Open water swimming at Mammoth Lake in Lake Jackson, TX (Houston area) is AWESOME!

Triathlon Forum
1

Im down prepping for Ironman Lonestar 70.3 and wanted to do some open water swimming. Found this place, which is a SCUBA training lake. It’s quite big, 1100 yards across, and has lots of buoys because they have lots of sunken things in the lake for SCUBA training. I spoke to the owner and wetsuit tri training is apparently a common request so I plopped down my $10 for the day and went swimming.

Its a manmade lake and fairly new. The bright orange buoys were really nice for sighting practice and the 1100 yards across means that one lap is a little over a HIM swim.

If youre in Houston I highly recommend this place if you want to spend a day open water swimming. Google mammoth lake scuba or mammoth lake Lake Jackson TX as I assume they have a website. Theres a restaurant next door whose patio is right on the lake too. I snapped some pics of it which I’ll post later.

Just a heads up!

2

Oh, pics of the lake on its site:

http://mammothlakescuba.com
.

3

It’s bad enough worrying about gators in lake Conroe. If I saw one of those paddlefish I ink I would freak out

4

Haha, I went out again on Sunday after I read your comment and I kept my eye out for any fish. Really didn’t want to run into one of those. :stuck_out_tongue:

5

Holy crap. I grew up there. Never imagined that place would have a good lake for open water swimming. That place is a swamp!

6

Im down prepping for Ironman Lonestar 70.3 and wanted to do some open water swimming. Found this place, which is a SCUBA training lake. It’s quite big, 1100 yards across, and has lots of buoys because they have lots of sunken things in the lake for SCUBA training. I spoke to the owner and wetsuit tri training is apparently a common request so I plopped down my $10 for the day and went swimming.

Its a manmade lake and fairly new. The bright orange buoys were really nice for sighting practice and the 1100 yards across means that one lap is a little over a HIM swim.

If youre in Houston I highly recommend this place if you want to spend a day open water swimming. Google mammoth lake scuba or mammoth lake Lake Jackson TX as I assume they have a website. Theres a restaurant next door whose patio is right on the lake too. I snapped some pics of it which I’ll post later.

Just a heads up!

One lap would be one length or 1100 yards, two lengths, 2200 yards would be two laps. I couldn’t resist.

7

Really? I’ve always considered a lap of a pool (and, by extension, a lake) to be out and back, and one length to be once across. Thus, 1100yards = 1 length and 2200yards = 1 lap.

Maybe I was confused. :stuck_out_tongue:

8

its a long standing dispute amongst the swimming community,I was just stirring the pot.

9

Sweet! Thank you for sharing. What was the water temp?

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It was right around 68 degrees! I was actually a little warm in my full wetsuit with the sun beating down.

11

I’ve done a bunch of scuba dives at mammoth and have never seen one of the paddle fish, I think you’ll be safe!

You can also just go to Offets Bayou and swim there for free, and get used to the salt water. I don’t know if they have closed the piers behind Moody Gardens for the race yet though…

12

Also Lake 288 of at the 288 and beltway 8 area has open water swimming as well. same deal as it is also a scuba park. It is about 750 if you go around the perimeter.