Crawling Along

I've written before about the humiliation that awaited me on last summer's visits to the swimming pool Sink or Swim. Well, nothing's changed. But I've decided that I can no longer be the only one doing a leisurely breast-stroke while everyone else is speeding up and down doing the crawl, or freestyle, as it's known here. Whenever I try it, I expend a lot of energy and get precisely nowhere, except nearer a watery grave.

So Cheryl, an instructress who also runs the pool, kindly agreed to sort me out. "Sounds like you've got heavy legs," was her initial verdict when I explained my problem, and my tendency to lie in the water at 45degrees. In fact, it's worse than that. A full inspection this morning revealed that my right arm and my breathing were fine but my left arm, upper body, legs and feet were not. I could see the poor woman wondering where to start.

She opted for the left arm, and her advice produced an almost immediate improvement. For the more serious problem of my heavy legs (her initial diagnosis was confirmed) I need soft flippers, apparently, and Cheryl will give me a set of drills to perform. So after some serious practice of my new left arm movement (carefully not forgetting what I was doing right with the other arm and my lungs), I tottered off to near-by Paul's Warehouse for said flippers. I'm determined. If I can crack this, maybe I'll even try the annual Jetty Swim.