It was worth the pain!

I’ve been swimming lately. This is new for me. I had pretty much left swimming behind when I left school many other forms of exercise have come and gone but swimming was a hazy, distant memory. I’d been going to the local city council pool. A friendly place with only two roped off lanes and lots of people generally floating and splashing about. The man who takes my money is friendly, seems like someone who has probably worked there for a long time as I watch him chat to lots of people. It is a nice place to dip my toes back into the swimming pool so to speak.

Today though I decided to go to a swimming pool a little closer to home, a pool attached to one of the big private schools as I’d heard through the grapevine that it was heated. As I entered the venue I saw some vaguely familiar elite athletes leaving. As soon as I got in there and saw every lane roped off and squads racing up down the pool I knew I wasn’t in Kansas anymore….. I assessed the situation assuming that like the freeway there must be a slow lane allocated for the elderly and the people that haven’t swum for thirteen years. I headed for the lane next to a man who looked somewhere in his mid-eighties.

It was at about the half a kilometre mark that I saw two people get into my lane (that’s right my lane I was there first). This is cool I thought I can share my lane they can weave around me as I breaststroke slowly up down the lane and this is basically what happened…. Until that awkward moment when we were all sharing space on the little step at the end of the lane specifically designed for standing and catching your breath when the lady said to me “Are you going to be much longer?”

Well I’d actually done 700metres I was totally shagged, but it seemed like it would annoy this lady to have to continue to weave around me so I did another 200 metres just for her, the pain was worth it…… I think I’ll go back to the council pool next time…..