Men who half-aeroplane and splash in lane swimming

[Stormei]

Am I the only one who has a special rage for this? One guy has started coming exactly the same time, in front crawl he practically straightens his arm out to the side in huge circles before flopping it with a splash in the water. Imagine someone pretending to be an aeroplane with one arm only. He raises it and scoops half the pool up. If you pass him when doing backstroke it’s fucking unnerving as his hand will pass over your nose. And he’ll scoop at ton of water in the process onto your face.

His legs make a rage inducing whump as you pass too. He seems to speed up just exactly to irritate, so every fucking pool end he tries to get in front of you however you alter to pace. I tried today to just carry on my course and he still barrels to the same spot, he actually barged me today. He arrived and 7 women were swimming, he forced 5 out into the main area as usual with this.

Aibu to want pools to have an extra lane for splashy men with poor technique and erratic bursts of speed (though they may not have this without women in the lane). I swear he does the same number of damn laps as me somehow with his pausing, splashing and up and down speed. It can have a picture of an aeroplane position on it. Men who remain on their side of the lane and maintain a speed obviously can stay in the main lane. Maybe they could watch people queue at the front desk and their manners and give out arm bands for this lane or something...

I find this a bit ridiculous, it's a public pool, not everyone is a great swimmer, just getting the courage to go swimming can be hard. Don't be so judgemental. I won't even go to the public pool because of the entitled idiots who complain loudly I'm too slow in the slow lane, one lady told me "it's a session for proper swimming". It's the only one without kids splashing about!

OMG splashy men who speed up and barge in front of you, only to stop at the end of the line GIVE ME THE LANE RAGE

95% of lane rage is caused by men where I swim

I’m a poor swimmer. I’m slow and I don’t have a great technique. I’ve had lessons, have marginally improved but am still not great - its just not a good skill of mine. Its threads like this that make me nervous going in the pool as people are clearly judging me for getting in their way

Woe is you

Just don’t swim in the middle lane. Don’t barge into people. Don’t overtake only to stop. Don’t wait until someone faster than you is about to get to the end of the lane and then set off in front of them.

You’ll be golden. No one cares if you are a shit swimmer. They care that you don’t act like a man spreading fuck face.

In the middle of the lane

Gentlemanwiththistledownhair
100% agree!

The pool is for every level of swimmer good and bad. Better swimmers have more awareness of thier surroundings and better techniques.

Complain about, and to, this person, politely and firmly. No more passivity! It is a public pool. There will be a set of rules somewhere and they will include not barging into others. Also, get a bright red costume/hat/goggles. I commute into central London and bright shades of red in a coat or bag make a noticeable difference to pavement bargers. It is the colour of danger...

Complaining to him likely won't change anything. I've had this before, I'm a relatively fast breast-stroke swimmer and I like to swim a mile once or twice a week. These men drive me nuts! I've found the best way to handle it is to ensure you're doing a particularly wide kick as they approach you. They stop getting so close to you after a hefty kick or two connects with a body part.

There's always one!

Could you ask a member of staff to observe him and then have a word with him? Can you imagine the satisfaction of him having to curtail his awfulness?

@Phineyj I had never considered this before. How obvious and how clever!

Definitely going to give that a go.

I have found my people. I was just complaining to my partner about this the other day!

My pool has women-only sessions sometimes. I happened to be there during one the other day and my god, it was glorious. A dozen or so women just happily pootling up and down our lanes, keeping out of each other’s way, and giving each other the occasional polite smile/nod when passing or turning at the end of the line.

Then we went back the next day and I think I encountered every swimming pool twat it is impossible to encounter:

• The guy in the medium lane with me, racing against his mate in the fast lane with as much obnoxious splashing as possible

• The guy who came barrelling down the wrong side of the lane and literally swam over the top of me

• The utter nob head wearing those fucking pad things on his arms to make him go faster - whhhy WHY do they wear those?!

I have ONLY ever seen this behaviour from men. And it’s not about being a bad swimmer, I see plenty of slow/not very confident swimmers who are perfectly respectful and courteous. It’s the assholes who want to crash about being the noisiest, fastest swimmer there and it gives me the rage!

(I’m another very fast breaststroker thanks to my gigantic leg muscles, and I will admit to feeling a certain smugness when I manage to overtake an obnoxious freestyling man with my girly stroke!)

Oh and before anyone says it, not all men etc etc etc. I was happily sharing the lane with two other men, letting each other pass at the end of the lane if we needed to and all that jazz, before Splashy Fucker showed up. And my (male) partner was in the slow lane with a woman getting along perfectly fine too. These twats ruin it for everyone, not just women.

Omfg yes! I know exactly what you mean op. It’s one of the many reasons I hate swimming. I go to the gym now instead.

Looks like someone’s been listening to us!

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/07/swimming-sexist-behaviour-british-pools-male-swimmers-men

This is why I'm so happy that my local open water swimming venues open this week! You still get plenty of tossers, but on a 350m loop you see less of them, everyone is going the same way, and if they decide to swim over me (it happens in OW, even with a fluro orange tow float) then getting kicked is par for the course.
And the cakes better!

I actually stopped going swimming because of this. There are 3 lanes sectioned off and the rest of the pool is for 'general' use which means it is impossible to swim in because it is full of kids bombing and diving. One lane is slow and the other two are medium so I go in the slow. I lost count of the times that men (and yes, it was always a man) would be physically pushing me out of the way, 'accidentally' smacking me in the head when overtaking and half drowning me. They weren't fast enough for the other lanes, which are dominated by seriously fast swimmers (again, mostly men) but clearly aren't going to go in that lane and have to push other blokes out of the way!

Currently 30 weeks preg so v v aware of personal space so really feel you on this. I go to a hotel pool, there are a few lanes and older people use them for pool walking and little physio exercises. and swimmers are then squashed into lanes because of it. Wrecks my head. Lanes are for swimming and the staff say nothing.