I hinted at this last week, but now I'll give the full story - or at least,
as much as I can remember. In my third year at BGS (called 'the fifth
form'), we had a swimming lesson once a week. I'm fairly sure that we gave
up our morning break in order to walk to the swimming pool of Bristol
University that was situated in the 'Union' building about half a mile away
from the school. I suspect that the swimming lesson must have been a 'double
lesson', so we would have come back in time for lunch.
As I wrote
before, we were taught properly how to swim crawl. Along with this, there was
plenty of time to practice swimming back stroke that was my speciality. In
the summer term (I think), I felt that I had a good chance of winning my age
group's back stroke race, and as practice I used to race with someone else
(I don't remember who) swimming crawl (he wasn't as fast as I was). One time
I was swimming quite fast when suddenly a muscle in my leg cramped - and
that was that.
The pain must have lasted a few days, for I remember going to the family
doctor who told me (probably) that there wasn't much that could be done
about the pain as the muscle would relax in time. For the mean time, though,
there would be no more swimming for me and that I was to take things easy. I
remember that I was almost in tears when I told my housemaster that I would
not be able to compete, but he didn't seem to be too moved (again, relying
on a doubtful memory that hasn't been recalled for over 50 years).
As always, one has to ask why I am telling all this. Yesterday I had the
second remedial swimming lesson: we started out holding flat boards with our
arms stretched out in front, practicising the leg movements for crawl. I
felt at first that I wasn't moving forward; it wasn't until I caused my legs
to be just under the water, instead of far below, that I started to make
progress,
Then I found that holding the flat board in front was more distracting than
helpful, so I left it at the pool's edge and starting swimming crawl
properly. I saw that I had to concentrate on four things at the same time:
my legs, keeping my face down, breathing and arm movements. I found it very
tiring to swim a width in this manner, but the skill was slowly returning.
In a break, someone asked whether it was easier to swim crawl or back
stroke; I said that back stroke was easier as one didn't have to concentrate
on breathing, although the same amount of energy is still needed. At the
least, the legs are on top of the water. I then started out to
swim a width on my back, but after a few strokes ... that same calf muscle in my
leg cramped! I immediately stopped swimming (not that I could continue anyway) and
started massaging the muscle, at least enough to relax it sufficiently so
that I could limp out of the pool.
Yesterday the cramp didn't seem so bad, but today it's been very painful
when using my leg. Of course I didn't go swimming and I've spent most of the
day lying down, but I still have to walk the dog. There isn't much pain when
walking on the flat or walking up a hill or stairs, but walking
down the stairs is painful. Completely by chance the other day I
received a 'massage pistol' as a prize from all my walking so I tried using
this on my leg. I can't say that it had an effect, but maybe it has to be
used several times.
If the cramp doesn't improve, I'll go to the clinic on Sunday morning and
see what they have to say. I hope that I will be able to continue with the
swimming lessons, not only for the lessons themselves, but also because I
had to pay no small amount for them.
Bonus memory: there were five classes in the fifths; I don't think that
all/most of the classes had swimming on the same day but rather one class a
day. This means that one class would have had swimming on the same day as
sports in the afternoon - this sounds unlikely to me.
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