1, 2, 3..wait, how many is that?

As I was swimming (ok, resting) on my own next to the local high school swim team, I overheard the following exchange:

Girl 1: You're brother messed up.
Girl 2: We were supposed to do a 200, right?
Girl 1: Yeah, and you're brother messed up.
Brother: Why did you guys stop?
Girl 1: You didn't count right. You were supposed to do a 200.
Brother: Shut up, I didn't mess up, you didn't do enough.
Girl 2: You can't count.
Brother: I can count, you can't count. At least, I was following Dave, and he can count...

I had to submerge my head underwater to muffle my laughter. All over the world, in all different languages, swimmers are having the exact same exchange. And I know this because I've trained in three different languages. In China, in Brazil, at the top clubs and teams around the world, no one can count to eight reliably.

For whatever reason, swimmers can't count to eight (that's what a "200" is: 8x25 yards/meters=200). I have a PhD, and I still can't count to eight (was that four or six? Am I done, or do I have two more laps left?). We all have (and you know you do) the story of when we were racing a 200 (short course) and we slowed up coming up to the turn after length six because we weren't sure if we were done. The worst is if we actually stopped, only to be yelled at by the timers, the coach, all your teammates, not to mention the other swimmers in your heat after the race who were confused by your stopping and began to question their own counting because no one can reliably count to eight.

Even if you're doing a race or a set longer than eight, it's always at about eight that you lose count. It's at that point in any race or set that your mind wanders just enough (see previous post) to lose track of how many laps you've swam. Actually, the magic number for sets would seem to be four. After four 50s, 100s, 200s, whatever, you completely lose track of how many of them you've done. Note how eight in 4x2, thus the theory still holds, however tenuously.

Thus begins (at practices anyway) the frantic exchanges, and then arguments, between lane members who are all trying to survive another long and difficult workout. There is almost always one person in the lane who can figure out how many you've done through "logic." I've place the word logic in scare quotes because it's swimming logic, which can provide some of the most convoluted reasoning you've ever encountered. You can tell how many by how long you've been swimming, what interval you're leaving on (this is provided you've used the clock correctly, which is another mathematical shortcoming many swimmers have), what pace you're currently going, what stroke or drill you're doing, how dizzy you currently feel, how many cramps you've had in your foot, how many times you've had to adjust your goggles, how many times someone has lapped you, etc...This isn't always scientific and can devolve into an argument of differing interpretations between swimmers.

Now, the argument can devolve (especially late in the week, late in the workout, about mid-season) into a fight over who wants to be there more, who takes swimming more seriously, who is holding up whose progress as a swimmer, whose the bigger idiot, and then the expletives come out, and if you're really unlucky or the timing is just right, someone will end up crying. It's really the perfect storm of teenage angst: take two over-tired (mentally and physically) teens, who are already sensitive and hormonal, add the confusion of getting lost in the middle of a set with the fear of being humiliated in front of everyone and/or chewed out by the coach, and voila! You have a breakdown.

Did I mention how drama is one of the many draws of swimming (or at least training)?

I'm struggling to find the upside to all this, and reliving some of my most humbling moments as a swimmer is not helping my motivation for going back to the pool today. I guess the most comforting part of this is that we all experienced it, and if the above overheard conversation is any indication, swimmers will continue to experience it over and over again. It's another one of those shared experiences that all swimmers have, that transcends time, space and place. We are all in the same pool, and we all have no idea how many laps we've done.