Counting swim laps

[Lise]

How do you keep track of swim laps when training? I swear, I need a little clicker.

[KSH]

Some suggestions from my Beginner Triathlete board:

1) Use the letters of the alphabet for each 50. Go up to J = 500.

2) After each 50, state what you are on outload, underwater. "100", "150", etc.

3) Buy a counter that goes on your finger (they have those).

4) Use your lap counter on your watch.

5) Use pennies on the side of the pool. Make a pile beforehand with how many laps you need to complete (count a 50 as a lap). After each 50 reach up and move the pennies to the completed pile.

[Lise]

Some suggestions from my Beginner Triathlete board:

1) Use the letters of the alphabet for each 50. Go up to J = 500.

2) After each 50, state what you are on outload, underwater. "100", "150", etc.

3) Buy a counter that goes on your finger (they have those).

4) Use your lap counter on your watch.

5) Use pennies on the side of the pool. Make a pile beforehand with how many laps you need to complete (count a 50 as a lap). After each 50 reach up and move the pennies to the completed pile.

What does the "50" refer to?

[Dianyla]

What does the "50" refer to?

Meters. An Olympic sized pool should be 50m long, but many smaller pools will be 25m.

When I was on swim team years ago, we had a gigantic clock next to the pool. When training we would do a lap starting every 60 seconds, so you'd launch off at the 0 second mark every time, finish your lap, and then start again. They were like mini-intervals. Then afterwards you would know how many laps you'd done by how many minutes you'd been going.

As for long stretches, I always did the longer 500m events (20 laps in a 25m pool) and I don't remember having problems keeping track of laps. I would just repeat the current number in my head over and over again through each lap.

[Grog]

50 yards - or 50 meters, depending on your pool...

I count meters, not laps. For some reason, I find it easier and more meaningful (plus: I'm usually swimming with a goal, e.g. 1000 m, more than a time goal... or I renegotiate my goal as I go, like yesterday: ok I have 5 more minutes to go before it's half an hour, I can do 150 or 200 more meters...).

[Lise]

"My" pool is only 20m long! It's in an ooooold YMCA building close by. I'm off to there now--got to get in my laps between the guppy and senior citizen swim classes! Thanks for the tips. L.

[RoadRaven]

I don't do swim laps, but I do do flat road laps... we have 1km of straight road before the hills begin, so when I want a recovery ride, I go out and do "farm flats" which is a 1km false flat rising toward town, turn and back to the gate.
I also do hill reps on a 1km long medium rise.

I find it very hard to keep a track of how many - numbers just get muddled.

So i do something similar to KSH's suggestions. I have five children and and eleven nieces and nephews... so I work out how many laps/reps I intend to do, and then chose a combination of families so I have the right number of children to match the laps/reps, and then I ride... each stage for one of the kids... I usually order them youngest to oldest by family and I never lose track...

"This ones for Em, this ones for Em... ok, that was Em's, this must be for Becca..."

[Lise]

That's great, RR! I did count laps by just repeating the number over and over as I swam. It takes some discipline not to say, "12..12..12..13..13..14..15...what? where was I?" Focusing on the number keeps my thoughts from drifting to the negative, and may, with practice, help me focus on form, too.

Swim report, good news first:

-I kept track of my laps
-I did more laps than usual
-My form felt decent, and the swim wasn't too hard after the first two laps
-The padlock I'd "lost" was on a locker. Evidently I forgot that I wasn't in HS anymore, and locked it and walked away at some time in the past. I'd noticed this silver padlock on the same locker the last three times I was there, so just for snix, I tried my "old" combination. Yep, it's my lock. Now I have two. One is purple, so at least I can tell them apart.

Bad news:
-I cut my foot on the pool ladder while kicking off the wall. Top of my foot, more of a scrape, shouldn't be a problem for the tri.
-My new swim mask cost $30, leaked, pulled my cap off my head, and left a big red dent between my eyebrows. It is now going back to the store.

Best good news:
The sky changed from grey and drizzly to nice and sunny while I was in the Y!

Happy swims, runs, and rides, all! L.

[Tri Girl]

Good suggestions. I grab a handful of ponytail holders (hairbands) and put them around my water bottle. After each 100 I pull one off. Then at the end I count up how many I've pulled off and that's how far I've gone.
I can't for the life of me remember how far I've swum otherwise (unless I'm doing a certain workout- but even then it's hard to remember sometimes).

[JoyfullySo]

I have to admit that after 5 years of swimming for fitness, I finally figured out how to count. I do the same a Lise- with every stroke, I just count. 1,1,1,1...
etc. That way, I am not getting lost/confused. Also, I came to the realization that during a race, there was no wall to touch, that the swim was continuous ( don't laugh, I can be slow), so I didn't want to stop all the time to move pennies. Train like you race-race like you train...

Best of luck to you... let us know what method works best!!!