Swim Start Etiquette..such a thing? (Page 2)

Not near as experienced as many here & only MOP/BOP swimmer, but a few things SHOULD be rules of tri pool swims:

1.  In a quick (every few sec) time-trial start from pool deck- Do NOT jump from the deck on top of another swimmer. Serious injuries occur from this (though usu not during a tri).

2.  Do not stand up in the middle of the pool lane (shallow end). To a swimmer just behind you this is like hitting a post.

3. Do not block the end of the pool so other swimmers cannot make their serpentine lane changes.

4. Do not sidestroke as pool lanes are not wide enough to avoid the kicks.

FWIW- My OWS's have been mainly uneventful.  A few brushes & bumps but no big deal.  OTOH- Pool swims can be a big PITA 'cause there's no room to avoid trouble.  All my swim-related bruises have been from the pool (kicks to chest, head, etc.).

Because it is much easier for the officials to see my number when I'm not in the water...

Seriously, though, it is much safer and easier to just go around.  The only time it is actually safer to go over is with breast strokers, but luckily I haven't been forced to go over any (yet).

CDA Swim Start

Lake Placid Swim Start

Known as two of the roughest swims in Triathlon.  I am doing one of them in June.  Wheee!!!

I wonder what was up with the single swimmer heading the other way...and the swim caps also reminded me of a box of nerds candy spilling out.

I can't comment on the swim start but I can comment on the East TN thing and yes, it's certainly an East TN thing.  

Not sure what everyone thinks 'swimming over' is. It's not taking your hand on the other person's head and pushing them under water. It's also not swimming straight over another person who is swimming in the same direction. There's no intentional punching and kicking going on. Most of the time it's putting your hand on their lower back or below (lower legs) and pushing them down or sideways during your stroke. It's not overly aggressive, and most people probably don't even know it's happened. It feels like a bump or light push and barely affects the person who's getting swum over.

'Around' isn't always an option. When you're boxed in on the sides and behind, your choices are to either stop (and have the person behind you stop, etc.) or try to squeeze through. Again, there's nothing malicious about it. Nobody's trying to dunk the other person or hurt anyone. If the whole group stopped every time they came up to someone treading water, the race would never end.

Most of the contact out there happens jockeying for position and (as was pointed out) around the buoys. If you don't want to be mixed up in this, then don't start there. The issue I see the most is someone starting out at the front, going hard for 50-100 yards, then stopping to tread water or slowing WAY down. Another one is someone swimming diagonally through the group. These people will get swum over, and most of the time they won't even know it.

I really was quite appalled in my first tri. I'm a strong distance swimmer but don't naturally start really fast (esp. if there's a sprint across the beach first) and probably am outweighed by most of the people in the race, es. the guys.  I have been swum over, kicked, hit in the face, and even, I swear, had a competitor grab onto my shorts!

In my first Oly I was unable to shake another woman who kept swimming just parallel to me, but so close she was hitting me with almost every stroke and shoving me toward a rope marking the course. Surely this wasn't advantageous for her, but she never pulled ahead and every time I pulled ahead, she caught up. Maybe my competition had just glommed on me from the start--several women finished that swim within a few seconds, including one who later won my AG (I was second and lost it on the bike, but we were within one or two seconds of each other on the swim). I keep a steady pace and usually finish strong, and it's not unsual for me to have a pack pacing off me in the swim or run. I don't mind if others benefit from my good pacing. But honestly, this start rudeness is contagious--for my second Olympic distance, I started like a maniac, whacked at anyone who got in my way, and finished three minutes faster despite some bigtime zigzagging at one point due to poor sighting. I felt it was shove back, or get shoved around again.

Most contact in a swim was last year in an Oly and I was doing the Aqua bike. We started with the women (under 30 I believe).  I was amazed at the amount of contact!  I am pretty sure in other countries I would be married to several of these women.  I just ended up swimming as fast as I could and going a bit outside.  Eventually the speedsters pulled away and the rest fell behind.  I think I will stick to swimming with the men, a bit safer.

My race a couple of weeks ago had some contact but I expected it and it was kinda fun.  Just some unintentional bumping, etc.  I have moved from a BOP swimmer to a MOP swimmer and I guess this is to be expected.

What's the difference? Perhaps I'm misunderstanding but swimming "over" someone means swimming "on" them.

If someone wants to pass you (presumably by tapping your foot), what's the etiquette? Should you move to the right if the course is counter-clockwise and move to the left if it's a clockwise course?

While sometimes I'm sure it "barely affects the person" and "they won't even know it", that's not always true. 

If it's a age-group wave start, I swim to the outside to avoid Mr. Speedy from a later wave thinking I'm an obstacle to push out of his way. Even so, I've been shoved sideways by more than one "I'm going to swim through" jerk. 

At IMLP (mass start), here I am halfway through the first loop, swimming along to the left of someone with a half-person wide gap between us, and suddenly there's this guy coming between us.   There was a good twenty feet of open water between us and the buoy line - no reason at all for this guy to swim between us.  He wants more room so he just puts is hand on my side and pushes me over to make a space for him.  My arm was coming up and it got hooked in his and in short it just messed me up.  He was fine.  No, it wasn't intentionally malicious - it was just intentionally selfish.