Swimming rant - was I in the wrong here?

[clary]

Arrgh need to vent
Had a lovely swim today but there was an annoying man. I swim there often and I have seen this man before. He swims in the medium lane (lanes are 2 x slow, 1 x med, 2 x fast) doing a very splashy but inefficient front crawl, slowly. I am a diehard medium lane swimmer – front crawl but not very fast.

I have no issue with people swimming in the lane at a different speed. But when they don’t move over it really bugs me. I left him a length to get ahead but still caught up with him within about 5 lengths. He MUST have seen me but didn’t move. I tapped his feet (ugh) and he still didn’t move. It took him four lengths to stop and let me go first.

Then the exact same thing happened again. Then again. The third time, I overtook him (we were the only ppl in the lane) as I was getting annoyed. I had finished my swim so I stopped at the end to say something to him, as he does this all the time and the older I get, the more I want to call out crap behaviour.

I politely said to him, can you try to be more aware of others in the lane and how fast they are going – you should stop and let them pass. He pretended not to understand, so I repeated it, then he unpleasantly said, speak to the lifeguard and see what they say; you were too impatient to wait for me to stop [wtf?] so it’s your fault. And he swam off.

He's massively out of order, no? If you are in a lane you need to be aware of other swimmers – it’s not hard. If I am in a faster lane (occasionally) I am hyper aware of the fast ppl and get out of their way, every other length if need be. Plus wait for him to stop? He was finishing his length and then immediately setting off again even tho I was right behind him – how can I wait for him?

OK thanks all I will avoid tapping in future, Tho when I spoke to the lifeguard he said that;s what he would do!

I really didn't want to go in the super fast fast lane as I don't like that, tho I agree that lane speeds vary and sometimes fast lane is right for me. Not today tho (splashy fast fast young men).

@whitefiligree when there are only two lanes at this pool (and the rest a free for all) it's slow (with about 8 ppl going really slowly - which is fine fc) and fast - with about 4 people swimming much much faster than me. No idea where the medium swimmers are.

I did that swim last week - had to go in the fast lane and literally stopped every other length to let people pass (as I do what I am told - anyway they couldn't have overtaken lol) - it was so disrupted I stopped after 20 lengths. Hence swimming in the five lane pool this am.

So what do I do? If I move to fast, I am then the pacesetter and the people in that lane (three of them) have to move?

I think you have a choice to swim faster and join the fast lane where you are then pace setter and they have to adjust around you, or stay where you are and swim slower. If the other man was very slow you could ask him politely if he’d mind moving to the slow lane. It’s rare to get a lane where you’re all at the same speed! Sometimes I swim in the open pool, just beside the lanes, to avoid this. Could that be an option?

I really didn't want to go in the super fast fast lane

Fair enough, but your OP stated
(lanes are 2 x slow, 1 x med, 2 x fast)

And he was there in the med lane before you, so I personally would have gone to the slower of the two fast lanes.

Regular ‘serious’ swimmer here….

The commonly accepted ‘done thing’ when swimming is to tap the person’s foot to make them aware you’re there, and then once you both reach the wall they should pause at the wall and allow you to turn first.

If a pool has extra-wide lanes, overtaking down the middle is usually acceptable (you just have to ensure you time it so that you’re not overtaking into oncoming traffic if someone is also overtaking in the opposite direction).

In addition to the above, in the fast lane in the pool I swim in we have a quick glance prior to the turn to see if someone is slightly faster but hasn’t quite reached you to tap you yet… if so we pause for 2-3 seconds at the wall to let them push-off first, as there’s no sense in them tapping you just after you’ve both pushed off, and having to swim an entire 50 on top of eachother.

None of it’s rocket science - it’s just both practical and courteous. There are signs in most pools with this guidance on. Also there’s just manners.

Surely it's just easier to turn early as other people have suggested if you are following the rules and won't overtake? On the very rare occasions that I catch up with the person in front, and if I can't overtake for any reason, then I turn and go back again, without resorting to tapping anyone's feet or telling them off. I can't imagine getting so wound up about a swimming session! 😆😆

Where I swim the faster swimmer overtakes and no foot tapping, I would hate that. If there's no room to overtake then I would generally stop at the end and let other person first or move to faster lane if I was faster. I pay slightly extra to go to a less crowded pool though where you get a lane to yourselves. I normally swim superfast with the annoying male swimmer and that gets rid of a lot of almost all of them and they go to sauna / steam room.

I love the idea that I can vary my swim speed? Can you? I swim as fast as I reasonably can so your first idea wouldn’t work (the faster fast lane was even faster). I’m not prepared to swim that slowly either tbh. I’m not asking this chap to swim faster, just to pull over as the pool rules request in case people have missed that bit. Maybe I’m in the wrong to speak to him but I still don’t see why I’m in the wrong for expecting him to follow the rules of lane swimming in this pool.

This is no use if you’re relying on your Garmin to measure your distance / pace. It relies on picking-up your push-offs, to calculate how many times you pushed-off therefore how far you swam and in what time (ie pace).

If you don’t reach the end of the lap (and just do a U-turn instead), your watch things you’ve just done one lap but in the time it’s actually taken you to do almost 2 (which cocks up your distance & pace).

Everyone can “vary their swim speed” to go slower, so no need to be rude. You “weren’t prepared to” go slower, that doesn’t mean you couldn’t. You could have waited to speak to him at the end of the lane instead of tapping his foot and assuming he knew what you wanted, or, involved the lifeguard at his behest.

I remember on a panel show someone telling the story on how they'd tried to solve this problem by swimming under an obnoxious man, only to run out of breath and have to re-emerge before clearing him. I get fits of giggles everytime I'm in the situation of needing to overtake as I find myself seriously considering how appropriate this option would be!

Depends on the width of the lane. Narrow lanes means there isn't space to overtake and you risk swimming into somebody coming the other way. She is in the right and the etiquette is to stop to allow them to pass at the end of the lane.

Same at any level of swimming.

Whenever I get to the end of the lane, I always have a quick look to see if anyone has caught up to me, then I let them go. I would absolutely hate someone to touch my foot, the thought of a stranger touching me in a pool without any prior warning would really shock me. I have some pool related phobia though from an early childhood experience so maybe I’m just strange.

Since when? We aren't on a group hike up a hill!

(with love from a slow swimmer)

Regular swimmer, Men routinely overestimate their speed, their egos won’t ever let them believe they’re not actually that fast.
If it was just you and him in the lane, just keep passing him. I’ve also done it before where I’ve asked to split the lane so we each have a different side, and added ‘because I will keep passing you’. That made him leave the lane pretty quick.
The foot tap is proper etiquette, you did nothing wrong, he should have let you go.

Absolute rubbish .

Apologies for being rude - not my intention.

I can’t swim faster. Yes I can swim slower but I don’t want to. And I don’t see why I should just bc this man refuses to follow the rule.

I also don’t really want to turn early and lose the push off tbf. Will try that in future tho and as I say, no more tapping.

But we're talking about people who are swimming in public pools. It goes with the territory that you are sharing the lane with others, and will sometimes need to adjust. To be honest it just sounds like a Garmin isn't a suitable tool for public session swimming.

Nor is my sodding fitbit because it gets stuck in waterlock mode, but that's a different story

I'm sorry but this is wrong. The faster swimmer has right of way.

I realise this may be an expensive option but I’m happy with how Apple Watch tracks swimming. I have it set it to calories that I want to burn.

You shouldn't have to swim slower. I sometimes have to resort to breastroke to slow up until the end of the length to wait for them to let me pass (which they generally do). I would be very pissed off if they didn't let me pass at the end of the length and would definitely touch their toes to indicate they need to let me pass. I swim in the fast lane so In public swimming I have nearly always the fastest in the lane.

However, I also swim for a master club and I'm most definitely not the fastest so regularly need to move aside to let others pass.
OP - you are in the right and the gentleman was an ignorant rude man. Speak to the lifeguard next time if he's there and get them to watch him and have a word. Lifeguards are often competitive swimmers or ex- swimmers so know the rules.

Absolutely nothing wrong with what you did. I am amazed at how clueless people are about their speed and others speed. I took am a medium swimmer but on a good day a fast swimmer (depends on who else is there) and I. Your situation I sometimes use the fast lane to overtake and then back into the medium lane but that's not always possible. Fair play to you for speaking to him - I have do many of these conversations in my head.

I was in the pool recently and the other woman in my lane suggested I go ahead of her cos I was faster. I was having a rest but love the gesture. Why oh why are people unaware of their speed?

Why didn't you just go round him??

This - he was being a knob.

She’s said multiple times that overtaking is specifically banned. Ffs.