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Masters Newsletter
July 20, 2007
by Tim Sheeper
In this edition:

Donner Lake Open Water Swim

The 27th Annual Donner Lake 2.7 mile open water swim is scheduled for Saturday August 11, 2007 and it is a Menlo Masters focus event for the first time in our team history.  This one of the longest running and most beautiful open water swim on the circuit.

Swimmers start at 8:30am on the east shore of the lake and swim to the west shore in the 68 degree water at an altitude of 5933 feet.  Not to worry, there is a 2 hour and 30 minute cutoff, and there will be a number of people on the team who make it under or near the one hour mark.

Accommodations:  There are many lodges/hotels/motels in Donner and nearby Truckee and North Shore Lake Tahoe.  Camping at Donner State Park in full, but Boca Reservoir has camping and is only 9 miles from the race start.

Travel: Travel time to Donner is 3-4 hours without traffic.  There will be a caravan and carpool that leaves from the tennis court parking lot at Burgess Pool on Friday August 10 at noon.

Entry:  Entries for the event can be found at www.pacificmasters.com  and flyers can be found at the front desk

Training:  There will be a 20 minute team warm-up swim at 5:00 pm at the east shore of the lake the Friday night before the swim.

Hope you can be one to join the many that have already discovered this gem of a swim.


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Summer Team Picnic

The Menlo Masters Annual Summer Team Picnic hosted by the swimmers of the year Lisa Sheeper and Murray McLaughlin will be held on Sunday August 5, at 12 noon on the grassy area under the oak trees at Burgess Pool.

Team members, family, and friends are all welcome to join in on the food, fun and games of a traditional summer picnic.

This will be a potluck affair with the following contributions per lane:
Lane 1-Salads (fruit, vegetable, potato, macaroni)
Lane 2-Main Dish (hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken, beef)
Lane 3-Drinks (everything in plastic or aluminum containers)
Lane 4-Breads, chips, appetizers, salsa, hummus
Lane 5-Desserts (pies, cakes, cookies)
Lane 6-Main Dish

An evite for the event will follow shortly.


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Photos from Short Course Champs

Photos of our swimmer at the swim meet back in April are available online courtesy of Eduardo Llach.  Paste this link into your browser and enjoy.
http://eduardollach.phanfare.com/album/307003#imageID=18623934


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Pizza and Movie Nights

To keep all informed.  We have pizza and movie nights at the pool during the summer months.  The next movie night is Saturday July 28, pizza served at 6:30 pm and movie begins at sundown, usually around 8:20pm.  The movie, "Happy Feet" will be shown on our big outdoor inflatable screen under the big oak trees on the lawn area.  The last movie night of the summer will be Friday August 17.


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Swim the Cycle

This is intra-team challenge of swimming all 17 competitive events in one calendar year at a swim meet.

We have three swimmers on pace to complete it this year.  As always John Sulzbach and Peter Shepherd are close to completion, with a new entrant into the fray.Lisa Sheeper.  Check the results at:
http://www.teamsheeper.com/teams/menlomasters/results/swimthecycle.html


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Trans-Tahoe

Best wishes to the team members off to Lake Tahoe to compete in the Trans-Tahoe swim on Saturday July 21.  We have a team of 50-60 year old men and a solo swimmer-Virginia Justus attempting her first solo effort. 


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1650 Butterfly

Once a year at the Rinconada Spring Swim Meet an extreme event makes it onto the event list, the 1650 Butterfly.  There is a cult following to the event and it sells out every year and this past year two heats were necessary.  We have had many swimmers over the year compete, complete and even win their division.  The event is hosted by venerable Rinconada swimmer and personality Aldo DeRosa.  He has his own website that produces the results and history of the event.   Check it out at:
http://www-ee.stanford.edu/~darosa/


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