Underwater People

For a while now, I’ve thought it would be fun to give a little insight into the cast of characters that I swim with several times a week at the Glen. Now that I’ve been a regular morning attendee, there are definite regulars at definite times—a fact that never fails to amaze me. For example, there are the Kraft folks—Erin, Jeremy and I are there on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays (although Erin is darn near always out of the water by the time I hit the pool deck—she’s a crazy-early morning person); Joanne (another multisport team member) is typically there several days a week—she’s training for a ½ IM this year; and Pat (my boss) is usually there at least one day while I’m there—it’s a little odd swimming with one’s boss, but I guess I’m over it now—he’s been very supportive of my training, and he’s also training for a ½ IM this year.

There is a distinct difference between those who are at the pool right away at 5:30 am and the rest of us—the 5:30 crowd (at least from what I observed the one time I was actually there at 5:30) consists of a group of Masters swimmers who take up two lanes and a bunch of other very athletic people who apparently enjoy the insanity of being at the pool at the butt-crack of dawn. The 6:30 crowd, however, is much more “normal”—those of us who try to cram in a workout before heading off to work but who refuse to cave to the morning person sickness.

The 6:30 crowd is fairly dependable—I usually recognize the majority of people at the pool, although, with the exception of the Kraft gang, I don’t know any of their names or anything about them. But…here’s a quick description of the people with whom I’ve shared lanes and/or high chlorine content water—these are just my perceptions, but hey—it’s my blog, so welcome to my world…

For starters, there is the groping backstroke man—a very normal-looking middle-aged man with a very unorthodox swim stroke—his arms and hands go very wide upon entering the water, which has, on some unfortunate occasions, led to inadvertent groping of people either in his lane or in the immediately adjancent lanes. Then there are the two water walkers—two women who are either sisters or friends who look a lot alike who have lots of resistance tools (ankle fins, barbell-type objects, and other things that I don’t know how to adequately describe). Lately, there has been sage-and-black Speedo man—the poor guy’s legs are apparently made of lead as his body position is approximately 30° from horizontal when he swims. His buddy, black-and white striped-trunks man, is a wicked lane hog with horrible technique (I’m not one to speak of poor technique as mine is certainly not great, but this guy might as well just thrash knowingly).

There are a few guys who I assume are triathletes—at least they all seem like they follow the “total immersion” school of technique—one guy in the black and green jammers is a bad lane hog as well, but at least I can swim next to him without getting kicked or groped inadvertently. Last, but certainly not least, are the two older gentlemen who regularly show up, get in a lane, and do an interesting walk/swim combo at roughly the speed of a two-toed sloth. One of them reminds me of the man who was the football coach when I was in high school—makes me chuckle every time.

After the 6:30 crowd leaves the pool, the 8:00 water aerobics class takes over two of the lanes. The class is almost exclusively senior citizens and mostly women—there is one man who is probably 80+ years old who participates while sitting on a swim noodle, but the rest of the class is women. The instructor usually comes in about 7:45 to set up—a fact I know because she wears incredible amounts of perfume so I can literally smell her arrival—which is why I try to swim in the lanes farthest from where she teaches. I’m usually in the locker room as the water aerobics women get ready to head out—in general, they seem like a nice group of ladies and are very chatty—one can learn a lot by listening to their conversations.

So, that’s a quick tour into my thrice-weekly trek to the pool—random, yes, but hopefully enjoyable…welcome to my little world, everyone…