister’s wedding back in Australia so I could say I’d competed in the world’s longest marathon, ouch!

At dinner that night we were told tomorrow we’d be racing an alternative 5km race instead of the 88km race, it would not be worth any Fina points and the prize purse would be going from $20,000 down to $7000... When I quizzed the organizer about why the prize money was being cut he was very quick to say if we wanted to complain he'd cancel the race all together...  Again I keep remembering what Pilar had told me, be flexible! I ended up winning the 5km race by 9 seconds...



Presentation for the Hernandarias – Parana alternative 5km race

 

The promotitional girls - who didn't speak a word of english!



Being the world’s two longest professional marathon races you’d think the prize money would be some of the biggest or of an equal value right? They’re actually the two lowest paid races on the circuit. Unfortunately the water safety in both these races were non-existent. There was no one making sure the escort boats or spectator boats kept a safe distance from the swimmers during either of the races. At times boats were running into swimmers and nothing was done about it. This is why unless big changes are made I can’t see myself going back. It’s not worth risking my life and safety doing these races for very little reward.

While I was in Argentina I had Pilar’s father Mario Geijo as my coach/feeder/translator/taxi driver/roomie and tour guide. He was fantastic and did absolutely everything for me. Below is a Picture of Mario (the guy with the beard)!

Ian, Trent, Mario and Alex

I got back to Brisbane on the 11^th of February then flew to Perth four days later for our 2012 Australian Open Water Championships. After returning home from Argentina I was feeling very run down and swimming our nationals was honestly the last thing I felt like doing. My body was screaming at me for a rest but I already had my flights and accommodation booked so I decided to race. I had nothing to lose anyway as there were no big teams being picked this year so we’d just be racing for Australian titles.

In the 10km race my mate Richard Weinberger from Canada broke away at the 5km mark. I chased as hard as I could for a good 1200m but Richard and the other two that managed to catch up to him were only increasing their lead. At this point I turned to see how many guys were on me and to my surprise there were still about ten. I had two choices. Pull the pin and swim easy the rest of the way to save my energy to try and win the 5km the next day or keep slogging away to fight it out with the ten other guys behind me for fourth place? I decided to pull the pin and swim easy. There was no use fighting it out with the other guys, my body was to run down. The next day in the 5km race while I didn’t win, I came in second…



Yasunari, Rhys, Jarrad and Trent



I have to congratulate all my team mates on their great performances too. Our club only had four swimmers competing and we still managed to place in the top ten clubs. Special mention to Zanatta Lovi. She’s one of my training partners and won the 14 year old girls 5km race by about 100 meters, in only her second ever open water race, remember her name. Also big thanks to Dean Sullivan (my physio) for making the time to come over to Perth with team Lawnton to sort out all our aches and pains.

Now I’m on my break and it’s going great, it’s good to have some time off to just relax every now and then. Tomorrow I’m getting a small surgery on my arm and I’ll be back in the water again next week training hard for my next lot of races I have coming up!


Sweat plus sacrifice equals success - (Charlie Finley)


Peace’

Trent Grimsey