I’m just as passionate about swimming as I am about writing.
It was only a matter of time before these two passions met.
As we celebrate and cheer on our Olympic champions this month, we find ourselves in awe of the incredible athletic ability of the competitors. In the same way, we can find ourselves in awe and inspired by the ability of creators when they put pictures into words in a book. Whatever sport you’re following these Olympic Games, I want to redefine the way you perceive the art of writing—as a sport.
Let’s begin with dedication.
Swimming is a sport that requires endless, full-time dedication. It requires outside-of-training discipline. It requires unwavering, consistent practice, and it requires an intentional focus. The act of swimming itself can be reasonably fast to learn, but mastering the technique is an art that takes years to perfect. High-level competitive swimming demands full-time attention, practice, and dedicated focus.
Likewise, writing also requires an immense amount of dedication and practice. While yes, it is far easier to string a nice-sounding sentence than it is to swim 100 metres freestyle in under 50 seconds, don’t let the ease of writing fool you. Writing a full-length project takes many hours of dedicated time, practice, and focus. A writer is always learning, and the more you intentionally spend time honing your craft the better you’ll be—as with swimming.
Some people say writing is simple.
I could say the same about swimming. The truth is, they both are simple. But do you think Ariane Titmus, or Mollie O’Callaghan, would say it was simple to win Silver and Gold in the Women’s 200m Freestyle? Certainly not! It’s as a result of their experience, strength, and technique that they were able to pull through with that double win.
I want to highlight the last one, because it’s often overlooked: Technique.
One dolphin kick. Pull down. Touch with two hands. —These are just a few of the essentials for breaststroke. When swimming, you need to get your technique right; not only because you could be disqualified otherwise, but because it helps you to move through the water faster. Writing, while more forgiving, also demands good technique to form a powerful and delivering piece to your audience: strong syntax, powerful verbs, alliteration, and more.
There are four strokes in swimming:
Butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle. There are also four types of writing. And what do you know! —It’s as if they pair together perfectly. From a swimmer’s perspective, I’ve paired each stroke with a style of writing:
Freestyle/Fiction: fast, reasonably simple (compared to the others), and the most popular choice
Backstroke/Non-Fiction: requires lots of practice, begins and ends differently compared to the other strokes/writing techniques
Butterfly/Poetry: strong and powerful, can be difficult to learn, but turns out beautifully when done well
Breaststroke/Academic: meticulous and detail-oriented with strict guidelines, slowest to deliver but has powerful execution
Treat Writing Like a Swimming Race.
Every writer knows not to compare themselves with others, because we’re all on our own writing journey. While this is absolutely true, I do have to point out that often a little competition is good. In the swimming world, every technique and drill is ideally geared towards helping you improve so that you can win.
Consider writing as a swim race—whether it’s a novel or an essay for school. Before you start, you go through your dryland routine by doing research. After that you line up and get onto the block: collect your research into an outline. Everything else waits until you’re ready.
Then you dive.
Depending on whether it’s a one-page sprint or an 800m novel, you pace yourself accordingly. Stroke by stroke, word by word, you pull yourself through the paper. Along the way there’ll be tumble turns required; a brief moment of respite before you continue. But no matter how the writers in the lanes beside you are going, you keep pushing yourself, knowing that you alone are responsible for your result.
One last turn, and you see the end in sight—just one more paragraph. You’re on the home stretch and you sprint like crazy, eager to get to the end. Just as you feel like you can’t go on any longer, something incredible happens:
You touch the wall.
It’s over. You’ve accomplished something great; whether you win gold or come last, you’ve swam through that document and now you’ve touched the wall of conclusion. Viewing your writing like this can allow you to remember to pace yourself accurately, to take the breaks when you need them, and to set goals. Try looking at your writing the way a swimmer looks at his race. You might be surprised with the result.
Writing is a sport.
Both swimming and writing demand focussed attention, determination, and perseverance. And a whole lot of crazy ambition. You can’t skimp on practice for either and assume you’re going to be a bestseller, or Olympian. It takes endless hours of hard work to perfect your craft and technique. Look through a pair of goggles at your writing and see the project like a swim race. It might take multiple laps and you might be up against some big competitors, but it’s worth it.
Shoulder injuries, water up your nose, over-rotating, not having enough air… that’s not even a patch on what swimmers have to go through. But with the pain also comes great joy, just as with writing, and all other good things in life. Embracing those challenges and joys is what gets Ariane Titmus those world records. It’s that same mindset that gets Tatjana Smith those medals.
That Word document is your lane. That deadline is your qualifying time. The audience is waiting for you to get onto the block and dive into your project with the same passion as Kaylee McKeown in her 100m backstroke.
Go Dolphins!
Hey Christopher! Commenting to let you know you've been nominated for the Sunshine Blogger Award!
https://warriorco.ca/2024/10/10/why-bother/
Oh, I love this so much, Christopher! The parallels you made are beautiful. Thanks for sharing!
What a cool article idea! I'm also a competitive swimmer, and I was quite happy to see that my favorite stroke got paired with my favorite genre to write.
Another brilliantly written piece. SO exciting to see you using one if your many God- given talents Love the parallels between swimming and writing. Well done!