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But if you think that a beginner is confused by using 100's or 200's, why would you ever think that laps would be better?
Because here in America, we teach our young swimmers (at least in 100% of the year-round, summer league, and high school swimming programs in NC IME) that lap and length are equivalent. It is evidently a glaring imprecision in our language, but only so if people are aware that more than one meaning of the word "lap" can be connoted. Until I got to NC State, I probably put in (literally) millions of yards in the pool and had never heard of a "lap" being down and back.
To the people who make the argument that my definition of a "lap" changes with the length of the pool, I agree, but that is implicit, uncomplicated, and essentially irrelevant. When swimming in a 25m pool, the length of the pool is unambiguous, and therefore the issue of one lap being 25m or 25yd in a 25m pool is irrelevant. As I previously said, I define one lap to be the distance across the pool once, and this quantity is invariant (with the obvious exception of pools that have the option of moveable bulkheads). If you define a "lap" to be down in back, then you have the same issue. I'm not tying the definition of a lap to one particular pool length any more so than those of you who believe a lap is down and back are, I'm merely illustrating a point. If I were arguing your point I would make the statement that a lap was 50yd at a 25yd pool, 100m at a 50m pool, and so on and so forth. Don't get sidetracked here...
It doesn't matter that somebody has drawn lines on a track that measure out where each fraction of one circuit is. The shortest non-fractional distance offered by the track is a lap, and in the pool the shortest non-fractional distance offered is the distance between one end in the other. That is how I choose to define the lap.
To people like klehner that don't have anything to add to the discussion, please feel free to fuck off. It is obviously a contentious issue (and one worth discussing, at that), as evidenced by the fact that there are so many replies. If you don't care to join in on the conversation that's your own prerogative, but there's no need to waste space announcing your displeasure.
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