An Inspiration
Since I have been back into swimming for four years now, I am truly inspired by senior adult swimmers.
This aquatic sport is so good on the joints that it is one of the few sports that older adults can still engage in and keep their bodies in tip-top shape. I am truly amazed by the senior citizens that I meet, and their swim endurance levels motivate me to keep going…to never stop. So in 2022, I decided to enter my first Long Course Swim Meet since being a competitive swimmer over 35 years ago. (Long Course means the meet takes place in a 50-meter pool – a truly Olympic size pool.) This Long Course meet provided many different races to swim, and I chose to swim the longest that it offered – the 1500-meter freestyle. I chose this for two different reasons. First, I was working on maintaining my endurance level for open water swims. Secondly, I wanted to overcome a childhood fear of this particular event.
I never swam the 1500-meter freestyle when I was a middle school swimmer, even though my dad really wanted me to. As a kid, I was really nervous about losing count of the number of laps I had already swam, but this was misplaced: for long events such as these, someone always holds a counter (pictured above) underwater and then lifts it up right before the swimmer reaches the wall to start another lap. The counter helps the swimmer to remember how many more laps are left to swim, just in case they miscounted. But as a tween, it just seemed too daunting. So, as a middle-aged adult, I decided to enter this event just to prove to myself that I could do it, even though I did not have that same fear as long ago. Facing something I couldn’t overcome when younger felt exhilarating! But I never knew I would get more inspiration after swimming this event - 30 laps later.
When my heat was finally called, I was inspired by another swimmer that was swimming in my heat - an older woman.
While we were sitting in our chairs waiting for the previous heat to finish, I couldn’t help but notice her pink swim cap and Speedo goggles; plus she was in great shape. I thought to myself…I want to be in great shape like that now. She looked so calm and ready to take on this long swim. Here I was, kind of nervous since I just got finished chatting with the third and final swimmer in our heat. He was in great shape too! As he was putting his goggles on over his silver hair, he told me about his last long-distance swim in which he got a leg cramp in the middle of the swim. I was thinking…Please, Lord, do not let that happen to me!
Forty-three minutes and twenty-three seconds later I had finished the grueling swim. I grabbed the pool handrail and thrust myself out of the pool with what little energy I had left. Sitting on the bleachers with a towel wrapped around me and a Gatorade in hand, I overheard people talking about that swimmer in my heat. I found out this older lady who I noticed beforehand with the pink swim cap was 82 years old and had been swimming for years. In fact, she traveled over an hour away to participate in this meet. I was truly amazed! She made 82 look phenomenal! Not only by being in great shape but by competing in this same event that took me my whole life to compete in. She and a countless number of other senior adult swimmers that I meet keep living life to the fullest! Watching this is truly inspirational! They keep at it! They are consistent! They keep pressing onward!