This question has been asked many times and the same opinions get trotted out every single time. The real answer is: a lap is either one length of the pool or two, depending on who you ask. For this reason no serious swimmers use the term. Instead we talk about the length of the swim 100, 200 (yards or meters) etc. There's no chance of ambiguity when you just state the distance swum.
When swimmers ask me about my swimming, I speak in yards.
When non-swimmers ask me about my swimming, I speak in yards- followed by a translation of how many lengths of the pool it is. I frequently get asked by people in my community how much I swim and I will say something like, "Today I swam a total of 3,500 yards which was 140 lengths of our pool."
This question has been asked many times and the same opinions get trotted out every single time. The real answer is: a lap is either one length of the pool or two, depending on who you ask. For this reason no serious swimmers use the term. Instead we talk about the length of the swim 100, 200 (yards or meters) etc. There's no chance of ambiguity when you just state the distance swum.
When swimmers ask me about my swimming, I speak in yards.
When non-swimmers ask me about my swimming, I speak in yards- followed by a translation of how many lengths of the pool it is. I frequently get asked by people in my community how much I swim and I will say something like, "Today I swam a total of 3,500 yards which was 140 lengths of our pool."
