8 Things Only Swimmers Will Understand
On average, swimmers spend 12 hours per week training to be the best athlete they can be. That means countless miles following that black line, hundreds of tumble-turns, and plenty of time spent with teammates. What’s certain is that swimming is a sport that requires strength, endurance and definitely needs its athletes to be mentally tough. While we can all agree that swimming isn’t a sport for the faint of heart, there are some things that only a swimmer will truly understand:
Not being able to hear your coach with your goggles on
Leaving your goggles on while coach is explaining the set means you won’t hear anything they say… But the second you take them off, you can hear perfectly clear. Which doesn’t make any logical sense, however, every swimmer has experienced this weird phenomenon.
Whatever song you last heard will be stuck in your head for the whole practice
Let’s just hope the last song you listened to wasn’t ‘Baby Shark’… Because, boy, oh boy, that would make for a long practice.
Buying your swimsuit two sizes too small
Not because we are dumb, but that’s literally how it works.
Slamming your hand into a lane line
You thought stepping on a Lego was bad? Try slamming your hand into a lane line, or hitting someone else’s arm while swimming butterfly. For the remainder of the lap, your hand feels numb as you pull through the water, leaving you questioning whether your hand is broken.
Taking one week off training feels like you’ve missed a whole month
After taking just one week off swimming, the water feels like its slipping through your fingers. Why does the water not feel like water anymore?
Being at a swim meet for nine hours, but only swimming for five minutes
That’s the life of a swimmer. Whether it be cheering on your teammate or supporting a friend who false started, those hours spent pool-side make for the most special memories with your team.
Swimming faster when you’re breathing less
To all other sports… If you thought your sport was hard, try doing it while holding your breath.
Putting your race suit on takes longer than the actual event
Swimmers know the pain of getting that race suit on, and you’d want to make sure you’re completely dry or it’s going to take you even longer.
All commentaries are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Swimming World Magazine nor its staff.
All true!
Alex Lynn
Luke Mark
Absolutely true!
So true!
Absolutely true
I agree totally ..I swam up to Commonwealthfinalist and raced up to 25km in openwater..in the 70s an 80s
Laura Mendez Berry, Mona E Nyheim-Canales, Carolina Cuco Rivera, Kristen Delatorre Halstead, Prebble Q Ramswell, Debra Yarbrough ??♀️
Jennifer Naae Albanese I’ll never forget your cap coming off your head slowly at south west conference in the mile
Mona – 10 pounds of hair too!!
That is so true I am a swimmer and all of that happenes
As a committed swimmer, all of this happens, like, twice a day for both morning and evening practice. One of the things that I hate my non-swiming freinds to say is, “Swimming is easy”, or “I could sprint 4 laps in 20 seconds.” (swim a 100). When people say stuff like that, I usually just say: “Try swimming a 1000 fly for warm up, then doing 8 50 frees on a 27.”
So true
All true very true
this is so true i’m still a kid but i can relate to all of these i still remember the time my friend couldn’t get her goggles on because they were to tight she almost gave me a heart attack
Only eight? Not very smart!
Sorry, I had my goggles on, what did you say!
Couldn’t be more true. Forgot the infamous smell of chlorine in your nose all day long and even when you wake in the morning. Never goes away until you take a training break.
Also, for open water swims, does anyone else feel like they can smell the water? I am not talking about gasoline fumes from boats or bbq smoke from the beach…the water itself. I swear I can smell whatever died in the lake and it is in the water, not on the shore.
100000000000 percent true
Some of us older swimmers never wore goggles Gary Hall senior was only swimmer i new that occasionally wore goggles .we also as guy wore caps
JackHorsley 1968 200 meter back bronze medal
I swam forty years ago for LIU/Bklyb for only 2 maybe 3 events. 50yrds, 100 yards, and alternate for 200im. Began training @6am, did road work, followed by swimming @ StFrancis college, LIU/Bklyn had no pool. Classes between.
Events describe occurred 1980-1984. Great memories.
Absolutely right…nailed it!
yep
Slamming your hand into the lane line is a humbling experience, not gonna lie 🙁
Yes very true
Yep Especially while swimming Fly