Bad Pool Karma

Whats up kids? Everyone groovy? Looking forward to the weekend? Thats right, we are almost there!!! Now go grab yourself a cold one.

I go to the pool after work today and had another experience of instant bad pool karma. I only brought it upon myself. Here is how Karma handed down the punishment I deserved.

I hop in the pool my set is as follows:

300 warm up (easy)
1000 form (5 x 100 form, 100 stroke)
1500 (3 x 300 pull, 100 kick, 100 free)
100 (4 x 25 free fast)
200 cool down (easy)

Voila, 3100!!!


Halfway through my 1000 form a woman on the pool deck asks me if I am going to be doing kick the entire time. I wasn't sure exactly how much of a jerk I wanted to be. I should have responded, "Yes, I am doing 3000 kick today, tomorrow I will be doing 3000 butterfly. It is a new swim workout plan called super distance sets." Instead, I quickly yell to her my entire workout and keep going. Here is my issue . . . .

If you have to ask me, what I'm doing before you hop in my pool lane. You best find another lane. Trust me, swimmers that ask, always mess your workout.

Wisely, or so I think, she hops in the other pool lane. I may have been rude, but everything worked out. She is swimming, and I keep doing my workout. Until pool karma came along. . .

I'm now doing the first 300 pull in my 1500 and suprise, someone joined my lane. No worries. They seem to be going fast (at least that first 50 was fast). However this swimmer's second 50 wasn't even a legitimate stroke. It was some squid like back stroke (think breast stroke, upside down). Needless to say I spent the next 1000 either passing or turning around before the wall. Pool karma had got me. If I was nice the first lady that asked me about my workout, I may not have gotten stuck with the squid stroker.

All in all I the Karma punishment fit the crime. I still got a good swim workout in but I needed to be reminded that it pays to be nice to people. Lesson learned.

Back to the Pool

Ahh, whats up kids? Everyone have a good day? Hope so. Especially you, reading this right . . . . now. I hope you had very good day. How was my day? Most Excellent, thanks for asking!!! I have all these foaming rants swimming in my head but I'm going to stick with the original one.

I'm training for the Chesapeake Bay Swim. 4.4 miles of sexyness. My workout today was fairly modest by any standard:

300 warm up, 6x200 1st 100 form, 2nd 100 stroke. 300 pull. 200 cool down. Nothing too intense just feeling my way into the water. I'm on the pool deck trying to pick a lane. There is free lane, so I pick that one.

Before I hop in the water I look at the guy in the "Fast" lane doing 50's on the minute! Are you kidding me? 50 yards on the minute!?!?! You better be doing 100 of those 50's. This should have been a sign to me. Just get back in the car. Go home.

I warm up. In the middle of my 2nd 200, I hear splashing and yelling. Wondering who is drowning in the pool, I pick my head up and look behind me only to see some regular standing in my lane behind me. He proceeds to say the 8 words that frustrate me to no end. "Do you mind if we share the lane?" You can't say "Yes." If you didn't think it was an issue you probably wouldn't be stopping me to ask. So I nod, and go right back to my form work. I should give a little back story right here.

I have a very uncanny ability of recognizing faces. So I knew what kind of swimmer this guy was. He is the kind of swimmer that thinks of a new swimming stroke while eating his cornflakes in the morning and comes to the pool to see if he can change the world of swimming. He does kicking drills. Wears a swim cap, without goggles but doesn't stick his face in the water. As if that makes any sense. I really wish I was making this up. But the above description is true.

Here I am doing a kicking drill and he thinks to himself, "wow, this guy is doing kicking drills, I do kicking drills. We must swim the same speed." Unfortunately for him, I do kicking drills to swim faster. Where as he does . . . . well, I have no clue what that dude does.

I get to the 100 stroke, and I am right on top of the guy in no time. Like I didn't see this coming. I just turn around before the wall. After passing him on the next 200, he stops me again. (Hey buddy, I'm here to swim. Not to chat.) We should split the lane, so we don't pass each other. I nod again and just keep swimming. I disdain splitting a lane. If you can't circle swim with me, then find another lane tough guy. I don't hop in lanes with people faster than me, and I expect you to show me the same courtesy. Its hard to flip turn in half a lane. Needless to say, the few glares I gave the guy when he stopped caused him to change lanes once another lane was free. I was free to do the rest of my workout.

Back in the day(2003), when I was in swimming shape I had a great technique for clearing a swimming lane. I would stand on the pool deck and pick a lane where I knew I was faster than almost everyone in the lane. I would stand right on the edge of the pool and while staring down the lane I would stretch. Slowly everyone who didn't do flip turns would see me at the end of the pool and find another lane to swim. It was particularly effective when slow swimmers were in the fast lane. My sister would actually ask me to do this whenever the pool was a little crowded and she wanted a free lane. Good times!!!

If the stretching didn't work, I usually made my first 100 a very fast and very obnoxious 100. That would usually help the slower swimmers make up their mind.

I'll end this post with one final question: Is Salsa considered a fruit or a vegatable?