I remember the issues you were having and glad you got beyond them!
My ways to exercise are cycling and swimming, but prefer swimming. It's a great workout with no traffic or street crossings to worry about! My local community college pool has been closed due to the pandemic until recently, and now only open 1 1/2 hours at noon. Thinking about returning and be content with that.
According to the CDC, community swimming doesn't generally pose an increased infection risk, which is welcome news.
Yeah, the pandemic placed a whole bunch of rules and restrictions in place at my pool- like 1 person per lane (even if you live with another person also using the pool), 1hr scheduled sessions (including locked room time), maximum 3 sessions per week, etc… so time in the pool was rather limited. Then there was this weird policy that pool supplied kickboard and pull bouys had to be disinfected after use, despite being used in literally a pool of chlorine.
It was not surprisingly figured out pretty early on pools were not a high risk environment (again, everyone is bathing in a pool of chlorine), yet for the purposes of “security theater” such restrictions were not reconsider until relatively recently. I’m fine with erring on caution, but things were a bit silly for a while once the data was in. But I digress.
Yeah, it’s rather amazing how many pairs of Speedo Vanquisher goggles I’ve accumulated over the years. It’s like you have your pair from last year, then you might as well buy a new pair because the old ones might break, then your buy another pair because you forgot your other pairs, then you lose your nicest pair and so buy new ones, then find the lost pair. I have 3 pairs in my swim bag alone. The real travesty is having perfectly fit goggles, only to lend them out to someone, they naturally adjust them to fit their face, and you can never find that perfect fit ever again on that pair.Trying to get back to the pool. Our current situation is such that I need to be at home during lunchtime, which was when I used to go swimming. I’m not sure it will revert back any time soon, so I’ll have to develop a new time / routine. As far as goggles, I like the speedo vanquisher as well, and I had several pairs. Unfortunately my son took 1 pair, and I left another at the gym. So I need to build the collection back up.
I’m also waiting for the weather to warm up so I can do some open water swimming. The lake was 55° last week, which is too cold even with a wetsuit.
I’ve always wanted to get into open water swimming more seriously. I once swam the swimming leg of a triathalon in college (other people ran/biked the other events). I bought an open water suit for that and used it basically that one time (plus several practices)… probably not good anymore after 9-10 years. Jeeze, has it been that long? I imagine the rubber and neoprene decomposes as in any other wetsuit. They are rather ridiculous when it comes to pricing.
In high school I would swim along the coast of the ocean while vacationing at my parents beach house. But I didn’t do a ton of that. OWS, particularly in the ocean, is very different than swimming in a pool.
Speaking of which, anyone try to buy a bathing suit lately from Speedo or TYR? Everything is “temporarily unavailable” or “out of stock”- even some of the ugliest swim suits ever.