It's orange and blue and black. The armpits have this resilient, stretchy fabric. It reads on it "IRONMAN" and "INSTINCT". It was the first wetsuit I owned. Bruce sold it to me for $100. Pretty damn cheap for a wetsuit. He said he got too fat for it.
On Father's Day of 2008, I got a gift card to purchase a new wetsuit. I went to Fleet Feet and, rather than handed a wetsuit and asked, "Does it fit?", they asked me a number of questions to fit me into a suit. I ended with a Blue Seventy Synergie. Hate the name. Love the suit.
The Synergie--er--um--can I call it something else? The Blue Seventy is incredibly efficient in its thickness versus buoyancy. But the thin material makes it suscepticable to easy rips. Two openings came undone around the chest and I gave it to Brodie to fix. For a short three days, I was left to the old wetsuit--The Instinct--while The Syner--er--Blue Seventy was being repaired.
I haven't worn this wetsuit since Ironman 2007. I haven't worn it since I failed at a race that has fed spite that fueled rage that drove me to sign up for this Ironman Wisconsin.
As fate would have it, I was swimming with this wetsuit in the same lake where I failed four years ago.
As fate would have it, I was swimming in the water with the brother of the man--Ryan Griessmeyer--who helped me develop my first breakthrough in swimming.
As fate would have it, I was swimming this day on a Tuesday.
As fate would have it, it was, as we Irish Protestants call it, "The Twelfth".
The next day, I was swimming again. I have employed every single friend and stranger to help me swim at least five times a week until Ironman Wisconsin. This couple was kind enough to let me tag along in Lake Monona with them. They told me, "Don't worry about being slow. We will see you, swim back and swim out." They circled me like sharks.
Coincidentally, my old wetsuit has cuts on the crotch that resembled a sharkbite.
The day before, Ryan and his wife-to-be Lauren saw these marks. "Tough place to have rips," Lauren told me.
"A shark bit at me," I joked. Then I put my body in the water and remembered why I got a new wetsuit. Those rips sure do fill up my nether-regions fast.
The couple who swam the day after, asked me if I was comfortable in the water. In order to avoid a long story about how I am not but I'm better now, I said, "Yes, I'm comfortable in the water." I surprised myself by saying that out loud. I have a tendency to go on about things...
They asked me how I wanted to go or how did I usually go. I pointed out to the water jump ramp and over to the end of the Monona Terrace. The very corner where I dropped out of the Ironman Wisconsin in 2007.
Wearing that old wetsuit and putting it on my body for the first time in many years, I smelled the same smells. The day before this, I put it on with Ryan and Lauren and we went out. I arrived where I once dropped out of the race.
I imagined that boat was still there. The man in the boat shoes and sunglasses was ready to help.
To my left was Ryan and to my right was Lauren. They swam on and so did I. My swim had changed from those days in 2007. And we made it about .75--maybe .80 miles off until we turned around.
In my swim session the next day, I swam even faster in that distance. The swim back had many waves and it felt like I was fighting the lake at times, but I made it back.
After I got the Blue Seventy back, the Ironman Instinct made its way onto Craigslist for sale. There is someone coming tomorrow to buy it. It's had lemongrass soap, sweat, tears, lake water, ocean water, piss, and throwup on it. I would never tell its tales but I would just tell the buyer, "I got too fat for it."
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