Open water and wild swimming advice

I swore I’d never get sucked in again….yet last week I found myself giving a quick bit of technical swimming advice on a social media page and then 3 days of disputing and arguing the advice, with 60 year old Dave….that took up swimming 3 weeks ago…or whoever else! This is quite a regular pattern it seems. You view any posts asking for help, on social media and you’ll have an avalanche of answers from people that have been swimming for 5 minutes, to people that have been swimming for 50 years. I almost feel sorry for the people that ask for advice, as if you read all of the posted responses it’d take you a week….and you’d be no closer to getting an answer. Or possibly worse, you’d take the wrong advice and be worse off.

Now I’m not arrogant enough to think that I’m definitely right or my way is the only way to do something, to train or sort out an issue. Time and time again however, I find myself reading a post by someone seeking advice and then reading the horror show of answers that people dish out. Ranging from good, solid advice to the ramblings of a simpleton. Now, if you’re asking for advice in the first place you’re probably not qualified to figure out the gems, from the fossilised turds. So what to do…?

My advice would be simple. Look at the source. If you want advice about cold water swimming…ask someone that swims year round. If you want technical advice…ask a coach, ask someone that swims big distances…and just because someone shouts the loudest or uses big words, it doesn’t mean that they know what they’re talking about. The best advice I think I’d give is to get off social media and do your research. Better yet, meet with a coach (when safe to do so) and pay for some coaching. If you’ve just taken up open water swimming for example, and get it wrong early it’s much harder to fix a technical problem later on down the track. Get it right from the start. Failing that - check youtube. It’s a great resource. If you’re not sure….how much to kick on a distance swim or how often to breath - check out what the Olympians do. Make sure you watch the correct discipline though. If you want to know how often to breath over distance, watch a distance race - don’t watch a 50m sprint. You won’t get far not breathing for 50m over a 3 km swim! There are also a number of great slow-mo videos on there.