POW Clinics In Woollett Aquatic Center

Courtesy of Mike Collins, California.

Mike Collins and Natalie Barrad hosted the first of their two annual POW (Pool Open Water) events at the Woollett Aquatic Center in Irvine, California.

“The open water practices are free; however, the POW Skills Clinic cost US$150 and are required to attend open water practices.

Collins continues, “This gives us a chance to teach athletes in a safer environment before hitting open water on February 23rd, March 28th and April 19th. These practices are challenging, yet skill appropriate from new level athletes to highly experienced open water swimmers and triathletes who want to get a good open water conditioning workout while working on open water specific skills including entries and exits, turning buoys, swimming in crowds, drafting, and dialing in effort and technique specific to wetsuit swimming.

There are 6-10 open water practices during the spring session. Then we will start the summer session of 8-10 practices between June and August. If there is enough interest, we will hold a fall session between September and October.

Swimmers need to attend at least one POW session, but really benefit from re-testing the Wetsuit Calibration Test frequently in a pool to dial in their pace at different intensities. We will offer a POW practice at the beginning of each session for new swimmers want to join the OWS practices.

The first two open water swimming practices are Cold Water Acclimation and Surf Entries focused. Attendance at one of the POW sessions is a prerequisite to participating in our ocean practices on March 7th in Huntington Beach and March 29th in Newport Beach.

Experienced swimmers can also benefit from the POW Clinics. We do wetsuit pacing calibration which most triathletes can utilize, or may be unaware of what their wetsuit swimming pace is. Then we teach:

* Sighting techniques and eyes closed swimming to see how straight they swim
* How to submerge 3-4 feet underwater in a wetsuit, a skill needed to get under waves
* Buoy turns techniques
* Dealing with large crowds and getting away from “asshole swimmers” without being too aggressive or getting super frustrated
* Getting comfortable drafting and swimming close to others

Our goal is to run 10 open water swim practices over the course of the spring and also offer a summer session, and possibly a fall session for late season races.”

Collins and Barrad will also host POW #2 on March 28th; see here. To register, visit here.

Collins and Barrad will also have an Open Water Swimming Skills Clinic in the Back Bay at Newport Dunes on April 19th. For more information about this April 19th clinic, visit www.coveathlon.com.

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