Three Rivers Marathon Swim (3RMS) - Pittsburgh - 2014

ForeverSwim

The Saturday, September 13 test swim for the 2015 Three Rivers Marathon Swim (3RMS) went wonderfully smooth yesterday out on the Ohio, Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers surrounding Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania! Invited swimmers Janet Manning (Frederick, Maryland) Melodee Nugent (Madison, Wisconsin) and Anthony McCarley (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) faced varied weather and river conditions throughout the 30K (18.6M) distance.

The race began with a water start from the Heinz Field (Pittsburgh Steelers) launch at 7:34AM and swam north (current assist) along 5K of the Ohio River in overcast/rainy (0.05in rain) 56F (air), 74F (water) flat water conditions. As they turned around at Brunot Island, and swam 5K back to the city (against the current) water temperature and conditions remained steady while the air temperature began to rise. Once the swimmers hit the Point State Park 10K mark, the air temperature continued to rise with intermittent sun occasionally breaking through. Swimming against the current to the half-way point (15K) on the Monongahela River, swimmers turned around between the Birmingham and Hot Metal Bridges. The sun was more prevalent and stayed out the remainder of the day with the air temperature climbing to 70F. Swimmers faced a strong head wind (gusting to 26mph) as they approached the 20K mark (current assist) and faced choppy, 1-2ft swells around Point State Park due to wind and light boat traffic. During the final 10K of the race, swimmers faced a strong flow as they traveled north along the Allegheny, and turned around north of the 33rd Street Bridge, west of Herrs Island. Swimmers enjoyed a fast 5K (current assist) to the finish along with a great view of Pittsburgh, PNC Park (Pittsburgh Pirates) to the finishing buoy outside of Heinz Field.

Distance: 30K - 10K, out-and-back 5K, in each of the three rivers; Ohio (1) Monongahela (2) and Allegheny (3)
Format: 2 kayakers/swimmer, powered escort boat and Pittsburgh River Rescue/Police in support
Water Temperature: (73 Low, 76 High) Air Temperature (56 Low, 71 High)
Water Conditions: Ohio River (flat, calm, overcast), Monongahela River (choppy, windy, intermittent sun), Allegheny River (choppy-slight chop, light winds, sunny)

Melodee Nugent: 09:15 (7:34AM - 4:49PM) *Current Course Record!
Anthony McCarley: 11:31 (7:34AM - 7:05PM)
Janet Manning: 12:24 (7:34AM - 7:58PM)

The 2015 Three Rivers Marathon Swim will be a charity fundraising event for Team Forever (www.darren-miller.com) which directly benefits the Forever Fund at the UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh. Interested swimmers can stay tuned to Darren's website and Facebook for updates, and are welcome to direct any questions to Darren via his website contact.

Looking forward to the world coming to the 'City of Bridges' next September!

Cheers to ADVENTURE!

Darren E. Miller, Race Director

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3RMS Daily News Coverage. Ready for 2015? Damn right you are...

http://dailynews.openwaterswimming.com/2014/09/triumphant-test-trio-tries-30-in-three.html?m=1

Cole_G

This race sounds awesome! Definitely gonna keep an eye on it for next year

IronMike

Wow, congrats to all the swimmers and @ForeverSwim for the test run. Sounds like a fun swim.

AnthonyMcCarley

Darren did a great job. Incredibly well organized and run. Darren has surrounded himself with wonderful, nice people - including his family. (His mom treated me like a tired little age-grouper at the end of the swim... which is exactly how I felt at the end of the swim.) Everyone there was great, nice and helpful. And they were top notch - Darren arranged to have the person who runs the Lake Erie Open Water Swimming Association as my kayaker. The guy, Josh Heynes, stuck with me all day long.

The water was clean and the scenery was amazing.

I have no doubt that Darren is going to build this into a standing, classic swim.

Just one word of warning. Maybe it was just me, but I found this swim much, much harder than MIMS.

ForeverSwim

Thank you @AnthonyMcCarley for such positive feedback - yes, my Mom is an amazing lady! Josh is an awesome kayaker and great friend. I was very thankful he stepped in to kayak for you all day as I know his time was very valuable. I am SO THANKFUL this swim went so well for you three, and I am already well on my way to planning for next year! 2015 is going to be so much fun...

KNicholas

Congratulations to Darren, Melodee, Janet, Anthony and all those that supported the swims. There are so many places to explore and see but it takes a lot of effort and confidence to make it come true. Some people love to chat and talk about swimming - others take the next step by getting wet and getting it done. Cheers guys!

Spacemanspiff

Anyone else who was curious like me, here is a link to the river flow velocity: NOAA River Flow Forecast. Seems like .2 to .4 mph? Sound about right @ForeverSwim @AnthonyMcCarley?

AnthonyMcCarley

@Spaceman, Doesn't seem right to me... At least from my perspective, the Ohio was the weakest (barely noticed the push against us and didn't make a big difference in my time). The Mon was harder and the Allegany was brutal (emotionally tough to see the same tree for minutes)... and, of course, Darren had us do them in that order. For me, there was a dramatic different between the three rivers.

The course was (flow direction-wise) 5k each: Down the Ohio, up the Ohio, up the Mon (so 10k straight upstream), down the Mon (for me this is when the wind picked up and worked against us - was the only time there was any chop besides boat traffic chop), up the Allegany, down the Allegany.

Spacemanspiff

@AnthonyMcCarley Well, those figures are current (as in "present") and forecast, not historical, so who knows what it was on the 13th. What I was most interested in was whether or not this was a "see the same tree for minutes" current, or an "Hmmm, I feel a bit slower than normal" current. I be down with the latter, but the former makes my palms sweaty just thinking about it (Seriously, I just dabbed a tissue on my keyboard)... Especially for 15K!! Congrats on your accomplishment!

ForeverSwim

@Spacemanspiff - I also saw the similar statistical information, and yet, it is amazing the difference between the rivers. For example, if you look at Melodee's final 5K/5K (up and back the Allegheny from the Point) the time difference was 2:20/1:19; literally one hour faster on the return trip on the final leg!

JBirrrd

May I chime in that if one must look at the same tree for long periods of time, Pittsburgh's three rivers certainly provide a picturesque backdrop to do so. Truly, this was one of my all-time favorite river swims. The rivers were clean and water temperature was oh so comfortable. I enjoyed swimming by the many varied bridges, huge fountain at the point, baseball stadium and folks out strolling along the walkways. There was always something interesting to see. Although the swim upstream was at times challenging, it never felt impossible. Darren, his family and friends put on a fantastic first time event with a fun vibe. He is excited to welcome open water swimmers to this part of the country. Next year's race is going to be phenomenal. Put 3RMS on your swim bucket list everyone :-)

Leonard_Jansen

Bump...
Haven't seen anything about this either on the calendars or mentioned here. Is this still on, etc?
Thanks.

-LBJ

ForeverSwim

@leonard_jansen, hope you are doing great my friend!

Due to the upcoming planning of our wedding, work and current training plans, 2015 will be another small event with a few swimmers along to continue 'working out the kinks' from the 2013, and 2014 event. I hope to launch this into a full-blown marathon race in 2016! After running with 30,000 runners at the Pittsburgh Marathon, I know our beautiful city is all for this event! Melodee, Janet and Anthony (2014 cast) were kind enough to present to me their thoughts on improvement, and am excited to use those ideas to upgrade the 2015 event going to be held on August 1, 2015 in Pittsburgh. Currently, the following have committed to the 2015 30K race:

Alli DeFrancesco (California/Pennsylvania)
Sarah Thomas (Colorado)
Kristin Jones (Alaska/Arizona)
Kim Plewa (New York)
Michelle Roth-Nelson (Florida)

Excited to keep everyone posted! Cheers to a beautiful 2015 summer of open water adventure!!

Leonard_Jansen

Hey Darren -

Thanks for the heads-up. You are getting married? Mazel Tov!

-LBJ

AnthonyMcCarley

Ha! It looks as if I will be the reigning male champion for another year… without even swimming! )

phodgeszoho

Looks like an awesome swim. I love river swims, especially against the flow and also love urban swims so this ticks all the boxes for me. Hope it goes well and I will look out for it in 2016.

Leonard_Jansen

phodgeszoho said:
Looks like an awesome swim. I love river swims, especially against the flow and also love urban swims so this ticks all the boxes for me. Hope it goes well and I will look out for it in 2016.

If it's close enough to you, give some thought to the Swim 4 Life in Chestertown, MD in mid-july. It's in a tidal river and the course usually has you going against the current for 1/2 the distance. Definitely NOT urban, however.

-LBJ