{"id":70,"date":"2017-01-07T14:22:10","date_gmt":"2017-01-07T19:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bscmultisport.com\/blog\/?p=70"},"modified":"2018-01-26T21:55:26","modified_gmt":"2018-01-27T02:55:26","slug":"sharks-dont-eat-people-very-often","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bscmultisport.com\/blog\/2017\/01\/07\/sharks-dont-eat-people-very-often\/","title":{"rendered":"Sharks Don’t Eat People . . . Very Often"},"content":{"rendered":"

Does this sound familiar?\u00a0 You are swimming along, doing your workout and a piece of vegetation touches your leg.\u00a0 You PANIC!\u00a0 Knowing that a very big shark is about to take a bite out of you \u2013 never mind you are in a pool.\u00a0 I feel your pain, and I share your anxiety; dare I say fear.<\/p>\n

When I decided I wanted to go back to Ironman Kona, I realized one of the things I would have to do was overcome my fear of swimming in the ocean.\u00a0 Here is the story of my illogical fear and what I have learned that helped me to maybe not fully overcome it, but at least mitigate it.<\/p>\n

I grew up in Southern California, only miles from the beach.\u00a0 I was in the water all the time, all year long; snorkeling, surfing, body surfing, just playing, it didn\u2019t take much to get me into the ocean.\u00a0 The first time I swam in an organized open water swim event was at Seal Beach, California during the summer of 1974.\u00a0 I was 16, I was invincible, and I was entered in the \u201c3-Mile Rough Water Swim.\u201d\u00a0 I suppose there is something to be said for the virtue of youth as it never occurred to me at the time that I was sharing the water with fish that may look at me as a menu item.<\/p>\n

That changed in June of 1975 when the movie \u201cJaws\u201d<\/em>\u00a0was released nationally in the United States.\u00a0 I know, it\u2019s just a movie; but it was a truly Hitchcockian suspense movie in that you just KNEW something really bad was going to happen. \u00a0Long before I saw the shark swimming across the screen I had a sense there is evil in the sea and that evil was searching for ME.\u00a0 That movie planted a seed of doubt in my mind as I began to consider that all sea life may not be as charming as Flipper.<\/p>\n

Notwithstanding my rapidly developing irrational fear, I swam the 3-mile rough water swim a second time in July \u201975.\u00a0 That year conditions were very bad and when the first large wave broke over my head at the surf line I forgot all about fish with an appetite and focused on survival in the extremely turbulent waters.\u00a0 In 1976 my fears had abated and I swam the 3-mile rough water swim a third time.\u00a0 The following week I joined my family on vacation and while we were in Florida, we viewed a re-screening of the1971 film\u00a0Blue Water, White Death<\/em>; a documentary about Great White Sharks.\u00a0 That was it, just that fast my open water swimming career was over.\u00a0 Some people may have said I had a phobia.\u00a0 Whatever! \u00a0I just knew I didn\u2019t want to\u00a0BE<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0dinner.<\/p>\n

I was OK with avoiding the ocean well in to the new millennium, right up until I decided I wanted to go back to Kona.<\/p>\n

Yeah, that meant I had to swim in the ocean . . . with all those critters that had designs on eating me.<\/p>\n

I figured the only way to deal with my fear was to confront it head on so I started learning everything I could about sharks and shark attacks.\u00a0 When I started looking at the facts, I quickly realized my fears were unfounded.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at some of the facts:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. There were 57 authenticated unprovoked shark attacks in the ocean waters of the United States in 2016, none of those attacks resulted in a fatality.\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.sharkattackfile.net\/incidentlog.htm<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. In the ocean waters of the continental United States, from 1580-2013 there have been 1,055 unprovoked shark attacks resulting in just 37 fatalities.\u00a0\u00a0You read that right, 1580-2013.\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.sharkattackfile.net\/incidentlog.htm<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. In Hawaii, where residents as well as tourists flock to the water, there were only 154 unprovoked attacks from 1828-2016, ten of which were fatal.\u00a0http:\/\/www.sharkattackfile.net\/incidentlog.htm<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. Each year there are, on average, 50 to 70 confirmed shark attacks and 5 to 15 shark-attack fatalities around the world. The numbers have risen over the past several decades but not because sharks are more aggressive: Humans have simply taken to coastal waters in increasing numbers.\u00a0http:\/\/www.sharkattackfile.net\/incidentlog.htm<\/a><\/li>\n
  5. Relative risk of shark attack on humans compared to other risks –\u00a0http:\/\/www.flmnh.ufl.edu\/fish\/sharks\/attacks\/relarisk.htm<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Right about now you are likely thinking the same thing I was \u2013 that\u2019s all well and good unless you are one of the unfortunate few who encounter a shark.\u00a0 The odds of a shark attack are already infinitesimal, but with a few simple precautions, it is possible to discourage them even further \u2013<\/p>\n