Blog Post: My Experience with the Alcatraz Swim

A number of years ago on a flight from SFO to the East Coast I was seated next to a guy who told me he was returning home after doing the “Escape from Alcatraz” swim.  He described dark choppy waters, perilous currents, and his fear of sharks continually preying on his mind during the swim to San Francisco.  It was a captivating narrative.

This past year I took up swimming in the mornings as a way of getting my day off to a good start, and my friend Larry challenged me to do the Alcatraz swim.  Larry is such a devoted open water ocean swimmer that he could probably swim to Japan if he could get the time off work.  Over time he has nearly evolved fins and a blowhole.   And he seemed a little surprised when I said “All right–I’m in.” 

I trained in the Richmond Marina next to the long breakwater that protects the sailboats from being beat up by the waves.  Not the roughest part of the Bay to train in but better than the comfy confines of the neighborhood pool.  I read a few blogs to learn from people’s experiences, like the one written by the guy who said half-way through the swim he looked down and saw a big silvery thing the size of a small car swim under him. (Yeah, right buddy.)  

The swim, if you were to keep a straight line, from Alcatraz to Aquatic Park in SF is 1.3 miles.  However, they schedule the race during a slack tide, with a flood current flowing in the first half of the race and an ebb current flowing out the second half, so that you end up swimming in an arc that covers more like 1.7 miles.  I trained up to that distance in the Bay and felt ready to go.

Leanne and my daughter Kayla sacrificially join me in waking up at 4:00am on Saturday morning to arrive at the South End Rowing Club in Aquatic Park by 5:15am for registration and instructions.  The guy in charge gives the 496 swimmers a rousing pep talk, announcing it was a perfect day for the swim, that the water was “warm today” and that we have nothing to complain about.  We need to stay within the confines of the kayakers that would be herding us like sheep dogs toward the beach in San Francisco; otherwise we might be “repositioned.”  I resolve that one of my goals is not to get “repositioned,” especially since Larry is one of the sheep dogs.  

I look around me.  At least a third of the swimmers are women.  There are 20-year olds with Olympic swimmer bodies, but middle-aged guys like me too, and even some sinewy old seafarers in their 70s, aging bodies hewn to look half their age by sun, salt, and waves.  Standing a few feet in front of me is a buff guy with one leg looking like he might have left the other one in Vietnam.  Nearly half of the people aren’t wearing a wetsuit. One woman is in a bikini.   

Led slowly by a bagpiper, we march in an enormous group toward the ferry waiting at Pier 41.  I hadn’t felt too many butterflies until the bagpiper starts up.  His melancholy piping creates a kind of funeral march ambiance, not very settling.  I strike up a conversation with a young San Francisco programmer named George.  I ask him if this is his first Alcatraz swim.  He nervously confesses he has never swum in the ocean, that he signed up a year ago because it sounded like fun, and he had just done a little pool swimming recently to prepare.  Inside I’m thinking, George, in an hour you’re going to be in one of two places: riding in the back of a kayak or exploring the contents of Davy Jones’ locker. But it’s a little late to back out now and I reassure him “Oh, you’ll be fine.”  

We get on the ferry and I’m realizing that all the hydrating I’ve done to prevent leg cramps is catching up with me quickly.  I head swiftly toward the men’s room on board and the formidable waiting line outside tells me that I’m not the only one who is overly hydrated.  At the time, drinking three bottles of Gatorade seemed like a good idea.  But not now.  And even after finally reaching my restroom destination, I’d overlooked the logistical complexities of getting out of a wetsuit to pee, especially in a code-red emergency scenario.

We’re approaching Alcatraz Island.  Very quickly someone on a bullhorn orders us to line up into threes to jump off the boat.  George and I pair up with another programmer-looking guy and we do fist bumps before we get close to the jump spot.  I’m thinking this might be George’s last fist bump.  

To catch the timing of the slack tide a group of three must jump every five seconds off both sides of the ferry.  The jumping spot reminds me of one of those scenes in a war movie where a 101st Airborne drill sergeant is yelling “GO!” to sequential groups of paratroopers jumping out of the side of a plane.  Here the drill sergeant is a husky woman with an overpowering voice that blows the three of us off the side of the boat before I remember to lower my goggles.  The water does not feel like the balmy Hawaiian sea that the organizer described.  It’s freaking cold, and when I return to the surface checking to see if both my contact lenses are still in, I hear Drill Sergeant yelling “SWIM!” from above.  I put my goggles in place and it’s all systems go.  

They’ve told us to sight off two tall apartment towers located behind Aquatic Park.  I’ve learned from YouTube videos that in open-water swimming you can front sight or side sight, and I pleasantly discover that the sun rising over the East Bay hills is at 90 degrees to the apartments, so I side sight off the rising sun and start paddling toward the city of Saint Francis.  

Because I was expecting the waves to be coming through the Golden Gate to the west, I’ve practiced left breathing to keep my inhaling open mouth to the east, protected by my head.  I’m in a rhythm now and feeling very settled and satisfied in my plan, watching the rays of my new friend the sun stream through the clouds, casting a blessing on the eastern span of the Bay Bridge.  Then after some unspecified amount of time passes, I realize that there is nobody to the left of me.  Nobody except one of the sheep-dogs motioning me like an air-traffic controller to get back west into the herd.   Future note to self: side-sighting does not work well in strong currents, which now have taken me a decent part of the way toward Oakland.  

I correct my course, now swimming hard west, more toward the Golden Gate.  It looks like I’m more than halfway there–Aquatic Park is now appearing bigger than Alcatraz, but a leg cramp in my left hamstring is starting to make an unwelcome debut.  Frequent front-sighting is using up a lot of my energy, so I begin to side-sight off the Transamerica Pyramid to stay on course.  

I haven’t front-sighted for a while, probably because I’m trying to concentrate on keeping my legs uncramped, when all of a sudden I look up and I’m about 50 yards west of the opening of Aquatic Park.  The ebb tide has clearly kicked into gear, and right now I feel like I may be on my way to ebbing out the Golden Gate.  This was the main thing I did not want to happen: letting the current carry me past the opening between the piers to Aquatic Park.  Other swimmers are also too far west, and I learned later that the ebb tide current near the city was stronger than they thought it would be; a number of swimmers have to be “repositioned.”  (This included a woman picked up by Larry, whom he then discovered to be doing the swim naked.)

I adjust my angle back east to try to get even with the edge of the west pier, but it’s like a treadmill and I’m not gaining any ground–the current is too strong.   I feel like an ant floating on a giant mass of moving water.  So I cut my angle even more and am able to make some progress against the current so that I’m able to get even with the pier.  I aim for five yards to the east of the pier and squeak into Aquatic Park.  There is still quite a distance to go to reach the beach, and I’m pretty gassed from swimming against the current.  But once inside the park, there is a sense that I’m going to make it, leg cramps and all, and this is a happy thought.

I don’t have a very substantial list of athletic accomplishments, but passing through the finish line with a big crowd of people cheering for all the finishers felt like one.  The nice volunteers at the South End Rowing Club give you congratulatory pats on the back and put a finishing medal around your neck.  I figure if they were to give an award for the swimmer who explored the farthest reaches of the San Francisco Bay in the course of getting from point A to point B, there is a good chance that I win that award.  Maybe they could call it the Sir Francis Drake medal.  

So good to see Leanne and Kayla at the end of the race and settle into the post-race brunch.  Never did mass produced scrambled eggs taste so good.  

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