Okay, somebody please give me some insight. Why do so many pool swimmers not participate in open water events?
With a background that didn't include distance freestyle, I wondered if it would be fun to try an open water event. Was it really swimming without a line on the bottom, flip turns, and chlorine? I've found open water swims to be pleasant complements to pool swims. This really makes me wonder why open water events don't seem to generate more participation? I'm eager to hear why so many competent pool swimmers seem to neglect their open water options...
Former Member
The odds of being attacked by a shark while swimming are very "situational" -close to zero when in Walden Pond close to 4 in 10 if just survived the sinking of the Indianiapolis. All in all jelly fish are more worrisome than sharks when swimming in most seas.
The early comment about Walden Pond is all too true. There are probably more people swimming in Walden on a sunny mid-summer day than there are people swimming laps in all of the surrounding pools. Still it beats almost all MDC pools.
You may not find that word in any dictionary or thesaurus, but somehow I think most men instinctively know what it means! (You women may not admit it, but you do, too!) Anyway, it should be in the dictionary...
I don't mean this to be a put down at all, but it does take a little
more courage to swim open water.
I see open water to a swimmer as a runner might compare cross country
running to an indoor track, or a mountain biker to a velodrome
bicycle race track, or an Indy race car driver to the Baja 500.
It is all racing, all competitive, but the open water offers/demands
more variables. You have to be mentally prepared to deal with
those variables.
An obvious point that hasn't been raised here is that all open water swims are essentially distance freestyle races. I've done a couple and both times during the race I start to wonder why I'm swimming 2 miles when I don't like to swim beyond 200 yards in a pool and really don't like to swim freestyle at all. The appeal just isn't there for all of us regardless of who is waiting at the finish.
Fisch -
Open water racing is rock & roll and pool racing is Carnegie Hall. It just depends on whether you are a rocker or a long-hair.
Long live rock!
-LBJ
