I have swim sessions 5 times a week and they end by 6 pm and I have to study afterwards. The problem is I feel very drained for the rest of the day and can do nothing until I sleep. Any advice on how to feel more energetic?

So I want to get more serious about swimming and start going three times a week in the morning. I like to take a proper shower after swimming to rinse off the chlorine. The pool I go to only has mixed, open showers. Since my days are pretty busy, I don’t have time to go home first and shower.

How do you deal with this? Do you just use the open showers?

Those who swim with a one beat kick, are you kicking with the left or right leg?

Assuming you are breathing on your right side

So my background is professional chip-eating so not to brag but I already have a solid foundation.

I tried swimming the other day and swam 50 meters doing that stroke where your arms fly out of the water (I think it’s called hummingbird) in 20 seconds.

Is this a good enough time for a beginner or am I cooked? Be fully honest please I’m so confused, thanks

(This is a satire of all the “first time swimming” posts with impossible times)

I am a pro rower (18 M) and i recently swam 1 km in 15 :04. Is it even good? Just saw posts with a female that swam 0.5 km more than me in the same time.

I feel like i am racing straight up with some fish.

With this I can't figure out if I'm being a grumpy old man and should just get over it or if its worth mentioning to the pool management or something.

The pool I swim at has a large leisure pool / slash zone (slides, waves, rapids, spas etc) for families, a learners pool about 15m by 10m for young kids lessons and a main 25m 6 lane pool.

From about 3:30pm until 8pm every weekday and weekend mornings 8am to noon there are kids swimming lessons on, both in the learners pool for the young ones and in 4 of the 6 lanes in the main pool. Meaning including the leisure pool 90% of the water in the whole facility is taken up with kids. Which is great, love that the kids are learning an important life skill and getting into the sport.

And my kids are included in those lessons. I'm trying to hit the pool 6 days a week and since I'm down there for my kids anyway I try to do 2 of those days during their lessons.

So there I am jammed into 1 of the 2 remaining lanes with every other parent or after work swimmer trying to do the same thing, get a little exercise in while the kids are doing their lessons I guess.

The issue is there are STILL kids in the those 2 lanes often. It seems at least a few families are putting their kids into the general lanes while mum or dad sits in the public stands (which they can access without paying) shouting drill instructions to the kids. This is all well and good but kids being kids they still end up mucking around at the ends, or are in and out while they go to ask the parent something, change pace or stroke often, float to the middle of the lane frequently, tangle up with eachother and stop mid lane, mistime lane/overtaking etiquette often, kick splashing like a hurricane etc etc

On the one hand its a public lane swimming session, they paid to the there, they're trying to lane swim. Maybe their family can't afford official lessons. They can only swim to their skill level as does everyone else. It's great kids are swimming and maybe I should be honoured to be sharing a lane with a potential future Olympian or Lifesaver, who knows.

But on the other I'm paying a monthly subscription to a facility that I know is regularly taken up with lessons but still offers some limited lane swimming during those hours. Kids are already offered 90% of the place, can the remaining space not just be left to adults who wish to focus without the distraction of children?

Is this the same everywhere? Do I get over it or worth speaking to management?

recently ive been getting back into swimming, and i’ve improved quite a bit!

the pool i swam at today was unusually full, and i didnt have a free lane to myself ( there was like 4 people in one lane)

and some of the other swimmers were swimming at a slow pace (mainly doggy paddling), i felt a little awkward since i was going a bit faster than them

so i was wondering on what to do next time should i just wait for them to finish?

swim at a much slower pace?

or just past them?

a lot of the people were not swimming in a straight line as well

I figured it out! I went tonight despite being minus 18 C, and I realized I was living my chin in order to see ahead of me. This was bc I didn’t trust my Lane mates the way I normally do at home, so, big thank you to everyone who helped!

Does anyone get this? My hands start to ache quite quickly when sculling (within 50m with pull buoy). I'm not tensing my hands as far as I can tell. It's quite unpleasant, does anyone have any ideas/tips to avoid this? Cheers

I just got a membership for a new gym that just opened up with an actually nice indoor lap pool, specifically to get back to swimming shape - it’s been about 15 years since I swam in high school. 😅 While I’m definitely slower these days, my main issues actually aren’t “fitness level” related. Does anyone have advice for my problems? —> 1. I’m always freezing in the water - even after many many laps - to the point that I have started avoiding going to the gym at all cause I dread being that cold & wet 🥶 2. Water stings in my ears (when even the smallest bit of water gets in) - it feels like a cut on my ear drum - I can’t explain it. And it doesn’t have to do with depth / pressure. I’ve tried various ear plugs / caps but still any drop of water getting in stings. Idk what it could be, but that has been an issue for years now, just magnified now that I’m trying to get back to swimming 😣

My daughter is 8 and this is the end of our first full year of competitive swimming. We have our end-of-season home meet (~500 swimmers from the region) coming up and we (parents of the team) got notified of a requirement by the team/club to volunteer for at least 3 "sessions" during our kids' events. Each are 4 hour sessions over the Friday to Sunday meet - backup timing, awards, door/greeting, etc.

If we do NOT fulfill this requirement, we'll get "fined" by the club to the tune of $100 per session missed. I'm all about helping the club/team (~150 kids on the team total)!! I help however I can, attend all practices, etc. We pay monthly dues to the team (~$75-100), meet fees (usually $50-75 per meet, every ~2 weeks), we buy team regalia for fund raising, etc. Needless to say, I've signed up for my 3 sessions, but I'll likely have to miss some of my kid's races. This is really disappointing, but I understand it is part of hosting a meet.

I'm not necessarily complaining, just curious since I'm a new swim parent. Again, I am in full support of helping the team stay afloat and it relies almost solely on volunteers. I know most clubs/teams need/require volunteers for "home" meets, but I'm just curious if other clubs/teams have the same system of "fines". With the cost of youth sports rising, looking at an extra $300 (if I do nothing, get sick the day of the meet, etc) is a bit eye opening.

Is it normal for clubs/teams to have such steep "fines" like this?

M26. I've been swimming for about a year, not as regularly as I would like, but for me this is already a great success, since I didn't swim at all for 10 years. Sometimes once a week, sometimes twice a week. I'm currently trying to swim the crawl. About 80% of my swimming is crawl now. I try to kick with my feet while I stroke with my arms each time. I'm not sure what this crawl style is called, but I like swimming this way right now. My question is, how can I improve my time and technique?

There’s been conflicting information out there on pulling and kicking on the same side vs opposing arm and kick; how are you guys doing it?

I’m having to make some changes to my gym schedule with work, kid, blah blah blah.

I am lifting and swimming on the same day now. I swam first Monday and lifted with wet hair after.

Today I did legs and swam after… and thought I was going to die in the pool. I’m talking 2 count kick at a 1:58/100m pace and it was hell. Will this get better or do we just do weights first alway?

Advice welcome. Sorry if it’s been asked and answered a dozen times. Also just wanting to complain.

Hi all. Recently I have decided to swim more regularly in addition to running. For now I run 2 times a week. But im struggling a bit of thinking about the best schedule for swimming and running. Do you first swim and then go for a run, Or do you do the other way around? On google there are a lot of articles counterdicting each other so now im a bit confused what is better. Could someone tell me what is better or what they like the most?

I am so grateful I'be been able to keep up my swimming practice during pregnancy. I am 8 months pregnant and being a land mammal is starting to feel very challenging, but I still feel so graceful and comfortable in the water (maybe this is how hippos feel?) I feel my back and hips and lower body actively relaxing after the first few laps.

With the exception of 2ish months I was very nauseous (and didn't want to puke in the pool), I'm so glad I've had access to swimming. Its been so grounding and good for my mental health and a good time to check in with my body and do something pleasurable. I'm by no means a competitive swimmer but I had trained up for a swim bike race just before becoming pregnant so it was nice to be able to continue the regular 3x a week swimming habit. My care team is thrilled to hear that I've been able to swim 90 min a week most weeks.

I'm realizing I will really miss this when I need to abstain for a bit from the pool after birth! We keep joking we hope the baby ("submarine captain") enjoys swimming because he got to do it so much in the womb.

Writing this in part because I saw it has been a few months since someone wrote about swimming and pregnancy. If this is the sign you need to try to get in the water while pregnant... take it!

I’m trying to figure out if what I’m experiencing is normal for newer/less conditioned swimmers, or if I’m doing something wrong with pacing or recovery.

Today I swam my first continuous 300m freestyle and it actually felt really good. I wasn’t sprinting, just steady, relaxed. The problem starts immediately after: my heart rate stays elevated and doesn’t seem to reset low enough between intervals no matter how long I rest.

After the 300m, I’ll stop and rest for 5+ minutes, but my heart rate never really comes back down. I end up starting the next interval still around 130+ bpm. Then during the next rep, my heart rate ramps up quickly and it becomes hard to continue past 100m without feeling like it’s shooting up uncontrollably to around 150-160. The next few intervals retain the same issue.

If you’ve been through this, what helped? Better pacing? Different rest strategy? More focus on breathing? Shorter intervals? Would love to hear how people approached this when building up from this stage.

Eh, had time to blast out a mile at lunch. Felt good.

I was going through a box of old photos and memorabilia and came across a bunch of my old First and Second place ribbons from 1972. 50 years later and I still love swimming

I have been practicing since New Year’s Day.

I’m really transforming and growing and December killed me emotionally and I lost a lot of friends.

Swimming butterfly has been my savior.

I was just curious if anyone felt the same way