Things I’ll Need for Swimming

Based on my swimming performance, or should I say lack of performance, yesterday, I’ve compiled a list of some things that I’ll need if I get serious about this and decide to do a triathlon. These few things will really help with the swim portion of the race:

1. Swim goggles – My eyes will just be too irritated to not have goggles, but not wearing my glasses will be a problem. I have the eyes of a hawk – a blindfolded hawk, that is. Therefore, being able to see in the open water will be an issue because I don’t want to pay for prescription goggles. But for pool training, my extreme nearsightedness should be tolerable and I can figure out later how to navigate to the swim buoys.

2. A sleeker bathing suit – My beach and pool side bathing suit is not going to cut it, as it has too much drag. I may need to get something more like Spandex, although I don’t know if it is fair to subject the world to that. I have this vision of mothers covering their children’s eyes and women running away in horror.

3. A wetsuit – I won’t need that for a long time yet, but ultimately, I will need a wet suit.

4. An air pump to inflate the wetsuit – I sink like a stone, but I bet using an air pump to inflate the wetsuit will help a lot. I have this mental image of me looking kind of like a black Michelin Man, floating along the surface of the water like a gigantic marshmallow.

5. Flippers – Technically these are not legal for a triathlon, but I have a strategy to get around this that I will discuss later. Yesterday, they were the only thing that kept my feet pointing behind me.

6. Little hidden propellers for my flippers – I don’t think that these are legal either, but they would really help. I figure that I can find a craftsman to implant these in my flippers with an electric motor. Once I am in the water, I press this button in my wetsuit, little secret doors in the flippers open, and the propellers push me along. Who said that swimming is hard?

7. A snorkel – I swim pretty good under water but cannot hold my breath for a mile, so I figure a snorkel will really help with my breathing technique.

8. An inflatable life vest – If I develop a leak in my Michelin Man wetsuit, and it deflates, I will clearly need a backup plan to regain buoyancy.

9. A small echolocation device – Eureka! I just figured out how to find those buoys in the open water without my glasses. Problem solved.

10. Five one pound gold bars – I won’t swim with these, but I think they will be useful in having the race officials overlook the snorkel, flippers, life vest, and so forth. “Flippers? I don’t see any flippers.” “That’s not a snorkel – it is just a stick floating in the water. A moving stick. A vertical stick that is being pushed along rapidly with two little propellers.”

With just these few simple items, I feel confident that I can train for and ultimately complete the swim portion of a triathlon.