Thorpe Lake, 26th September 2021
Whatever you say, this event is never without its little adventures!!
The Third Spencer Mile was a challenge in many ways. An initial 25 entrants were reduced to 19 by illness and lack of fuel. Thorpe Park on Sunday 26th September was somewhat grey and the absence of any lake staff on time was somewhat worrying. However, water was around 17/18 degrees after a very nice September (water temperatures have been down at 12/13 at this time of year to my knowledge)
The course looked rather odd with two proper buoys and a torpedo in the distance. As agreed the course was four laps of the lake, swum in waves to prevent too much contact at the early corners. As it turned out the torpedo buoy appeared either to have a very long anchor or to be drifting!!!! In the end the measured distance was a new distance of the post Brexit “mile” of 1900 metres, but it was still a great race.
Two men and two women fought out the first places with Alan Parkins pipping Clive Benson, both in suits and Jess Campbell beating Georgie Quayle on time. However, in a unique innovation, I had decided to implement a handicap system, adding 10% to wetsuit times, which saw Georgie’s time pip Jess in the adjusted variant and indeed end up as the overall winner on adjusted times.
All good fun.
The full list of winners (everyone was a winner!) is below, with most of the swimmers in an age category of their own. There were some great individual battles and swimmers of the day must include the highly impressive Alain Renders and Willem Heskes.
The real disappointment was the over officious kayaker lifeguard who ushered two of our swimmers out 10 minutes early. “I was only following orders!!!” I have heard that excuse before and it didn’t cut much mustard then.
Sincere congratulations to Robyn MacCrae on her first open water race. She managed to keep up with Godfrey, so well done.
Following this we had the hat ceremony and another excellent barbecue from Michael and Mila. Thank you to everyone for their donations of cake and sweet things.
For those in the club for whom this event was too cold, too far or whatever else, they missed another fabulous club event and party. This event is now a core part of the calendar and I look forward to running the fourth event in 2022.
See you there.
Congratulations everyone.
Steve Baker
Full Results
| Place Overall/Adjusted | Name/Gender/Suit | Time | Adjusted Time | Category Place Age/Suit |
| 1./2 | Alan Parkins/M/Y | 28.12 | 31.02 | 1 |
| 2/3 | Clive Benson/M/Y | 28.53 | 31.44 | 1 |
| 3./4 | Jess Cambell/F/Y | 28.54 | 31.45 | 1 |
| 4/1 | Georgie Quayle/F/N | 29.09 | 29.09 | 1 |
| 5/5 | Alain Renders/M/Y | 29.58 | 32.54 | 1 |
| 6/7 | James Draper/M/Y | 30.29 | 33.41 | 1 |
| 7/8 | Lee Fennell/M/Y | 30.33 | 33.43 | 2 |
| 8/10 | Amanda Heath/F/Y | 31.00 | 34.06 | 1 |
| 9/11 | Emily Hayter/F/Y | 31.28 | 34.34 | 1 |
| 10/12 | Luke Schuberth/M/Y | 31.53 | 34.39 | 1 |
| 11/14 | Barbara Halls/F/Y | 32.03 | 35.15 | 1 |
| 12/6 | Willem Heskes/M/N | 33.02 | 33.02 | 1 |
| 13/15 | Helen Cumber/F/Y | 34.57 | 37.87 | 1 |
| 14/9 | Ed Hill/M/N | 34.05 | 34.05 | 1 |
| 15/13 | Claire Humphries/F/N | 34.41 | 34.41 | 1 |
| 16/16 | Michael Barnet/M/N | |||
| 17/17 | Julia Weall/F/Y | |||
| 18/18 | Godfrey Admans/M/N | |||
| 19/19 | Robyn MacCrae/F/Y |