Swimming is unlike any other sport. Swimming takes 6:00 AM practices to a whole new level by adding diving into an ice cold pool of water to the list. Although technically a team sport, swimming is highly based off individual performance. Swimming takes practice and stamina, it's a lifestyle. Every swimmer knows the struggle of realizing you haven't actually gotten to the main set yet, being the only sport where you get yelled at for breathing and having to time your butterfly perfectly to not hit the twelve other people in your lane at practice, but you really know you're a swimmer when you relate to the following all too well.
1. Perpetually showing up everywhere with wet hair.
It can’t be avoided. Not only are you constantly responding to dinner plans with “I can’t, I have practice”, but the one time you can actually make it to dinner your hair is soaking wet because there was no way you had time to shower AND blow dry your hair. Priorities, people.
2. Singing songs on loop in your head.
I’m not even sure it’s possible to swim a 500 (20 laps) without singing a song on loop. It’s usually not even a song you want to be singing, but, hey, it makes the yards go by.
3. Having an unreasonable amount of goggles, but never being able to find a pair when you really need them.
Any time anyone needs a pair of goggles you are the go-to person, but come time for you to really need goggles, those twelve pairs are nowhere to be found. It becomes an endless cycle of asking your mom to buy you a new pair, even though she just bought a new pair last week. Conveniently, you always find that lost pair right after your mom’s latest purchase.
4. Loving the smell of chlorine.
5. Having questionable pre-relay rituals.
So it’s not normal to each take a bite out of your time card and spit it out onto the ground before your relay? That’s not acceptable? Who cares? Not you, your relay just took first.
6. A one second time difference might as well be an entire minute to you.
To everyone else your 24 second 50 free is “awesome”, “a tremendous improvement from last meet!” Too bad your competition finished in 23 seconds and all you want to do is crawl into a hole and never come out because you are such a disappointment and will never amount to anything.
7. The one day you skip practice being the one day Coach decides to have "fun" practice.
You are well aware that practice isn’t optional, but when your mom finally agrees to let you stay home from 6:00 AM practice after ten years of swimming, who are you to argue? But when your teammates all text you about the fun games Coach let everyone play during practice, you have to wonder if your mom and coach are in cahoots.
8. The moment of terror you feel when the starter says to "stand."
It’s borderline cruel to tell swimmers to take their mark and then take it back. Not only do you have to worry about false starting, but also falling into the pool and completely embarrassing yourself.
9. Tan lines.
Every swimmer knows the pain of having a giant circle on their back at some point in their life. Swimsuits have evolved over the past ten years, moving from a circle to an entirely open back. This, however, hasn’t lessened the awkward strap tan lines and pale stomachs.
