What can make a potentially great pool and swim meet (78-80 degree deep water, wide lanes, great gutter system, good starting blocks, great lighting, large scoreboard, excellent officials, etc.) into a mediocre one? The lane lines.
We recently swam our championships in a new state-of-the-art pool. The only problem was the slack lane lines. The water was very choppy and continued that way throughout the whole race. They served no more purpose than the old “floaties” we used 45 years ago. They were so loose they visibly rose and fell with the waves and had so many horizontal waves they looked like serpents at the surface. The lane lines did not cut the waves but rather rode them. When there was a race with an open lane, the waves pushed the lane lines well into the free lane. Predictably overall times were not as fast as they could have been.
It is not necessary to have the lane lines are tight as a piano wire in order for them to be effective, but tightening them up for a meet is an area that is most often neglected. We work too hard at our craft not to be given every opportunity to swim as fast as the pool allows.
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Kaelonj Thank you for supporting the water aerobics folks.
Confession time here. I do the water aerobics class twice a week at my pool. Aquageek, you are right, some of the folks in the class are far out of shape, but they are doing something to get into shape... everyone has to start somewhere. And you are also right that for someone who is in shape the class is not aerobic However, aerobic fitness, endurance and speed are not the end all/ultimate goals for everyone. I time my swim workout so I am swimming slow easy cool down laps just before the water aerobics class begins, then I paddle on over, participate and cool down a little bit more... it is a good stretch. Recently, the class has been doing ai chi as part of its workouts. You think the water aerobic exercises don't look difficult, you should watch the slow ballet like movements of an ai chi class--those postures, believe it or not, are harder to perform correctly than most of the water aerobic exercises we do. Since beginning ai chi my flexibility has increased. I even think it has helped my endurance some because, like tai chi, ai chi stresses breathing correctly as one performs the postures. What I'm trying to say is everyone gets out of an activity, what they put into it.
The water aerobics folks pay their dues just as lap swimmers do and have a right to use the pool in a manner they find fit. Look at it this way... would you rather have the times you can swim laps restricted so lap swimmers and water aerobics aren't in the pool at the same time? Guess we are lucky at our pool because as far as I know lapswimmers (and I know most of them) and water aerobics folks (and I know most of them too) co exist peacfully.
Kaelonj Thank you for supporting the water aerobics folks.
Confession time here. I do the water aerobics class twice a week at my pool. Aquageek, you are right, some of the folks in the class are far out of shape, but they are doing something to get into shape... everyone has to start somewhere. And you are also right that for someone who is in shape the class is not aerobic However, aerobic fitness, endurance and speed are not the end all/ultimate goals for everyone. I time my swim workout so I am swimming slow easy cool down laps just before the water aerobics class begins, then I paddle on over, participate and cool down a little bit more... it is a good stretch. Recently, the class has been doing ai chi as part of its workouts. You think the water aerobic exercises don't look difficult, you should watch the slow ballet like movements of an ai chi class--those postures, believe it or not, are harder to perform correctly than most of the water aerobic exercises we do. Since beginning ai chi my flexibility has increased. I even think it has helped my endurance some because, like tai chi, ai chi stresses breathing correctly as one performs the postures. What I'm trying to say is everyone gets out of an activity, what they put into it.
The water aerobics folks pay their dues just as lap swimmers do and have a right to use the pool in a manner they find fit. Look at it this way... would you rather have the times you can swim laps restricted so lap swimmers and water aerobics aren't in the pool at the same time? Guess we are lucky at our pool because as far as I know lapswimmers (and I know most of them) and water aerobics folks (and I know most of them too) co exist peacfully.
