I hate rude pricks

Last night I had an encounter with one of those jock-types who thinks he’s above all he surveys.

Really sorta pissed me off.

I was at the Skyway YMCA, which is not known for its muscleheads as you can imagine.  The clientelle is mostly comprised of women, old women (aka cougars), older men, racquetball guys, some weightlifter jocks, mentally challenged individuals, and gays.

Last night, I had blissfully completed my 40 intense minutes of elliptical, pushups, and crunches and was looking forward to a nice sauna visit to relax and stretch out.  I got all of 3 minutes of solitude when “the swimmers” came in.

“The Swimmers” are sort of known about this Y.  Its this pair of guys who always do swim workouts and race each other in the pool and do sprint work and generally make a big noise about being “kings of the pool” and “being serious”.  One is the leader and one lets himself be led.

Assholes, is what I call them.

We know each other even though we have never spoken before.  That’s because when I swim I’m generally in a lane right next to them.  And swimmers notice each other in the pool.  We’re competitive.  We watch how each other swims– looking for flaws.  We race (or at the very least consciously keep track of how we are stacking up against each other).

Its what (former) competitive swimmers do best!

Anyway, I’m all stretching and in walk comes the first “swimmer”.  This one is the quiet guy.  He’s very handsome, probably late 20’s, 0% body fat, no chest hair, etc.  He comes into the sauna wearing his suit, goggles, rubber cap, AND brings in his personal kickboard.

I take this opportunity to chat with him.

cb (speaking rather genially):  You know, you could probably save yourself a lot of hassle if you just used one of the kickboards that the Y provides.  That way you wouldn’t have to cart that thing around.

cute swimmer:  Yeah, but the Y kickboards suck.  This kickboard floats so much better.

cb:  Well, look at it this way— the Y kickboards will make you work harder and give you a real workout.

cs:  Not in a good way.

Hmmm.  First of all, his kickboard was made of the exact same material as the Y boards.  Second, I’ve seen this fucker do kicks before- and he ain’t all that.  And the thing is he doesn’t even work on his kick very often, and when he does he just sort of slags through it.  And its not like his board was some Speedo-designed, hydrodynamically-enhanced thing.

It was about then that the other swimmer came in.  This guy I just patently don’t like.  Have you ever seen someone at the gym that you size up in like 2 seconds and just know that you dislike them?  This guy is one of those.  For the sake of this post we’ll call him “swimmer dick”.

Swimmer Dick is a good swimmer, but he’s just one of those ‘full of himself’ jock types that just sort of poisons the air around him.

Swimmer Dick also has extraordinarily large hips.  This is not why I hate him, but I will pick on him because of it.  Its good that he as tree-trunk thighs to sort of balance it out, but he looks odd in a speedo.  The hugeness of his lower body combined with his regular torso sort of gives this overall impression:

Swimmer Dick likes doing things like backstroke drills where he sprints the entire length of the pool underwater using dolphin kick.  He also uses a stopwatch to time his compatriot and likes to give him feedback.  Its like he’s cute swimmer’s coach.

Only dickier. 

Swimmer Dick (sitting down in sauna with a sigh):  Well, THAT was interesting.

Cute Swimmer:  Yeah.

SD:  We started off strong, but finishing everything tonight sucked.  You got even worse than you were yesterday, and I felt great at the start then did a 180.

CS (kind of offput): Well, I don’t know about worse… but I’m still feeling the race effects from this weekend I think.

SD:  Yeah, I forgot.  But you have just seemed off this past few workouts.  And I started off great tonight but was really having trouble with the second splits.  Everything is just “off”.

CS:  Well, I struggled with the swim portion this weekend.  The current was stronger than last year, and because I let a gap open up between me and the front guys, I really suffered.

SD:  You let a gap open up?  How much??

CS:  About 5 seconds or so…

SD:  Yeah, you were screwed.  You can’t do that and then hope to recover.

CS:  I really felt the effects of the current- especially before rounding the marker buoy.

SD:  How so?

CS:  Well, I was working hard but it just felt…

SD:  Like you weren’t grabbing the water and had no power.

CS:  Well, no.  I felt like I was grabbing the water fine, but I just couldn’t make any headway and close the gap.

SD:  You weren’t gonna.  You gotta stay right on their feet man.  That’s where you blew it.

<<<This is where I decide to interject>>>

cb:  So, do you guys ever do distance per stroke drills or anything during your workouts?

SD (throwing me bad smell face):  No.  Looking pretty ain’t gonna help, I’m out there to win. 

This little comment told me that yes, they had noticed me in the pool and had watched me swim before.  Almost everything I do in the pool I’m focusing on improving my technique and being as efficient as possible.  I was moderately gratified, but more miffed as if Mr. Dick was completely dismissing the importance of technique.

cb:  Oh.  I was just wondering.  I mean, I don’t know what you are training for when you swim.  But it sounds like you (I said while turning to cute swimmer) are doing triathelons or something.

CS:  I am, yeah.  He doesn’t do them.

cb (trying to help cute swimmer):  Well, I’m definitely not an expert, but maybe the whole distance swimming and water current thing could be helped by learning to swim where the water is not.

SD:  What the HELL is that supposed to mean?

cb (still friendly, but hackles rising):  Well, I guess it means learning how to roll your body through the water to cut down on resistance and to conserve energy.  If you watch the really good distance swimmers, they roll through the water like the hull of a racing yacht in order to minimize water resistance and drag.  And they use their hips and a strong two-beat kick to help pivot them around, thus reducing wasted arm energy.  Which could help a lot in a triathelon I would imagine.

SD:  You know what also helps?  Speed.  Either being in front or staying with them.

cb (now getting chippy):  I totally agree.  Speed is very important.  But so is technique.  Swimming, as I’m sure you know, is like 90% technique.  And its much easier to start with a good technique and work on speed, than it is to do it the other way around.  And you know?  They have even started to study salmon and how they swim upstream to understand how they conserve energy and ‘avoid the current’.  Facinating stuff.

SD didn’t say anything— just glowered at me.

cb (changing topic):  Triathelons, huh?  Man, those are tough.  Swimming is ok.  Biking is ok.  But running AFTER swimming and biking?  That’s insane.  You are just crazy, man.

CS (smiling):  Yeah- I enjoy them, but they are tough.  Its good that l like running.

cb:  Well, see you guys later.

I’m sure that swimmer dick had some choice words about me after I left the sauna.  I’m sure he pointed out how I’m fat and out of shape and swim slower than they do, how my technique is flawed, etc.  And I say fuck him.

Because I know that when you watch the best swimmers, their strokes ARE beautiful.  And because I know that I can swim the length of that 25 meter pool in 13 strokes- when they are take 17.  And yeah, I counted.

And I know that when I get in better shape I’ll kick their ass in the pool and have energy left over to burn.

So suck on THAT, Dick.