Last night I experienced a "social swim" for the very first time. I had never even heard of such a thing. A social swim simply means that you're sharing a lane with more than one other person; so instead of going back and forth on one side of a lane while the other person swims on the other side, all three or four or however many people swim in long skinny ovals so you don't run into each other.
Here's the story: I was at the gym with my dear friend and occasional swim coach. We were going for a swim first, and then at the end she was going to try again to teach me how to do a flip turn. It'd be a really helpful skill, now that I'm swimming longer distances. Plus I would feel awesome. (Unfortunately, the last time I tried to learn the flip turn, I kept running into the floor. Yowch.) Anyhow, after only ten minutes of our swim, the pool was suddenly invaded by Aqua Fit--one of those really strange water aerobics classes mostly attended by people much older than I, to put it gently. My swimming buddy and I were already sharing a lane due to lack of space; now we had to share it with two other women! Hence the social swim idea: If we all just swim in ovals, keeping to the right, we can all four use one lane.
The problem with this arrangement was... I'm sorry to say... me. One girl finished up her swim pretty quickly, but the other three of us were socially swimming for probably half an hour. And let me tell you, I am slow. I'm not the slowest of the slow (occasionally when I'm swimming on my own I will "pass" someone in another lane, and I get really excited for myself), but compared to My Friend the College Swimmer and the other swimmer in our lane, I am slow slow slow. I had to stop at the end several times to let the others pass me. Ah well, I'm learning.
Part of the strangeness of this social swim was the Aqua Fit class (did I mention that many of the women are actually wearing sneakers in the pool? And that this particular class was led by a very middle-aged woman in a seafoam-green bikini? I found this very interesting). The class takes up most of the pool and does a lot of kicking and bouncing and things that create a very weird current in the single lane at the end. It was probably good practice for swimming in a lake! Seriously, a few times I thought I was going to be swept out to sea or dashed into the side of the pool.
So that was my latest (mis?)adventure in the realm of swimming. In other news, training is going pretty well. I was able to stay on track (minus one bike ride) even with a trip out of town last week. Most importantly, I am coming to terms with the statement My goal is to finish. This is very true of me and this triathlon. I realize more and more that merely crossing that finish line will be quite an accomplishment; setting time goals for myself is just plain unhelpful at this point. Truth be told, I probably will be at the end of the pack. And, to keep up this honesty thing, I have to admit that I don't really like that thought. But it will be all right. Just a few months ago I could hardly swim from one end of the pool to the other; so finishing a half-mile swim alone, not to mention the other two activities, is a pretty big deal.
No comments:
Post a Comment