Out of curiosity, what brought you to swim?
I'm a fitness swimmer now and do OW races for fun. I began swimming as an alternative to running, I had taken a swim class in college that demonstrated routines and corrected my form enough to do well without getting frustrated or feel intimidated. When I had trouble running I would go swim instead. I began swimming regularly to train for the Long beach triathlon years ago. Now I enjoy swimming just as much as running...it's a new challenge as well as a great stress release for me. I'm just finishing up my credential and will be transitioning from a career in IT to teaching, which means that i'll be open to joining a masters team soon! Wohoo!
Here's the question....
Why did you start?
When?
What's your day job?
I hated and was scared to death of swimming lessons as a little kid, I think I took intermediate swimming 3 times and never passed it, the two-arm backstroke with frog kick always eluded me. The first couple summers of lessons when I was 6 or so they had to politely ask my mom to leave during the lesson because I was in hysterics about having to get in the pool. I've wondered what some of my old swimming teachers would think if they saw what became of my swimming.
Later, my mom wanted me to do some sport outdoors for my health and I was always too spacey and my hayfever was too bad for something like baseball or soccer so despite my lackluster experiences with swimming lessons she had me try out for the local USS team at age 9. To make the team you had to swim a single 25, I did about 15 before clinging to the wall exhausted. For whatever reason the coach decided to let me on anyway and by the end of the week I could do a 50. Within a month I'd learned back, ***, and fly which I had never done previously.
Fast-forward 6 years when I started to grow a bit and for who knows what reason something clicked and I went from a 1:17 breaststroker to a 1:09 in the course of a week. From then I was hooked. I burnt out a bit after a year of college swimming and its 25 hours-a-week commitment and quit for 10 years before rediscovering my love for swimming with masters. I've been swimming masters now for just about 4 years and don't plan to stop. In most of my events I'm actually doing lifetime bests now.
I hated and was scared to death of swimming lessons as a little kid, I think I took intermediate swimming 3 times and never passed it, the two-arm backstroke with frog kick always eluded me. The first couple summers of lessons when I was 6 or so they had to politely ask my mom to leave during the lesson because I was in hysterics about having to get in the pool. I've wondered what some of my old swimming teachers would think if they saw what became of my swimming.
Later, my mom wanted me to do some sport outdoors for my health and I was always too spacey and my hayfever was too bad for something like baseball or soccer so despite my lackluster experiences with swimming lessons she had me try out for the local USS team at age 9. To make the team you had to swim a single 25, I did about 15 before clinging to the wall exhausted. For whatever reason the coach decided to let me on anyway and by the end of the week I could do a 50. Within a month I'd learned back, ***, and fly which I had never done previously.
Fast-forward 6 years when I started to grow a bit and for who knows what reason something clicked and I went from a 1:17 breaststroker to a 1:09 in the course of a week. From then I was hooked. I burnt out a bit after a year of college swimming and its 25 hours-a-week commitment and quit for 10 years before rediscovering my love for swimming with masters. I've been swimming masters now for just about 4 years and don't plan to stop. In most of my events I'm actually doing lifetime bests now.
