To think when you go to the swimming pool you should be swimming

[Jusfloatingby]

The pool at my gym can get pretty crowded, particularly in the early evening when people call in on their way home from work. There is invariably a couple of people just standing in the pool having a nice long chat while people swim around them trying not to knock into each other.

There are benches at the side of the pool, two jacuzzis and two steam rooms they could sit and chat in.

AIBU to think they should get out of the pool and leave room for people who actually want to SWIM?

I really want to go and eat an iced bun in a weight watchers meeting now.

The fast swimmers are welcome (and BTW, I can go in the fast lane), slow swimmers are welcome (just not two abreast) and medium swimmers are welcome. People doing exercise are welcome. People socialising in the lanes, getting in the way and chatting rather than swimming are not welcome. I don't mind people who are polite about it, get out of the way and are to the sides. People who treat the swimming pool like a big, social bath are annoying.

Doctrine go right ahead

I just want to eat an iced bun now.

I haven't had an iced bun in ages. I don't deserve one what with almost never swimming any more

Another thing that annoys me - when it is completely clear that everyone is swimming up and down in lanes, then some idiot decides to swim their laps across instead of up and down, makes me mad! Some people honestly do do that

Our local council run pool ropes off two lanes for lane swimming. The rest is 'free'. I go to swim in the lane and often can't turn for people standing at the end of the lane chatting and doing one lap every 15 mins or so. I try a couple of polite 'excuse me 's and then I complain to the lifeguard and ask them to point out that the lanes are for swimming only, not chatting. I don't care if that makes me a grumpy cow, I just want to swim!

i wonder what you will be like when you get old
and walking really hurt
but standing in pool and chatting to your mate who is only able to come out for a few hours a day as she is caring for her husband and loves swim like you a bit of breast stoke so you go up and down together and have a lovely time.]

Hope you lot never get old or get pains or have a care for your husband.

grow up and stop behaving like en-tiled brats just go round people . you know like you would do if you were walking down a road

Get old? Do you mean get to 50?

longjane don't be silly. My DM is almost 70 and swims every day. She knows the bloody etiquette, why shouldn't another older person? It's not just older people cluttering up the lanes you know. By all means swim side by side and chat, just not in the lanes. By all means float, just not in the lanes. When i swim round people who don't know how to behave, they give me bloody evil looks. I can't swim laps if they are in the lanes, they can chat and float elsewhere.

Also, they are different times for different things. I go when the lanes are there because I want to swim in the swimming pool. Why can't they check the times and go when the lanes aren't there?

we have two lanes for swimming that are always there and always for swimming and never for mouching over spilt water - so you can go in these lanes to get away from the none swimmers in the swimming pool. Though there are numpties that can't understand swimming in a clockwise direction as the board indicates is what you do in these two lanes - so there are still issues They want to swim back and forth and each person keep to their own side - only these only works with two people and when I get in and swim behind they get confused

I'm not allowed to swim but I like to sit in the pool.

Those ones that walk up and down the lanes when everyone else is trying to swim - now what's that about?

YABVU. The pool is not only for swimmers. It can as others have said, alleviate conditions which are painful. Why shouldn't people pay to simply be immersed in water?

The ones that walk up and down are often the ones who have arthritis and can't walk freely elsewhere!

HERE it is called Water Walking and if it helps people in pain then WHY shouldn't they enjoy the pool too?? It's not only for you!

Mifirlady Some people can't swim due to joint conditions so the only exercise low enough in impact is walking in the pool

If people are so keen on floating, walking, poncing around, then there is a great business opportunity for you. Open a Japanese style public bathing place. Like <a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.ca/imgres?hl=en&sa=X&biw=1280&bih=709&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=2uW-zJs77lkQSM:&imgrefurl=romiantiwaras.wordpress.com/tag/japanese-baths/&docid=64W_gW77HcQmOM&imgurl=romiantiwaras.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/japanese-baths-wide.jpg&w=580&h=375&ei=xLqJUJ7_OObfiAKewgE&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=422&vpy=204&dur=566&hovh=180&hovw=279&tx=155&ty=86&sig=101652942560651010940&page=2&tbnh=172&tbnw=269&start=13&ndsp=18&ved=1t:429,r:14,s:0,i:111" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">this. WARNING: naked men in picture. No willies though.

Leave the lanes to swimmers.

Could call it The Ponce Pool.

At the pool I swim in there was a great big large area for free swimming / slow swimming /gossiping / walking / resting / doing handstands / whatever.

And two lanes. One was a medium lane and one a fast.

You'd think that we would all be able to co-exist quite happily. But no. There were the girls who would gossip at the end of the medium lane. And the very very slow breaststroke swimming man who would swim in the fast lane. And not even stop at the end to let the 10 people stuck behind him pass.

Why? Why would they do that? Particularly the man? Has he no social skills at all?

Yanbu, I thought I would try get in to swimming at my local pool. Had to stop as there was a large group of men that went regularly that would stand in a group at the bottom of the pool checking everyone out very obviously. If there was someone rather larger they would all snigger and laugh, if there was someone half decent they'd all be stood there drooling and rubbing their thighs.

Not a comfortable swimming experience.

If you're in a swimming pool then you should be swimming.

Not a particularly strange remark, do you think they can't feel the animosity radiating off you?

When I wanted to meander/float Pregnant i paid my money the same as anyone else yet had to deal with people tramming up and down all the lanes as if they had far more right to them as they are proper swimming. When in fact if I am in an area floating/paddling about first then I am there first, it's my space to do with as I choose!

If you are doing laps and the women move into your lane to start gassing then fine, other than that go round, and ask your gym to section the pool. quote

What animosity? Just because I find something annoying doesn't mean I go around 'glaring' at people. My point was not about people using the pool to float or to walk up and down but about people who just stand there chatting as if they'd just bumped into each other in the supermarket aisle.

YABU. People pay to use the pool. You are not in control (not should you be) of how they choose to use it. For all you know, the chatting people might be annoyed with the way you swim.
Quote by TiggyGOLDdancer

Tiggy, do you apply this logic in say, the cinema, for example. If people pay to go in and sit there they are perfectly entitled to chat to each other instead of watching the film. The rest of the audience are not 'in control' of how they choose to use the cinema and have no right to be annoyed?

Just wondering.

I think the one thing we can all agree on is it's the standing chatting or ogling (yes our gym had a pair of male oglers too) that gets on everyone's wick. The gossipers are obvious because they're gossiping before they get in, gossip after getting in the water and then you hear them say ooooh we'd better actually do some swimming ha ha and all then swim down to the other end and start gossiping again! I'm sure it's lovely and every thing but as a poster upthread said think of the cinema analogy. Gossip before and after, yes, but while you're in there do some exercise along with everyone else because other wise you are spoiling it for others. If you need a rest fine, but you're not a herd of cattle!

Of course the water is useful for treating different conditions at different times of our lives. No one would be ignorant enough to say that the whole pool should be for swimming non stop and nothing else.

Lane etiquette such as people going too slow for the lane they're in, or turning too early, or not 'giving way' at the end when someone obviously faster than you is close behind, or swimming up and down the middle, is always going to be a problem because you cant police good sense or manners sadly.

It IS however the responsibility of the pool staff to ensure there is enough room for the swimmers, plus designated space for the more sedentary pool users, for their stretching or floating.

At the moment, from my experience at local pools and from what's been said on here, it seems that the size of the allocated areas is a bit out of kilter with whats needed by its users.