#swimming

In Athens I was 17 and I didn't have any expectations. I was just swimming fast and racing everybody. I didn't have the joy after my races in 2007. I didn't want to go to Beijing. I had to for sponsors. ↗

— Laure Manaudou

#any #athens #beijing #everybody #expectations

Swimming is a confusing sport, because sometimes you do it for fun, and other times you do it to not die. And when I'm swimming, sometimes I'm not sure which one it is. ↗

— Demetri Martin

#confusing #die #fun #i #other

I never told my father I loved him before he died, and I have a lot of issues about that. They're all swimming around in my head, in my heart, unresolved, and in a way it felt fitting to dedicate the film to him. ↗

— Gary Oldman

#around #before #dedicate #died #father

I'm a little top heavy, so I have to pay attention to that area. I think it was from my years of swimming in school when I was a kid and it just overdeveloped my upper body. In fact, when I started modeling, my back was so developed, I could not fit into any dresses. ↗

— Rebecca Romijn

#area #attention #back #body #could

When you're young, you don't really know quite what you're aiming at. You're very impulsive and acting on impulse, which is very important and valuable. But you're kind of swimming in a blind sea. When you get older, you have more of a sense of direction. ↗

— Sinead O'Connor

#aiming #blind #direction #get #important

Michael wasn't on the pool deck, which was hard for me. None of my old Coral Springs teammates were around. Still, that old plane of cement felt like home. I folded my clothes and put them on the bench. I placed my water bottle under my starting block, and I dove in. Once again, I felt that ultimate state of transition, my feet no longer on the ground, my hands not yet in the water. ↗

— Dara Torres

#home #peace #solitude #swimming #age

As long as it's a regular day, not too rough to begin with, the ocean is pretty smooth once you make it out past the first set of waves. That's why people are afriad to swim in the ocean. They try to jump over those waves and get slammed down to the bottom and pulled across the sand like a piece of shell. You've got to go throught them, dive under just when they're rising up for you, set your direction, close your eyes, and just swim like hell. Once you get throught that, you'll find there isn't a better place for swimming because it's the ocean and it goes on forever. You don't have to see anyone if you don't want to. If you look out, away from the beach, it's easy to imagine that there's no one else but you in the whole world, you and maybe a couple of sea gulls. ↗

— Ann Patchett

#imagination

Swimming gave me my start, but my pal Tarzan did the real work. He set me up nicely. ↗

— Johnny Weissmuller

#gave #me #nicely #pal #real

I was 15, and the years of hard swimming had packed muscle on my frame and made me very strong. Not as strong as a football player, but strong enough to inflict heavy damage. ↗

— Esther Williams

#damage #enough #football #football player #frame

Somehow I kept my head above water. I relied on the discipline, character, and strength that I had started to develop as that little girl in her first swimming pool. ↗

— Esther Williams

#character #develop #discipline #first #girl