Joining my high-school swim team is hands down the hardest thing I have ever done.
I had never been a very strong swimmer. I usually struggled to pass the summer camp swim test every year. I sort of knew breaststroke and freestyle but had only done them at a leisurely pace to swim around in the local pool. I never joined the swim team as a little kid and had never in my life swam in a pool with lanes. I had only learned how to dive a few years before I started on the swim team.
Having that said, somehow my friends on the swim team (who were all those kids who had been on the local swim team since they were 5) convinced me that it would be a ton of fun to join the team! They had me all gung-ho about trying this new competitive sport. It was the middle of my sophomore year. Classes weren't too challenging and I needed something to do. Hey, maybe it would keep me from getting fat over the holiday season!
Our team was pretty fantastic at the time I joined. We always won the local conference title by a land slide and had a lot of swimmers regularly advance to the state championship. As a whole, the team was FAST. I was not.
I remember my first practice pretty vividly. It was a nightmare. I was sort of guided by my friends into the so-called "slow-lane". It was the slowest group of swimmers on the team but it was still too fast for me. I distinctly remember the panicky feeling of drowning when my leg cramped up in the middle of the lane. I considered myself pretty athletic but I had never had a cramp like this before. I thought I was gonna die. Then I realized the lane pool is only 4 feet deep or so. So I hobbled to the end of the lane, sat on the side of the pool and massaged my cramping calf.
The next few practices were a blur of exhaustion, nausea, and chlorine but somehow I stuck with it. I slowly progressed as a swimmer over the three years that I swam for my high school team. I steadily trimmed a second or so off my 50-free time during each successive swim meet. I felt a little less nauseous after each practice. I started perfecting my stroke during practice and could get going in a steady pace. I was proud of myself even though I was still probably one of the slowest on the team.
My proudest accomplishment was my completion of a 500m freestyle event at a meet. If you don't swim, a 500m is like the marathon of swimming events. I sort of dared myself to do it and I told my coach I would do it if it meant it was the only event I had to swim at that meet. He agreed and I made my first attempt at practice jsut to see if I could even do a 500m all at once. It took me a long time but I finished a 500 in my own lane during practice while everyone else was doing the team workout. At the meet, I was pretty nervous. They had lumped all the male and female 500 swimmers together into one event. Not many people swim the 500. Usually just one or two from each team. I think this was probably because most teams only had one or two insane people who loved the feeling of burning pain in every muscle.
I got on the block and prayed to God that I didn't come last. The whistle blew and I dove in somewhat clumsily (I hadn't known how to dive very well until I started swim team) and started my event. I knew I had to set my pace slow or I'd burn out before I got halfway. I had a friend of mine counting laps for me. They ticked by agonizingly slow. It didn't take very long for the burning sensation to come over my whole body and I was struggling at 3/4 of the way done. I could see when I came of for gasping breaths that the other guys on my team had already finished. Great. I'm pretty sure the only reason I actually finished is because my team mates gathered around the end of my lane and started cheering me on. I could hear them yelling for me every time I came up for a breath. It really meant a lot to me and actually makes me tear up a little just writing this. I think the friendly people on the team is what kept me swimming for the last three years of high school. I hated swimming but I loved the people.
Anyway, I was limping down the lane for my last few laps and just giving it all my body had while most of my team was cheering for me. I had to finish now or my whole team would see me fail. So despite the pain, I somehow finished and I even beat one person! I didn't come last! ...never mind if it was a girl. I had so much spent myself that I actually couldn't press out of the pool. I had to have someone pull me out of the pool. I then flopped down into a puddle on the pool deck, gasping for air, not unlike a fish yanked up into a boat. I was exhausted but happy and immensely proud of myself.
I had never considered myself a very good swimmer, and still don't honestly, but I had a lot of fun on the swim team and I think it was mostly due to the awesome people who talked me into it and the easy going coaching style. So thanks to those who made one of the most exhausting times of my life also one of the happiest.
-Me, the Swimmer
