Goggles at Dawn

You can't beat Wellington on a good day! Although I don't really go along with 'seasons' in relation to open-water swimming - after all, every day is perfect for something, some days are just a little chillier - the summer season here in Wellington is marked out pretty well by Splash and Dash. This is a great series of swim-only or aquathlon events, run by the Barefoot Triathlon team. From late November into mid-March, we assemble fortnightly on a Wednesday at Freyberg Beach for some feats of strength. The swim-only events involve laps around the pontoons and fountain, and the swimming runners do either one or two swim laps and then hurtle off somewhere on a run. They generally look completely done in when they finish, and very sweaty. My 'dash' is confined to unsteady lurching up the beach to the timing mats, and that's it. Way back in the late 90s, my father took part in these events but believed me to be too young and foolish to participate. This was som