I think to do that you have to know how salty the saltwater pool is. My backyard pool is saltwater so the electrolysis unit can make chlorine. But the salinity is much less than the ocean. I think most saltwater pools are alot less salty than the ocean because they don't need to be to make chlorine or maintain good chemistry. So I think you would have to be in a lap pool that is next to the ocean and is pumping in ocean water. I think a few of those exist in places like Australia. The aquarium my clownfish live in is too small for swimming :)

---

They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

By "sweet water" you mean "fresh water" I presume? As opposed to water with sugar in it!
I've never heard that term before in my life.

Saltwater is significantly denser than fresh water and as such you're more buoyant. The same advantage you get from the buoyancy of neoprene foam in a wetsuit. The combination of the two obviously being quickest of all. So it's not just a subjective observation, there's an objective reason. Afraid I can't give you a percentage speed increase estimate but I'm sure a web search will turn up some relevant data.

I had never seen/read/heard-of this term before today either.

Isn't "sweet water" collected by a "honey wagon"?

The local Kroc Center—where I swim—is salinated.
My swim times are the same, compared w/ same distance chlorinated pools.
Best thing about salinated pools: no post-swim chlorine-induced itching or sneezing.
...

"Sea water pools require special equipment and surfaces to withstand the very briny 35,000 parts per million (ppm) of salt found in the ocean."

"Salt water pools are quite different, with only about 3,000 ppm of salt. This concentration is below the threshold detectable to human taste buds and will not leave any noticeable salty residue on skin and hair."

http://www.inyopools.com/...s-a-salt-water-pool/

---

no sponsors | no races | nothing to see here

I think I get roughly the same benefit in terms of time swimming in saltwater without a wetsuit. as I do swimming in a wetsuit in fresh. Based on race times. But that is just subjective. I have heard the term sweetwater as well. I wonder if it is used in some places as opposed to freshwater.

---

They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

I used to swim in a proper saltwater pool. It wasn't quite seawater - rather, water pumped fresh from a saltwater aquifer - but the salinity was the same. It was brilliant, with the same buoyancy and feel-good as seawater but the clarity of the cleanest spring. Was also nice to be able to train in my wetsuit without killing it with chlorine.

Can't say I was any faster then, because that was my first pool... Technically I've been faster in every pool since.

---

ZONE3 - We Last Longer

Sorry about that, this was based on a wrong translation ( I'm Dutch). I changed my post accordingly.

I'll let you away with it in that case ;)

To be honest I wouldn't have been surprised if it was a US or Australian term for fresh water that I just hadn't heard before.

My relatives are German and Austrian and they all call it "sweet water" in English.

Must be the direct translation from German?

Yep, "Süßwasser"
Süß = Sweet
wasser = fish

I wish these 2 statements were true...........

---

Pink? Maybe. Maybe not. You decide.

It may have fallen out of use, but judging by the number of towns named Sweetwater in the USA, I would guess that at some point it was common.

C.S. Lewis used sweet to describe the water becoming non-salty as the Dawn Treader approached the edge of the world.


Where the sky and water meet,
Where the waves grow sweet,
Doubt not, Reepicheep,
To find all you seek,
There is the utter East.

My local pool is saltwater. I see no significant difference in 100 yard times from this pool to freshwater pools I use at YMCA's when I travel. There can obviously be other differences in one pool to another as I find out when I do simple pacing steps as I very rarely find two 25 yard pools that measure the same.

Being a sailor I have hear the term sweetwater rather often. Boats float lower in fresh/sweet water than in the oceans and you do have to account for the draft differences so you don't run aground.

Well, a fish is in the water, but wasser means water.

Thanks for replying.
Yes, that is really an issue with the lengths. I wondered once about different swimming times in different 50m pools. I took a tape measure than (the pool attendent looked suspicious) and it turned out that one pool had 49,8m and one even only 48,9 m (after a renovation where they put a stainless steel in the tiled pool).

Ha!

How did I manage that?!
When I looked up freshwater in german it came up with freshwater fish, which is Süßwasserfische. I deleted fische and then when I wrote the post my brain seems to have added it back in. Doh!
Apologies for my inattention.

Ok. Sometimes I sneeze post-swim. But I'm never itchy post-swim in a salinated pool.

---

no sponsors | no races | nothing to see here

Our local pool is a different length on one side vs the other. About 3-6 inches I think. If someone takes out the lane dividers the wrong way it is quite a mess. When they have swim meets no one outside our local group has noticed. Lane assignments for meets are random so sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. All we have is local age group meets though.

---

They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within
Dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good T.S. Eliot

Hmm, I can now cut and paste your reply from post #8:

I'll let you away with it in that case ;)

I just read he translated it from Dutch. This is also the case for spanish, where we call it "agua dulce", which literally means "sweet water".

Afrikaans the same, soetwater is literally 'sweet water' but means fresh water.. made sense to me ;-)
Also, if you swim in an estuary, and cross the line between the salt and fresh water, the fresh water tastes amazingly sweet..

this is the only sweet water i have heard of.....

http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/2301670849

Do you mean saltwater as in salt water chlorination or salt water pool as in:



If it's the former, the difference is negligible, if it's the latter you should feel a difference in buoyancy. I can float in the ocean, I can't float in a pool.

Sweet water? Isn't that where that stubborn red headed Irishman McBain set up his homestead expecting the railroad to come through?

Anyway, if salt water is easier than fresh water, your legs are probably sinking. You are probably keeping your head high (hips sinking), or you are pushing down on the water when you enter (chest goes up and again hips sinking) or you are not engaging your core to keep the body aligned. There are videos on youtube to help you correct this. Head down, hips up, keep the body long and straight, roll like a log. Edit: salt water is denser and human body more buoyant in it, which helps keep the legs up higher. Even then I suspect your hips are too low even as your feet are not, and in salt water you are probably in a sort of a hammock position.

Post a video of you swimming if you want specific advice.