I'm kind of on my own path with swimming right now because I started almost from scratch at age 17 and now, at 19, I'm the youngest Masters swimmer I've seen in my area so far who's actually going to practices and/or meets. In a way it's kind of nice because it motivates me to go out of my way and invite people or talk to people in my age group so I end up having a lot of fun with fellow close-to-twentysomethings. We aren't the majority and it's easy to feel really young and maybe out of your comfort zone at first.
Both in and outside of the swimming community, people do not always consider how your body can still improve well into your years. I've always been surprised to see really good or passionate swimmers just stop "cold turkey" but at the same time I get it, because there's a lot of other things to do in life and some people might have never had, or have lost, their intrinsic motivation. Masters is really good for people who love swimming or fitness in and of itself and who would make sacrifices just to spend time training for personal improvement, but I've heard former competitive swimmers describe Masters as a "drastic" difference from varsity swimming and for that reason it may not offer the same social or tangential benefits that ex-varsity swimmers want from their time in the pool.
I'm pretty happy to see there are still a good amount of younger people here, though. Even though it doesn't look like there are a lot of people my age in Masters from a glance, if you dig around in the online search you'll find a good amount of 18-24, or 25-30 aged people and some of them are even still swimming in college and are posting really impressive times. I really enjoy how I was able to find swimming competition here, which is a huge goal of mine, and I'm glad my age group is included in Masters, because otherwise it would be hard to find people to swim or compete against. There are a few varsity swimmers in my Masters age bracket that I've noticed online so I try to track their times and go to meets with them to have a rival/swimming role model.
Plus what's nice with Masters is that even though not many people start young, if you do start young you have the opportunity to pursue swimming from the perspective of it being a lifelong sport instead of the perspective of it being an eight-year or four-year competition. That point is what has made a world of difference in my life.
I'm kind of on my own path with swimming right now because I started almost from scratch at age 17 and now, at 19, I'm the youngest Masters swimmer I've seen in my area so far who's actually going to practices and/or meets. In a way it's kind of nice because it motivates me to go out of my way and invite people or talk to people in my age group so I end up having a lot of fun with fellow close-to-twentysomethings. We aren't the majority and it's easy to feel really young and maybe out of your comfort zone at first.
Both in and outside of the swimming community, people do not always consider how your body can still improve well into your years. I've always been surprised to see really good or passionate swimmers just stop "cold turkey" but at the same time I get it, because there's a lot of other things to do in life and some people might have never had, or have lost, their intrinsic motivation. Masters is really good for people who love swimming or fitness in and of itself and who would make sacrifices just to spend time training for personal improvement, but I've heard former competitive swimmers describe Masters as a "drastic" difference from varsity swimming and for that reason it may not offer the same social or tangential benefits that ex-varsity swimmers want from their time in the pool.
I'm pretty happy to see there are still a good amount of younger people here, though. Even though it doesn't look like there are a lot of people my age in Masters from a glance, if you dig around in the online search you'll find a good amount of 18-24, or 25-30 aged people and some of them are even still swimming in college and are posting really impressive times. I really enjoy how I was able to find swimming competition here, which is a huge goal of mine, and I'm glad my age group is included in Masters, because otherwise it would be hard to find people to swim or compete against. There are a few varsity swimmers in my Masters age bracket that I've noticed online so I try to track their times and go to meets with them to have a rival/swimming role model.
Plus what's nice with Masters is that even though not many people start young, if you do start young you have the opportunity to pursue swimming from the perspective of it being a lifelong sport instead of the perspective of it being an eight-year or four-year competition. That point is what has made a world of difference in my life.
