Organizer hopes to stage Escape next year

Kiyokazu Onishi is hopeful that this year’s non-Escape from Managaha Island does not discourage participants from entering the open water crossing next year.

Onishi is the founder of the KFC Club, which is the main organizer of this year’s 2nd Annual Escape From Managaha Island.

Despite a cancellation in the second attempt to cross the channel between the uninhabited island and Hafa Adai Beach Hotel, Onishi said he still feels confident that local and off-island swimmers from would still try to make the crossing.

Through an interpreter, Onishi expressed disappointment that the crossing was scrapped for the second straight year but maintains that with cooperation from Mother Nature, it could still work next year.

He said he also felt sorry for the local swimmers who were all excited about making the historic swim. Onishi, however, felt more sad and apologized to the contingent of Japanese swimmers who came to Saipan precisely to swim the island-to-island hop.

More than a 75 percent of the close to 60 swimmers who enlisted in the race were tourists from Japan.

While Onishi remains upbeat about the chances, NMASA Hall of Fame coach Bill Sakovich seemed a little more pessimistic about the possibility of holding the same kind of race next year.

Sakovich, who is in town specifically to help out in the swim, said organizers might need to tweak some of the event’s specifics to convince guest swimmers to come back and local swimmers to sign on again.

He said alternatives to the four-kilometer open water crossing could be a swim around Managaha Island, a swim from the island to Hyatt Regency Saipan, and a course from the Hyatt to Pacific Islands Club.

According to Sakovich a swim around Managaha Island is feasible because it wouldn’t be that too long and swimmers wouldn’t be that too exposed to the elements compared to a water crossing.

Like the first option, the swim to the Hyatt is also a nice option because swimmers still get to do a crossing and the shorter distance makes it doable even in bad weather conditions.

The 4-6 mile swim from the Hyatt to PIC could be the most challenging for short-distance swimmers among the three alternatives. But Sakovich said that on the part of organizers, that type of swim could be the easiest to stage, at least logistics wise.

He said with the swim being closer to shore, KFC Club, the Marianas Visitors Authority, and other government and private agencies could readily deploy support craft for the participants.

The course being basically within the protected cordon of the breakwater also makes it ideal in either good or bad weather.

“We tried it last year and it was canceled because of high surf and the strong current. We held the Escape earlier this year ahead of the typhoon season but what could you do when nature has other plans?”

Asked why Guam seems to have a lot of success with its Cocos Crossing, Sakovich simply said that the similar open water crossing just seems to get lucky each year.

He, however, added a caveat that despite the Guam swim being staged each year, it has claimed its share of lives.