News and updates about OPEN and team members:
OPEN on TV! February 2012: Check out this great video story that recently appeared on Oregon Public Broadcasting’s TV series Oregon Field Guide about open water swimming. OPEN members are all over the place in this great story filmed at the Eel Lake open water swim this last August. Here’s the link:
http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/segments/view/1809
Charlie, John, Jackie, Keith, Dan, Lynn, and Robin are seen on land and in the water. OPEN swim caps everywhere!
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September 2011: After considerable discussion, we decided to modify our team name. We are now know as the OPEN Narwhals-which is what we’ve usually been called for years anyway! OPEN is no longer an acronym for anything, as we’re “open” for all abilities and fitness levels, we thought this simplified change would be less confusing and more reflective of what we’re about. We still have the most fun of any team, too!
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August 14, 2011: OPEN gets the three-peat as 2011 OMS open water champs for the Small Team Division!!! Nearly every Narwhal attended the OMS Championships today at Cottage Grove Lake and the team effort paid off as OPEN won the team championship again! Keith swam great and surprised his rivals by winning his age group. Jackie avoided drowning after getting a mouthful of lake water and then finished strong to place high in her age group. Lou made an open water appearance after missing all of last years events and had a great swim. Dan and Lynn made the trip up from Southern Oregon to dominate their age group. John showed continued improvement with a great swim, as did Robin with his new bionic hip. Charlie gave up another chance to do an acting job on his favorite TV series to compete in the championship swim and help OPEN go for the three-peat. This was also the first open water swim that Charlie did not get leg cramps and his time reflected his effort with a good placing in his age group as well. When the day was over, OPEN edged out the host team to remain as the open water champions for another year! As always, we had the most fun of any team and cheered each other on all day! We are, Narwhals!!!
OPEN members proudly hold their 2011 Championship banner!
OPEN's Lou Boone (bottom) did most of the Whitely 1,000 event Butterfly stroke!
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August 11, 2011: At the organization meeting of the new Oregon Masters Swim Club, which is one of the three clubs that make up Oregon Masters Swimming, Inc. OPEN’s Charlie Helm was elected as Vice Chair. Charlie was also elected by the new Board to be the OREG club representative on the OMS Board of Directors. OPEN’s Jackie Parker is also currently a member of the OMS Board.
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OPEN members swim in first River Fest Endurance Swim. 11.7 miles from Oregon City to downtown Portland!
OPEN members who swam the River Fest swim: Keith-4th from right, David-3rd from right, Jackie-far right.
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OPEN repeats as OMS Open Water Champions in 2010!!!
The Elite Narwhals did it again as we won the Team Championship for our division for the 2nd year in a row at scenic Applegate Lake in Southern Oregon! The 1500m swim was the championship event and all seven OPEN members attending competed and swam well to keep the team championship with OPEN. Charlie did his first open water swim in over 10 years and the newest Narwhal John , who is Jackie’s husband, made his first ever masters swim to insure OPEN remained the OMS open water champs. We all shared the same campsite and, as usual, we had the most fun of all the swimmers! Most of the other OMS swimmers dropped by “Camp Narwhal” during the weekend to socialize and admire our banners hanging proudly from the trees.
Jackie relaxing at "Camp Narwhal"
Your proud Elite Narwhals with our new championship banner!
On Sunday, our distance Narwhals swam the long distance events. Robin swam the 5k while Keith, Jackie, and Dan swam the 10k. Jackie beat Keith to get payback for Foster Lake where Keith had passed Jackie at the end to beat her to the finish! It was an awesome weekend at a very scenic location, with warm water, although the 95-degree air temp was a bit uncomfortable for the 3 days we were at “Camp Narwhal”. We now know why it’s called “open water” swimming-because OPEN dominates for the 2nd year in a row! We are: Nar-whals!!!
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OPEN member David Livengood successfully swims English Channel on July 5th, 2010!!! David’s time for the crossing was 13 hours, 58 minutes.
David swims while seagull watches an Elite Narwhal head for France!
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The June 2010 issuse of the USMS newsletter Streamlines chose our website as “The Really Cool Website of the Month”!!! Thanks to USMS for this honor and to all those who visited our site!
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OPEN’s Charlie and Lou have great meet with OMS at USMS Nationals in Atlanta!
The scoreboard at Georgia Tech with 40th USMS Nationals logo.
OPEN’s Lou Boone and Charlie Helm both had a great meet and set new PR’s as part of the Oregon Masters team at the 40th USMS National Championships held in Atlanta, Georgia on May 20th-24th at the campus of Georgia Tech-site of the 1996 Olympic Games swimming. Lou swam 5 individual events and 3 relays. Charlie swam 3 individual events plus joined Lou on Sunday for the men’s medley relay. We both also got to share a lane in the warm-up pool during the meet with a couple of Olympic Gold medalists and were able to chat (and trash-talk) with them as well! It was a fun meet at an awesome facility and the entire Oregon Masters team had a great meet to finish in 6th place-ahead of several teams with more members! “The power of the blue-camo suit was in Atlanta, baby!” -Charlie
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OPEN swims strong at 2010 OMS Championship meet in Corvallis!
OPEN members again set personal best times, had great relays, and had the most fun at the OMS Championship meet in Corvallis April 9-11, 2010. Although we did not repeat as team champions due to a very crowded medium team division (we were the smallest team in the division) with much larger participation this year, everyone swam like champions and supported each other like always!
Top row: Anna, Michelle, Lou, Jackie, Keith. Middle row: Ryan and Charlie. Bottom row: “Nellie Narwhal” and Dave.
Not pictured: Dan, Lynn, William, Bryan.
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OPEN does it again! OPEN wins 2009 OMS Open Water Championship!
OPEN members are now Pacific NW ZONE CHAMPIONS!
Rich, Mark, Jackie, Keith, and Robin show off our new 1st place banner!
OPEN did it again by adding the Open Water championship to our pool championship for 2009! Rich Juhala and Mark Neubert joined regular OPEN members to be part of our successful open water team to bring home the title for the small teams division. (maybe that’s why they call it “OPEN” water!) I’ll post how everyone placed once I get all the info from those who attended.
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OPEN members rule the 2009 Gil Young Memorial/Pacific Northwest Zone LC Championship meet!
The following Narwhals can proudly say they are ZONE CHAMPIONS:
Lou Boone: 1st- 800 LC Meter Freestyle, mens 45-49 age group.
Robin Bragg: 1st- 200 LC Meter Backstroke, mens 45-49.
Charlie Helm: 1st- 400 LC Meter Freestyle; 1st- 800 LC Meter Freestyle, mens 50-54.
All 3 of us also got top-6 placings in our other events, so it was a very successful meet for the Narwhals!
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OPEN wins 2009 OMS Association Championships Medium Team Division title!
Back Row: Lynn Sacks, Jackie Parker, Anna Shoemaker, Keith Dow, Dan Gray. Front row: Ron Thompson, Charlie Helm, Robin Bragg. Not pictured: Michelle Frangipani (who was about to start a race)
Ron, Keith, and Jackie on the pool deck Saturday during warm ups
