The goal in the spring was to transition from base building high volume training to cold water training. We still held our volume high (50K/week) for most of the weeks but we would allow it to drop below 50K in interest of spending time in cold water. When we got in water at 50F (10C) or lower, we found that we had to allocate more recovery time (shivering and rewarming our core) from our allocated training time. We also had trouble pushing our bodies to do multi hour swims at those temperatures on the weekends. Each time we went out at the lower temperatures, we would try to push ourselves a little further to the edge of serious hypothermia without going over. It was a tense time period as we keep a close eye on each other to insure we were safe.
We did our first lake swim of the season on April 7th at a temperature of 46.9F (8.3C). We decided the day before that we were going to do it but when we got to the shore, it was blowing snow with about a 1" of snow on the ground. The desire to bail and work on building fat by getting a double stack of pancakes at the local diner was very large. We finally convinced ourselves that if we got up that early and drove to the lake that we should get in. We negotiated that we would do at least 6 strokes out and back. It was minor and we could have gone further but it was the first step in getting back in. Two days later (no longer snowing), we jumped back in for a solid 15 minutes to start our slow, conservative re-introduction into the cold water.
I am not sure how others people's bodies react to the cold water but here is a brief description of how mine did in that 48-50F (9-10C) temperatures. As we walked into the water, the leg bones actually hurt at what seems to be the bone level. Not sure what the physiological explanation of this. We would frequently stand in the cold water with only our legs in until the legs numbed. Our excuse was to reduce the mental shock so that only half the body would be "hurting" at a time. Once the legs numbed, we would submerge the rest of the body. At first, we were conservative and would not dive in head first so that if we had the gasp reflex from the cold, we would not ingest water. We found that our previous cold water training had trained out the gasp reflex at these temperatures so we quickly went for a dive in and stroke away rapidly. Once we dove in, we would instinctively stroke like we were sprinting. Not sure if it was due to desire to get out or generate more heat. The skin would tingle like a thousand small needles were being pushing in. It seemed to be about minute or two into the swim, the arms would start slowing down. It actually felt like I was starting to swim through mud. I could not keep the high cadence up and went to my normal cadence. For the next 5-10 minutes, the tingling of the skin continued. Slowly, the tingling would go away. I would notice the cold on the skin but it was almost a detached feeling, almost as if it was someone else body that was experiencing it. As the swim progressed to the 20ish minute mark, the core would start to feel warm and I would feel like I was a little heater. It actually would feel like the heat would extend to my limbs and the skin was hot. This felt great but would last for only about another 20 minutes or so. Somewhere around the 40-45 minute mark, the warmth feeling would go away and I would start feeling cold again. At this point, my body reaction seemed to diverge from Eliz's. My speed would drop considerably about 5 minutes after the cold would set in and Eliz would pull away from me. The first time this occurred, I panicked a bit thinking it was a sign that I was getting very close to dangerously hypothermic. Over several swims, we would push the time I would go after this slow down. I was able to go at least 30 minutes past this point in our experimentation with no further digression. We had to stop the experimentation when the lake water warmed up enough that I no longer experienced the slowdown (mid to upper 50F or 14-16C). We also tried to figure out why. My cadence did not significantly slow down nor did my stroke mechanics changed noticeably from what Eliz could tell in the murky, dark water. We are guessing it was related to stroke mechanics and my ability to "grab" the water but could not narrow it further then that. Mentally, I just learned to accept it would happen, not worry but focus on other more obvious signs of hypothermia such as significant cadence change and mental sharpness decreasing.
Back to the progression of the spring training. Quickly (within a week), the lake temp rose to 50F (12C). This is where the unpredictable Colorado weather started the first of its curve balls. We had an unusual cold and wet spring where the temperature in the lake stayed relatively close to 50F (12C) with an occasional day where it would warm up to 52F (13C) just to have a snow storm come through to cool it back down. It stayed in this temperature range for nearly 5 weeks. We were hoping to start getting multi-hour swims up to 3 to 4 hours in the lake but were hampered by the cold water and my slow experimentation on how long I could continue swimming after the slow down occurred. It was great cold water training but we were looking forward to a least a minor warming to the mid-50s (14-15C) to get some long swims in. Finally, mid-May the water started warming up. This is when the Colorado weather threw the second curve ball. A major switch was thrown by the weather gods and almost overnight the temperature outside jumped to the mid-80F (29C) range. Within 2 weeks, it moved from 50F (12C) to above 60F (15C) and then up to the mid-60F (18C) a week later. We were hoping for several weeks of training with the temperature between 56-60F (14-15C) range. Instead, it was only a matter of days. We entered June with the temperature in the upper 60F (18-19C). We now had 7-8 weeks of training ahead of us in considerably warmer water then the Channel.
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