First of all, I want to thank you for supportiing me in the Save the Bay swim in the past and I am very happy to say, I have registered for the two mile swim again this year.  I am a huge supporter of the Save the Bay organization as they are the keepers of the bay we live on and assure that it remains clean and pristine for swimming, fishing and boating. They need our financial support!

This will be my 13th swim and it comes with a bit of a bigger challenge than previous years. As some of you may know, I was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March of 2023 and entered into a rigorous treatment schedule of chemo, radiation, Whipple surgery and then several more chemo infusions that ended just before Christmas of 2023.  Believe me, I was very happy to walk out of the infusion room for what I hope will be the last time.  I've had two CT scans since then, one in January and one in mid May and both were clean!  I am so relieved and grateful and certainly hope the beast does not return.

I've been back in the pool at the Y as much as I can since January and it feels great. I am working on my distance and my training sessions have been between a mile and a mile and a half.  The water in the pool is a lovely 82 degrees, a far cry from the ocean which is at about 55 degrees right now. I've lost a lot of weight in the last year (a low of 167 and now at 180 and I was initially at 200) so I really feel the cold -  but thankfully I have a  few good wetsuits to choose from.  When the ocean temp rises above 60 I'll be back in the sea and will be training with my group of open water swimmers at Mackerel Cove in Jamestown.

Barring any medical setbacks, I should be at the starting line of the two mile Save the Bay Swim at the navy base on July 13.  

I hope I can count on your support.