Report: DAM Lake Berryessa OW

Photography and Story by Bart Selby

Scene at 2009 Lake Berryessa OW

Once again, the Davis Aquatic Masters (DAM) showed the world how to put on a party, the 25th annual Lake Berryessa Open Water swim was both huge and a success.  Over 1200 swimmers participated in a plethora of events, a two-mile, a one-mile, a teenage one-mile and a 500-yard swim for 8-11 year-olds.  It's by far the biggest swim in PMS, and one of the largest masters events in the country.  Each of the masters events were about 450 swimmers each, with wave starts by age.

The Marlins in attendance did well, Laurin Weisenthal swam both the one and two miles, finishing in 1st in her age group in both swims, and 2nd and 3rd overall.  Cheryl Hardin doubled too, placing 3rd and 5th in her age groups!  Henry Chan also did both swims.  Leon Kief had a good swim in the two mile, the rest of the team competed in the one mile.  The other swimmers were Alli Cravito, (4th in her age group), Ann Lambertson (3rd in her age group) , Julia Montgomery, Regina James, Coach Carla Navarrete-Gianoli, Brook Baker and Bart Selby.

Before the start of first group of women

The weather was great, a bit of high overcast to start the day, but clear skies, almost no wind and temperatures in the mid 70's when the races started.

If you have not been to Lake Berryessa, it's a two hour drive from the Joinville Pool, east of Napa and west of Clear Lake.  Back when Bill Stuart was coaching the Marlins the team rented busses for the annual start of summer pilgrimage.  During the Thomas Huggins years the tradition passed into the history books and now only a small group of Marlin survivors still make the trek.

The water was as low as I've seen it, and this was my 17th straight year.  But it mattered little, the courses were the same, with the exception of a swim through a channel between Flamingo island(s).  In most years this is only one island, but low water turned a gravel bar into terra firma.  Zodiac island, just to the north of the course, was a peninsula, as it was when the famous killer attacked here back in 1969.

Start of first group of men

The water was good, decent visibility, and warm, the organizers claimed 69-70, it felt like 72 or more to me.  They had wetsuit divisions for each swim, I did see one swimmer start the two with a wetsuit and take it off and give it to a kayak.  I also saw a huge fish jump out of the water near the finish of the two mile, a first for me at this swim.

I'd have to rate this year's tee-shirts thumbs-down, the logo (pictured above) is a shark with the international red slash "no" symbol.  Prior shirts have been much better, although truth be told, no one can challenge the Santa Cruz Pier swim in the clothing department.  They remain unsullied at the top of the best gear list with at least long sleeved tees and often good quality sweatshirts with outstanding artwork, included in the price of the swim!  Santa Cruz did pass out really bad hats about ten years ago, but have been hitting them out of the park since then.

I can't rate the food the swimmers had, I take my kayak (and my daughter) and help on the two-mile, the food they gave us volunteers was excellent subs they made to order on the spot.  Because we are busy from when we arrive until I finish the one-mile we did not have a chance to hang with the Marlins, but they had a group in the usual spot, but without a banner this year.

At the start

The starts were about the same as past years--if you are serious about your time you have to do the blender thing.  If you are not worried about qualifying for the Olympic trials, just hang back and let the maniacs thrash each other.  There was talk at the PMS open water meeting about starting in waves by seeded times, not by age- that may help on large swims like this.  It may also be possible to start even more spread out using the chips and mats to start, but that remains to be seen, perhaps next year.

Berryessa Finish

What was new this year was timing chips and no balloon arch.  The chips, which were pioneered by the Marlins at the Parkside Mile in April, sped up the results postings.  The chips allowed them to post results quickly, which was a pleasant change.  The new arch is identical to the one we used at Parkside, except it is yellow.  It is not as tall as the balloon arch but was pretty easy to see as we finished.  Having to swim between the two islands also helped keep wayward swimmers to a minimum.  The finish was a bit tougher than years past.  Even though they paved the boat launch ramp another hundred feet into the lake, it was just short of the finish, so we had a muddy exit.

Webmaster's Note:  Thanks, Bart for this great article and the fantastic photographs!  FYI:  For the complete meet results, CLICK HERE.  If you'd like to see more of Bart's great photos of the 2009 Lake Berryessa Swim go to: http://picasaweb.google.com/bartongarrett/2009BerryessaSwim#