I still go running but there are days when I have aching muscles. But I dislike the idea to do nothing at days when my legs can’t run. So, I had the glorious idea to look for an alternative sport so that I can fill these days. One thing that came to my mind was swimming, and I don’t mean splashing around, I really mean swimming laps. I could still do the splashing after the laps, like jumping from the spring-board and so. Well, today was that day. Since some time, my new motto is “Stop thinking, start doing it”, at least for the things that can be done and where I don’t have to overthink or plan. This is for example how I convinced myself to do regular running sport, and I do this now since over a year. Since we have indoor sport swimming pools in every district, I just packed my bag and started.

I am already pretty fit due to the running, but when I started swimming laps today, there was a laughing voice in my head that said “Haha, swimming is a different sport than running, you’re not fit”. Yeah, it was my own inner voice, but it just convinces me even more. I did swim 10 laps at first, that was about 250 meters. After that I needed a break, I am beginner. But when I left the water, I felt like an astronaut who came back to earth, with difficulties adjusting to the gravity. For a second I thought my legs couldn’t carry my body anymore, and I hoped that nobody saw this one-second attempt to make a curtsey. I then looked for a place to sit and when I enjoyed the break I thought “You did it again, yes you can”, and even if this sounds like a slogan of Obama, it was yet again just my inner voice.

After 5 or 10 minutes, I felt like I would be ready for a few more laps again. I did again 10 laps, so I was now at 20 laps or 500 meters. This time when I left the water, I didn’t make a curtsey, no, my legs got used to switching between swimming laps and walking on land. It sounds like I never swam, but my point is that there is a huge difference between splashing around in the Baltic Sea or swimming quite some laps in an indoor swimming pool. One of it is fun, and the other is sport. Still full of zest for action, I walked to the pool supervisor and asked him if he could open the spring-board. So, I jumped maybe about 10 times headfirst from the 1 meter spring-board into the water. I was not used to this anymore, it’s been quite some time since I did this the last time. It felt like the water would push through my nose into the brain (laugh), it’s of course not possible but it felt like that.

As a kid I always wondered why some grown-up people use a nose clip, I think I got the answer today. But after a couple of headers, I developed a technique that this became less of a problem, you just have to tense your nose a bit. Now I started to feel very exhausted, I still had the idea to jump from one of the bigger towers into the water, but I was now way too exhausted to ask the supervisor to open one of the towers. I was 2 hours in the indoor hall and now I wanted to go home. On the way back I started to feel how my muscles are absolutely not used to this type of sport anymore. I might hike and run, but swimming is indeed very different. And I really mean, all my muscles started to remind me of the activity. I had already aching muscles on the way back home. And I was now very hungry and tired.

Arrived at home I wondered if I should eat something, but the fatigue was way stronger than the hunger. I fell asleep on the couch and woke up 3 hours later, knowing that this would be quite bad, because falling asleep in the evening would get much more difficult. I thought the aching muscles were already bad on the way back home, but now I sit in front of the computer, and it’s much worse. When my mother called me by phone, she laughed and said “Well, you don’t do swimming sport anymore since quite some time, and doing 20 laps was maybe a bit too much for the first time!”. I think she is right, but I like the fact that I started with a different sport again, because now I might choose between running or swimming, depending on what I want to do.