I hope you all are enjoying the spring weather this week. It’s finally starting to feel like spring now and our Venus flytraps and other carnivorous plants are in full growth mode now. I love this time of year!
With summer just around the corner, there are lots and lots of swim events coming up. I wanted to give you all some information before the party this Saturday at 6pm at Yeonjoo’s so that you can ask any questions you may have at the party. For those of you unable to attend the party this Saturday, feel free to email, text or call (636-209-8916) anytime if you have questions or want to get more information.
For reference, I try to link to the registration (first) and a mapping of the location (second) of the event for each event listed below. For events that SOMA stands to compete as a team, I have marked them in RED. Please consider attending those events most strongly so that we can swim together and earn more team awards – aka the best kind of awards!!
UPCOMING EVENTS
May 19th & 20th – Bend Long Course Meters Meet & Beautiful Lake Juniper “Open Water” Swim at Juniper Swim & Fitness Center in Bend, OR: This is a fun overnight trip to Bend and a great chance to get some LCM times for the big OMS Association Champs LCM meet later in the summer. Do the Bend LCM Meet on Saturday and then the “open water” swim (in a pool with no lane lines) on Sunday morning. The Beautiful Lake Juniper swim is a great introduction to open water swimming for people who have never done an open water event and it’s the closest event to southern Oregon this year aside from our lake swims at Applegate, Eel, and Lake of the Woods. And, to top off a great trip, there is a party on Saturday night hosted by my good friend Christian Tujo that ALL swimmers are invited to. It should be a lot of fun!
May 26th – 5K or 10K ePostal National Championship at Amazon Pool in Eugene, OR: Bring a timer and choose to swim either a 5K or 10K outdoors in beautiful Amazon pool. Spots are limited and there isn’t much room left, so let me know very soon if you want to do this event. Amazon Pool is a 50m outdoor pool (Olympic size) and we will be renting the entire facility from 2pm to 6pm. We are in need of lap counters, so if you want a free trip and to support and time a teammate (plus maybe some hot tub time and free dinner or whatever your timer is willing to offer), please let me know.
June 9th – Oregon Senior Games at Juniper Swim & Fitness Center in Bend, OR: Open to anyone 50 years old or older (sorry youngsters, myself included), this is a qualifier for the 2019 National Senior Games in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Could be fun for many of you!
July 12th (Note this is a Thursday) – Foster Lake Cable Swims (1-mile & 2-mile) near Sweet Home, OR: Definitely try to get to this event if at all possible. The 2-mile cable swim is the USMS National Championship this year. The 1-mile cable swim will be the open water equivalent of the OMS Association Champs SCY meet that 30 of us attended in Corvallis on April 20-22. That means that SOMA will be competing against other teams in Oregon and be vying for an open water championship banner. I know of at least five of us (maybe more I’m forgetting) are planning on coming. Let’s all show up for this event and come home with another banner!
July 14th & 15th – Applegate Lake Swims at Applegate Lake near Ruch, OR: Our good friends and neighbors, Rogue Valley Masters, will be hosting the longest-running open water swim in Oregon. This is one of the (if not THE) best open water swim in Oregon so be sure not to miss it! On Saturday we offer the 10K (national championship this year!), 5K and 2.5K. Sunday is the 1500m swim, followed by the crazy-fun 500m pursuit relays. Be there! I and Mike Servant will be co-race directors for the event and volunteers are always needed, mostly in kayaks on the water, so if you’re not planning on swimming, plan on coming out to help.
July 27th-29th – Cascade Lake Swim Series & Festival at Elk Lake: COMA will host the 24th Annual swim series that includes 5 swims in 3 days. This is the most well attended open water swim on the Oregon circuit, and for good reason…it’s an awesome event!
August 11th – Eel Lake Swims in William M. Tugman State Park: Offering 1500-meter and 3000-meter swims, this will be SOMA’s first official hosted USMS sanctioned event. Please plan on attending as either a participant or a volunteer. I’ve done this swim in years past and it is in a beautiful location with wonderfully clean and clear lake. Jayna Tomac will be safety director and I will be race directing the event for the first time (with assistance from Jayna and Ralph Mohr – previous race director). If there is one event to try to get to this summer in order to support SOMA, please make this one!
August 24th-26th – Gil Young Memorial Meet in at Mt. Hood CC in Gresham, OR: This will be the long course meters (LCM) equivalent of the OMS Association Champs SCY meet that 30 of us attended in Corvallis on April 20-22. That means that SOMA will be competing against other teams in Oregon and be vying for a banner. This is a more mellow meet than was the April meet, but it is a ton of fun and one of the best LCM meets on the west coast. Nothing beats swimming outdoors. Let’s show up for this event and come home with another banner!
September 8th – Lake of the Woods Swims at Lake of the Woods, OR: Finish the summer season off right, and close to home for most of us (other than our amigos from “SOMA del Norte”) at beautiful Lake of the Woods. 2018 will be the first year that this event will be USMS sanctioned and SOMA will be hosting. In conjunction with the 1500-meter and 3000-meter swims, my good friend Chad Wikander will be putting on a lot of multi-sport events on both Saturday and Sunday so bring the family out and have them all choose an event in which to participate. Given that this event is very close for most of us and at a beautiful location, I expect a good attendance from SOMA swimmers!
That should give you all at least a few events to consider attending this summer. I really hope we can get a good-sized group to come to the Foster Lake Cable swim on July 12th and the Gil Young Meet on August 24-26. It will be fun to swim as a group again!
See many of you Saturday at Yeonjoo’s. See the rest of you sometime soon this summer in or around water!