Talk:Long-distance swimming
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the problem here is that while both articles are attempting to deal with the same subject, neither is the exact, correct name.
- long distance swimming = swimming for a long distance, but with no indicator as to where it takes place, you could do it in a city pool. it would be terribly boring, but it could be done.
- open water swimming = swimming in open water, but no indicator as to whether this is recreational or competative, and if it is competative it gives no indication of the distance, which could be quite short in a small lake or river.
while the olympics are not the be all and end all of sport (how can they when have seperate and unequal sports for women and can't decide whether to call them 'women' or 'ladies'), they do seem to have chosen the more unique name which will probably lead to more understanding by the general public, considering that when most people think of swimming they think of natatoriums and relative long distance swimming does exist in that context. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 151.201.133.107 (talk • contribs) 12 May 2006 .
Long and short are subjective and relative terms. There are many accomplished masters swimmers who consider 800 yards of freestyle to be a long distance event but who would nonetheless concede that it is a short distance compared to say 3 or 5 miles. In turn, a 3 mile race would be considered a relatively short distance to someone training to swim the English Channel. In other words, the terms "short distance" and "long distance" are not helpful in the absence of an official (though probably somewhat arbitrary) cut-off point on which a representative body of swimmers can agree.
As it happens, the International Swimming Federation ([1]) has adopted a set of open water swimming rules that begin with the following definitions:
Open water swimming shall be defined as any competition that takes place in rivers, lakes, or oceans.
Long distance swimming shall be defined as any event in open water competitions up to a maximum of 10 kilometers.
Marathon swimming shall be defined as any event in open water competitions over 10 kilometers.
So for FINA, long distance swimming is a subset of open water swimming, and cannot, according to its definition, be undertaken in a pool. This is consistent with some swimmers' views that extended swimming in a pool is a form of training for open water events, and does not constitute long distance swimming in itself. A principal argument in favour of this view is that touching a boat, structure, side or bottom of a watercourse is seen to be breaking the swim, and will generally result in disqualification in open water events of any length.
The inclusion of the word competition in the FINA definitions reflects the Association's concern with sanctioned, multi-competitor events, and is misleading. Open water swims are often undertaken alone (not counting an escort boat), for example in crossings of the English Channel, Catalina Channel, or the Great Lakes which separate Canada and the United States. Possibly one could consider these solo swims as part of a larger competition that has been going on for centuries but some solo swimmers would certainly object to this idea, not least because it is presumptuous and easily refuted by contemporary participants in the sport.
FINA curiously omits to specify a minimum length of the long distance event, so that 100 metres would qualify just as much as 10 kilometres. FINA should perhaps consider adopting 1500 metres as the lower cut-off for long distance swimming, since that is the longest distance recognized by the same body for swimming other than open water swimming, and is correspondingly the longest distance for which one can obtain an official world record in a pool.
Conclusion: The entries on open-water swimming and long-distance swimming should definitely be merged with "open-water swimming" used as the page title.
--Gus Delmar 22:13, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
