Four Times as Fast
I could never run at any kind of speed. Russian-peasant descent, you see. I can carry things that are heavy. I can keep going for a long time. But I don't do speed.
In the water, though, I do better speed than many: but that's because I learned to swim when I was very young, and then I had some excellent lessons from a man called Ivor Fish (I know I've mentioned him before, but I just like typing his name).
I swim mostly breast stroke these days, with the occasional burst of back crawl, and I can do a length of breast stroke in just about a minute.
At the women-only session that's not bad at all. Okay, a few young fast things go speeding past me swimming front crawl. And I don't count those people who swim four abreast, very slowly, having a chat. I can tell, though, from the amount of time that I spend thinking "oh, get out of my way so I can speed up" that I am faster than most people in the pool.
The reason for my comparatively good speed is not really down to any great aptitude: more to a lot of enthusiasm, and hence practice, over many years, and hence having a decent stroke. Many people swim breast stroke with their head way up out of the water, and of course that cuts down the speed tremendously.
Two things have helped my speed. Firstly, I started wearing prescription goggles so I can now see where I'm going, after years of blind blundering along the pool making much unexpected contact with other people's soft bits.
Secondly, I have learned how to put my head down without having water go up my nose (which is horrible) and it is simply to breathe out through my nose when my face is underwater.
Well, as you may perhaps have heard, the Olympic Games started today, and I was watching the heats of the men's hundred metres breast stroke, so I thought I'd compare speeds to see how I fancy my chances for 2012 in London.
In the first heat that I saw, five of them did it in under a minute.
Even the commentators were surprised. But then, this lot didn't look like ordinary mortals at all. They were entirely triangular in shape, with mighty shoulders, and they were all wearing all-over black suits, with only their arms not covered.
(I should point out that I thought this was a bit disappointing. When I'm in charge of the Olympics I'll ban that lot and go back to trunks. What's the point in watching a sport that should have half-naked men in it when they're not?)
So they plunge into the water, arms out in front, and then immediately swing their arms back to their sides for a few seconds whilst they're underwater. And once they start swimming, they haul themselves out of the water almost to the waist on each stroke as they power through the water.
Yes, yes, pretty good - for human beings - though, just to keep things in proportion, I will point out that if you had a school of dolphins watching they'd be falling about laughing at our uselessness.
Anyway, back to the speed. A hundred metres in under a minute. That's four lengths of my pool. Fifteen seconds a length. FIFTEEN SECONDS! Four times as fast as me.
I think I'll have to do a bit of practice before 2012.
In the water, though, I do better speed than many: but that's because I learned to swim when I was very young, and then I had some excellent lessons from a man called Ivor Fish (I know I've mentioned him before, but I just like typing his name).
I swim mostly breast stroke these days, with the occasional burst of back crawl, and I can do a length of breast stroke in just about a minute.
At the women-only session that's not bad at all. Okay, a few young fast things go speeding past me swimming front crawl. And I don't count those people who swim four abreast, very slowly, having a chat. I can tell, though, from the amount of time that I spend thinking "oh, get out of my way so I can speed up" that I am faster than most people in the pool.
The reason for my comparatively good speed is not really down to any great aptitude: more to a lot of enthusiasm, and hence practice, over many years, and hence having a decent stroke. Many people swim breast stroke with their head way up out of the water, and of course that cuts down the speed tremendously.
Two things have helped my speed. Firstly, I started wearing prescription goggles so I can now see where I'm going, after years of blind blundering along the pool making much unexpected contact with other people's soft bits.
Secondly, I have learned how to put my head down without having water go up my nose (which is horrible) and it is simply to breathe out through my nose when my face is underwater.
Well, as you may perhaps have heard, the Olympic Games started today, and I was watching the heats of the men's hundred metres breast stroke, so I thought I'd compare speeds to see how I fancy my chances for 2012 in London.
In the first heat that I saw, five of them did it in under a minute.
Even the commentators were surprised. But then, this lot didn't look like ordinary mortals at all. They were entirely triangular in shape, with mighty shoulders, and they were all wearing all-over black suits, with only their arms not covered.
(I should point out that I thought this was a bit disappointing. When I'm in charge of the Olympics I'll ban that lot and go back to trunks. What's the point in watching a sport that should have half-naked men in it when they're not?)
So they plunge into the water, arms out in front, and then immediately swing their arms back to their sides for a few seconds whilst they're underwater. And once they start swimming, they haul themselves out of the water almost to the waist on each stroke as they power through the water.
Yes, yes, pretty good - for human beings - though, just to keep things in proportion, I will point out that if you had a school of dolphins watching they'd be falling about laughing at our uselessness.
Anyway, back to the speed. A hundred metres in under a minute. That's four lengths of my pool. Fifteen seconds a length. FIFTEEN SECONDS! Four times as fast as me.
I think I'll have to do a bit of practice before 2012.
posted by Daphne at 4:58 pm
3 Comments:
At least no one was trying to interview them (or you) right after they'd climbed out of the pool.
I was watching the rowing this morning and the BBC guy was shoving the mic at them just as their feet hit dry land - I mean have you seen those rowers at the end of a race ? They don't have enough puff to inflate an empty crisp bag.
Was like listening to Norman Collier do his act.
I'm the one who gets in your way trying to do widths rather than lengths as I need to know that I can put my feet on the bottom if I need to. :(
Go Daph go!!!
I'm a plodder. I can swim for hours, but very slowly. I was great in the 5 mile swim when I took lifeguard classes, but man oh man did I have to work hard to make the speed trials.
I keep telling Silverback to get prescription goggles. Maybe you can work on him before he leaves for FL!
Post a Comment
<< Home