Yesterday, I helped put on the Portland Bridge Swim as a co-race director. I was offered the role end of 2023 as the PBS planning team started to prep for this year. I learned so much, and had a whirlwind of a day. My write up may bounce around as I try to unscramble all of the planning from the past 9 months and the action-packed day yesterday.
Planning Process
The Portland Bridge Swim is a non-profit, and has a board of directors that meet a few times to kick off the next year event planning journey. They discuss what purchases need to be made, validate financials, and determine the schedule for the next few months to launch the event. I was invited to listen in on a few of these meetings so I could learn the ropes of how the organization is governed.
We also had an interesting start because our previous safety director retired, and the position wasn't well documented. When you have someone doing the role for that long, they know it like the back of their hand, but new folks obviously need a crash course. Ben stepped into the Safety Director position, with Sam being his understudy.
The other change that changed many conversations was that relays were removed from the event this year. That meant fewer participants, but also fewer shoreline access points.
Marisa, the creator and race director for the event, has created a set of tracks for the event to follow, knowing what needs to happen, when, where, and why. Although I'm working to write a full event guide, Marisa somehow holds all this info on her head and guides the rest of us through it to make sure all the boxes are checked before crunch time. She knows who to contact for permits, potties, food, and everything in between. She's also amassed a huge network of volunteers that come back year after year to support the event, which made recruiting so much easier.
Safety Planning
One of the most important safety pillars of the event is the safety crew, which primarily relies on motorboats. Marisa has developed relationships with several boaters who understand the race and the waterways. Given the Willamette is an active shipping channel with a stupid amount of recreational boaters as well, there's no way to have this swim without the small army of powered boats each year.
Leading up to the event, our safety team held a virtual training and distributed safety protocols to make sure every single safety volunteer knew our Emergency Action Plan and the logistics of the event. We also packed "boat boxes" that contained safety essentials:
Radios
Floating radio straps
Throw Bags
Binoculars
Megaphone
Batteries
First Aid Kit
CPR Masks
Rescue Noodle
Rescue Tube
Emergency Blankets
Pens
Boat Banners
Safety & Evacuation Procedures
Evacuation Codes
Course Map
Radio Etiquette
Swimmer Spotter Sheet
Absorbent Towels
Snacks
We also had safety paddlers on the course, in addition to swimmers' escort paddlers. These safety paddlers served as race officials, having radios and being the secondary level of response (after the escort paddler) to any issues that arose on the water.
I held a virtual swimmer/escort paddler event overview and safety briefing in early July to meet participants and provide as much info about the race, logistics, and safety as I could. 100/10 I think every single event organizer should do this - it's free with google meet or zoom, and I had so many participants ask great questions and tell me it assuaged their nerves a bit.
Packet Pickup
Saturday's packet pickup was a great way to meet swimmers and paddlers and get them their kits. PBS does pre-event items a little differently than the other swims I've participated in or volunteered with; an assembly line of volunteers puts together racer packets Saturday morning, which contain everything the swimmer needs or purchased for the event.
T-shirt(s)
Race swim cap
Race Tattoos
Mesh bag
Emergency Blanket
Food Vouchers
Paddler Bibs
Safety Pins
Paddler Orange Vests
Escort Instructions
Bridge Swim Rules
Swimwear Rules
Tow Float
Gear Check Cards
This squad of volunteers assembles each swimmer kit based on what the swimmer has ordered and their wave, plus any special instructions or requests that swimmer has communicated to the planning team. During packet pickup, the participants sign a waiver and are handed their kit, so check in goes pretty quickly. Swimmers can also pick up their kits Sunday morning, but having Saturday pickup means less stuff for the organizers to bring on Sunday morning!
Pasta Dinner
The night before the event, there's a ticketed optional pasta dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory in SW Portland. The Old Spaghetti Factory sits on the waterfront, and you can see the Sellwood Bridge from the second floor windows. I was honored to meet swimmers, paddlers, other volunteers, and their families in such a beautiful setting.
Race Morning
I had packed up both of my household's cars the previous night, and they were filled to the brim with boat boxes, lifeguard tubes, race official paddler kits, and tons of odds and ends for the event.
Sam and I woke up at 3:30 AM to try to get on the road by 4:30 AM to arrive by 5 AM. I attempted to run less-late than usual, but still ended up getting to Sellwood Riverfront Park at 5:30 AM (I might have realized I forgot a few important items in my garage and had to go back, and then hit every light and even had to navigate around a giant police incident on the way). As soon as I arrived, Sam and I coordinated loading Sam into my car and we drove to Waverly Marina, where the boaters and lifeguards were supposed to meet at 6:15 AM. We dropped stuff (and Sam) off at the Marina, and I headed back to Sellwood to help with getting the race officials on the water and watch the start of the race.
Swimmers were arranged in 3 waves this year - with the first 25 swimmers (Wave 1) starting at 7:30 AM. We had their kayakers enter the water first to head out to the "chute", and then checked swimmers into the water by checking their swimwear category. Kayakers had to wear bright vests with their swimmer's number pinned on the front and back of their vests. Under the vests, each paddler was required to wear a PFD.
Because the river is a heavily trafficked waterway and an active shipping channel, all swimmers are required to wear tow floats corresponding to the color assigned to their wave, as well as wave-colored swim caps.
Before the race, I had received quite a few questions about why I strongly recommended feed ropes, rather than swimmers being handed bottles by hand. Although I explained the river current, tide, and wind could capsize a paddler and sweep their feeds away, some swimmers felt like the hand off process would work for them. After the race, I had one swimmer come up to me and say they wish they had used the feed rope method, as several of their bottles floated away, and the kayaker had to spend time hunting them down, which impacted their swim. Folks, you heard it here: swimmers AND paddlers like the feed rope method over the handoff method.
Another question I received before the race and the morning-of: where to put all the feed bottles? I had suggested finding a deep cooler that could be strapped to the front of the kayak to hold feeds, but those are expensive and sometimes hard to find. The morning of, when paddlers realized the sheer volume of the feeds, snacks, and safety gear that would need to go into their kayaks, some paddlers panicked a bit trying to find a way to fit everything. As someone who is tall, wide, and leggy, I urge all swimmers and paddlers to discuss this piece of the logistics well before the race. Most rental kayaks are recreational kayaks that may not fit each paddler perfectly. We're unable to rent specific sizes, as many swimmers change their kayakers last-minute, and the kayak rental stores only have so many rental kayaks available for our event to rent. So, we do our best to supply a ton of options, but they may not be the most comfortable, or provide the greatest storage areas.
There was one swimmer/paddler pair that used a Quackpacker to store extra feeds and equipment! I was so incredibly proud of the little duck being part of their crew!
After the 3 waves started at 7:30, 7:40, and 7:50 AM, the race crews and spectators packed up and headed to Cathedral Park. I was wearing one of the safety crew radios, and was receiving reports of different safety concerns - a recreational boat speeding towards the course, one of the borrowed kayaks taking on water, a swimmer feeling like she might need to exit the water. As I was driving, I was trying to listen and respond with any direction I could provide. I later learned the safety crew on the boats handled everything without me and didn't need my radio chatter! Lesson learned - give the folks who are heading up their teams the baton to run their crews as they see fit.
Finish Line
Once the planning team and volunteers arrived at the finish line, which is on the beach under the St. John's Bridge at Cathedral Park, we started setting up the finishing "chute" to guide swimmers across the official swim end point on the beach. We had our first swimmer pulled as we were setting up and transported to the finish by the SeaStrike, our safety jetski/boater. The SeaStrike, being nimble and so fast, was able to get close to swimmers and scoop them out of the water if they needed to abort their swims.
USMS regulations are very strict about the method of approaching swimmers on the course with a boat that has an open propeller with no propeller cage. As a result, if a swimmers has to be pulled by a motor boat, there are a series of steps that must be followed to keep the swimmer and paddler safe. The jetski does not have this issue, and was often used as the quick intermediary on the course.
The larger safety boats were integral as a security buffer against the river traffic as well. While the jetski was able to patrol the course quickly, the larger boats served as intimidating guards, and made sure no non-event boats even got close to the swimmers.
While Sam and Ben managed the handful of swimmer extrications on the course, as well as two swamped kayaks, I helped manage the on-land festivities. The first place finisher was quickly closing in on Cathedral Park, so I wanted to make sure we had a rope set up for the finish line, as well as a buoy to sight from. We also needed to set up gear pick up, awards and medal stations, an announcer, food vendors, and EMS. I ran around helping put up signs, set up the beach, and knock out some of the endless list of tasks that kept the event on track to be ready. The first place finisher came in amazingly fast soon after.
Watching the leader finish well ahead of the rest of the swimmers was an incredible sight, but I had quite a few tasks to do that prevented me from watching much of the rest of the race.
A few swimmers who had been pulled were delivered to the finish line, and 2 had some more serious symptoms of electrolyte imbalance. One swimmer was shaking, queasy, and needed to stay sitting on the beach while she drank some Gatorade. Another swimmer was transported to the warming tent and required more advanced care. Both swimmers had said they didn't think they ate enough during the race. I also suspect the 75 degree warm water, 90+ degree heat, and many swimmers wearing wetsuits didn't help matters.
There were many very happy swimmers who ran/walked/crawled out of the river at the finish line. I got to watch a handful as I communicated with the safety boats to confirm who had already finished, and who was still in the water. They confirmed every single swimmer who hadn't finished was still making forward progress, and the boaters had eyes on every single swimmer still in the water.
Once the last finishers walked across the finish line, our team started breaking down the site, as our permit expired at 4 PM. We had about an hour and a half to pack everything up, and with how tired and hot everyone was, we were moving pretty slowly. We organized all the tow floats and other returned equipment as best as we could, and shoved all the tables, chairs, signs, banners, buoys, shirts, and everything (with the kitchen sink) into the Uhaul to bring it to the storage unit. Somehow, I still ended up going home with a car full of stuff (oops!) that we figured out Monday morning.
After Sam and I got home, we sat on our kitchen floor trying to cool off and drink as much water as we could. We were burnt and tired, and I had worn out my foot because I hadn't realized my favorite set of sandals had fallen apart sometime earlier in the day, and I had been flopping around with my foot hanging off the end of my shoe for hours without noticing. We decompressed by swapping stories, mine from shore, Sam's from the safety boats, and I couldn't believe some of the stories! From a kayak getting swamped and emulating the Titanic, to my poor radio skills, Sam gave me some incredible play-by-plays. I had seen the results of Sam and Ben's decisions, as those swimmers safely arrived on shore, some being pulled and others finishing their race with some scrappy ingenuity.
This event simply would not have been possible without the safety crew and on-land volunteers. It took close to 150 people (escort paddlers, safety boats, race officials, lifeguards, and oodles more on land) to host an event for ~75 swimmers. It takes a VILLAGE! And the outcome was a lot of happy swimmers, whether they finished the event or not. We even had participants from Australia compliment how smoothly the swim went! Now, to start planning for Portland Bridge Swim 2025!
Learn more about the event at www.portlandbridgeswim.com or email info@portlandbridgeswim.com with any news, feedback, or questions.
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