Tell me about swimming - what am I letting myself in for??

[scrappydappydoo]

Bear with me - I'm not being a pushy mum just interested..
dd1 is 3yrs, she REALLY loves swimming - we go very regularly and she can swim several metres - I vaguely know the swimming teacher at our local pool and said that I'm starting her on lessons in january just so she doesn't develop bad habits. Swimming teacher launches into a whole thing about how she can go through all the swimming levels and can join the club at 5 etc etc my head started to buzz at this point... DD1 is standing next to me looking v. excited and starry eyed
Obviously interests come and go and I would never push dd to do something she isn't into but tell me swimming mothers is it horrific to have swimming obsessed kids and what are the realities I should brace myself for if this is a passion for life??

Loads of hours by the pool - weekends both Saturday and Sunday at whatever pool (usually school) that they can book and at least one mid week night - if they get really good 12 hours a week (and landtraining) with 6am starts.....not trying to out you off and to be honest she is a long way from this why not see how it goes.

ok ... ds1 started at a club at 7 zipped through that club's squads, so went from 1 to 3 sessions a week by the time he was 8, went up to another session by the time he was 9, then outgrew that club so moved to a more competitive one

he's been there a couple of years now and is in their top junior squad and swims 2 hours on Monday, 90 mins on Wednesday, 90 mins Thursday, 2 hours Friday, 1 hour land training on Sunday followed by 2 hours swimming, plus swimming 2 lunchtimes a week for school, plus galas on a regular basis - open meets and counties/regionals are all day Saturday and Sunday, inter-club galas and club champs are in the evening

ds loves it but it does take up an awful lot of time plus ferrying about although thankfully he's now old enough for us to drop him and pick him up rather than have to hang about on poolside for the whole session

ds is also doing nothing like the amount of training many of his competitors do - some 11 or 12 year olds are swimming 7-9 times a week including very early starts, but thankfully his club is more concerned with keeping them in the sport long-term rather than having them staggeringly successful in the early years then burning out at 14

dd (6) has just joined too ....

I keep reminding myself that it would be worse standing on a cold, wet touchline ...

Age 3 you're fine. At best there will be some galas amongst others in the club but she'll only be swimming once a week. There seems to be a surge at around 7 when the quantity and pace increases. But that is a long way from where you are right now, and there are many activities which she has not yet experienced which may take over.

3 is rather early to say if she'll still be madly into it later on, but you sound as though you realise that and it's certainly possible that she might be.

My two go through phases of loving it & getting to the verge of giving up. It seems to go in 12-18month cycles. Ds is 14 and swims 5-6 times a week + galas approx every other weekend (but about 3/4 of those are Sat night affairs rather than all weekend jobs - they also tend to come in batches rather than being evenly spread through the year). Dd is 13 and less keen at the moment she swims 3 times a week and does fewer galas. 18 months ago it was the other way around. It is a sport that you can more or less do as much or as little as you like later on (we have some swimmers at club who come just once or twice a week), but if you have talent and want to be very good then a big commitment is needed, including early mornings. I find early mornings rather horrific (especially at this time of year), but we only have one a week and dh takes ds along (and swims himself too, so quite enjoys it).

There is something rather special about the way club swimmers move in the water compared to everyone else: they look so streamlined and move almost effortlessly.

Mine started when they were babies, but never got into swimming club. DS started at a club for a while but it coincided with chronic sinus problems, so he went back to weekly lessons.
He is 13 now and instead of going along the swim trainer/ club route he started doing life saving which he has loved and will be doing his Bronze Medallion next term.
He has also opted for swimming as a "major" at school.

DD 11 still has her weekly lesson, but never went down club route either.

dd didn't learn to swim till she was 5.
She started lessons a month later and finished when she was 7. She started in a club then and has been there a year. She swims 3 times a week and loves the training. She doesn't much like the galas because she's a bit nervous in situations like that so she doesn't do many of them.

Swimming is boring for siblings to watch but not so bad for me because I love the stuffiness if the poolside. Also when armed with a mug of coffee and a mag it's not so bad.

We've no early mornings yet and tbh I would say dd would give up club swimming if she had to get up early.

With a couple of years of club swimming I'm hoping dd will then go on to do lifesaving when she's old enough. I've always thought if you could be a lifeguard at a pool you could get good money all through your late teens and be able to bypass manky kitchen porter jobs and waitressing.

Quite a few ofour club swimmers go on to do lifeguarding. You have to be 16 to take your pool medallion (& hence be a lifeguard at a pool). The pay depends on the pool, but can be quite meagre and the job itself is very dull (includes cleaning usually). I wouldn't necessarily assume it's a step up from waitressing.

My son was a successful club swimmer so when DD came along nine years later had been inside a swimming pool most of her life. I steered her away as I could see the same thing happening to her and did not want to go through it again. Anyway I taught swimming and she came with me every Saturday to the club. At 14 she was employed by the local council as a swimming assistant and was paid well. By the time she was 18 she had passed all the exams to teach. When she went to drama school in London she taught swimming some evenings and weekends and the pay was very good BTW. She is an actress now and when she is resting she can teach swimming and still pay her mortgage. I think the woman was telling you what your options are but as you can see you dont have to go down the competitive route for it to be usefull.