Intro | Temperature | Visibility |
Safety | Weather Conditions
Visibility
The visibility in open water tends not to be anywhere near as good as what you would experience in a swimming pool.
For one thing, the water is unlikely to be so clear, and for another, there may be waves (in the sea, rivers and reservoirs) and even at still water sites.
However, there are steps you can take to control and enhance your limited visibility in open water.
Firstly, you will need to get used to regularly lifting your head to see where you are going, particularly if you are a freestyle swimmer as you are likely to have to adapt your stroke to do this effectively.
As a rough guide, you may need to take a look every 3 or 4 breaths in poor conditions while this might rise to 10 or even 20 breaths in better conditions.
Secondly, it’s a good idea to lock on to an object that is sufficiently far away and preferably as straight ahead as possible (if it’s to one side there’s a risk of swimming off-line while if it is too far away you may feel you are making no progress).
Try to use obvious points of reference with some height such as church steeples, other large buildings, pylons or even large trees. Ground-level objects should be avoided.
Again, you can also use kit to help you control the visibility element of open water swimming. In this respect, a good pair of goggles should help you quickly locate your point of reference when you do have to look up.