OWS WAS MY LIFE BUOY

My name is José María Galera, and I come from Alicante, a coastal city in the Spanish Mediterranean Sea.

2014 Madrid Half Marathon

I have been a runner all my life. My only sport was to run.

I had run the NYC Marathon twice, the London Marathon and lots of races for the last 25 years.

I was working in a apparently solid big Spanish Bank but, suddenly, starting the year 2013, my company went bankrupt and myself and a lot of workers were laid off.

They gave me a severance pay and the golden handshake. After 25 years working there, that was my only compensation.

The first months after that were very complicated for me. 
I was depressed!

I was used to working 10/12 hours daily, my free time to run was only at weekends, and not even all of them!

I had to fill my life again. 

I had a lot of free time, and in that time my mind was thinking and thinking.... why me? 

I had to look for a solution to fill my life again!

And I decided to learn to swim. 

In the past, I had often thought: "Why don´t I learn to swim?" 

But, every time I thought about it, finally I abandoned the idea quickly. 
Now was the moment!

I started to learn to swim in a swimming pool in Easter 2013. I remember the first days, when I wasn´t able to swim a length in my 25-metre swimming pool. 

It was awful! I tried not to lose heart!!

The first day I was able to swim 1000m. in one hour in my pool, was incredible for me, I was crying for joy!

In the sea I always swim with buoy 

The summer of 2013 was ending and I had never swum in the sea yet. One day, in September that year, I decided to do it and I tried it.... when I had only swum 100m, I had a panic attack and I needed to go back to the shore. 

 2014 New Year´s Eve Crossing

After that panic attack, bit by bit, I was able to swim 500 metres, 1000 metres in the sea... and I continued practicing in a pool, now of 50m- length, for some months more. 

Finally, in the summer of the year 2014, I did my first open water crossing. I remember when I finished it, I didn´t stop crying for ten minutes or more, I was very happy. 
I had done it!!

After that, I did some more crossings, because on the Alicante coast we have a lot of them during all the summer,  from April until the end of October.

5ª Neda el Món Swim Barcelona 

And in July 2015 I did my first crossing out of Alicante. It was the "5ª Neda el Món Zoggs Swim Barcelona", along the beach of the city of Barcelona. It was a very complicated 6-km crossing, because the sea, initially calm, suddenly became very choppy and the second part of the crossing we had to fight a lot with the waves. 

Fortunately, the security of the swimmers was fantastic along all the crossing with a lot of paddle surf and boats. I arrived exhausted at the finish line, but it was a very exciting experience.

Now I continue preparing new crossings, on the Alicante coast and in new places too, while my mind is dreaming about new adventures... 
The "Straits of Gibraltar" perhaps?

I discovered a new way to fill my life now - swimming in the sea.

Open water swimming was my life buoy!

"2015 Mariners Crossing". I did podium!

See you on the shore!

José María Galera

OWS Alicante