Throwback Thursday: At what age did you learn how to swim? #TBT

[#1]

It's Thursday!

I grew up in Iceland, in case that has not clear by now. Iceland is an island (and is spelled Ísland in Icelandic). So the school system teaches us how to swim. I think we started swim lessons at age 6. And it is built into the school schedule. Like in 3th hour, we´d go into the bus, which took us to the pool (or we´d walk), then shower and get into swim suits. Do the lesson and then shower, get clothed and back on the bus (or walking back to the school) for 4th hour. 

Sooooo, tell us how old you were when you learned how to swim.

Let’s make it a great Thursday!
KGM

[Reiner]

I learnt to swim at the age of 4-5 (and still love it today)

[Ram Kumar Aravindakshan _Adaptavist_]

I was about 10.

[Andy Gladstone]

I grew up less than a mile from the Atlantic Ocean and we also had a pool in our backyard (until Hurricane Gloria destroyed it in 1986). I was swimming while still in diapers. I was less than 3 years old when I no longer needed a safety flotation device while in the pool. We spent summers by the ocean and open water swimming was something I was doing independently by the age of six. Early life experiences led me to captain the swim team in sleepaway camp during middle school (7th and 8th grade) and I swam the anchor leg in the team events!

Thanks for this swim down memory lane @Kristján Geir Mathiesen! 

[Amanda Barber]

Wow, that's awesome that it was part of school at such a young age. In Wisconsin, we often went to lakes in the summer, and I believe I took swim lessons at around 8 years old. We didn't have swimming in school until high school. My own kids started swim classes as babies to get comfortable in the water, and then actual swim lessons when they were ~3. They won't have swimming in school until high school.

[Barbara Szczesniak]

When I was about 5, my parents won a 1-year membership to the local YMCA in an auction. To halve the number of children at home, my older sister, brother, and I would go to a 3-hour program at the Y on Saturday mornings: 1 hour swim lessons, 1 hour tumbling and other sporting activities, and 1 hour of arts and crafts (I remember making a candle shaped like a teddy bear 🐻).

[Dan Breyen]

I believe I had swimming lessons somewhere between 5-8 years old.  I sill remember being terrified of having to jump off the high dive board into the water.

I don't remember seeing Wendy Peffercorn guarding the pool however.

[Peter Van de Voorde]

I learned how to swim at school between the ages of 6 and 8.

[Susan Waldrip]

I learned at age 7, and still remember the dread of hitting that cold water at 7 in the morning. Brrrr!

[Tuncay Senturk]

I was 20 when I decided to learn to swim. I floated on an inflatable seabed, practicing my strokes far from shore. Suddenly, I heard a "tssssss"—the seabed was deflating! Panicked, I started "swimming" toward the coast, which looked more like hitting/kicking the sea.

Exhausted after a few minutes, I let myself sink a bit, only to find I was in knee-deep water. I crawled to the shore, panting but with a glory. That deflating seabed forced me to swim for the first time, even if it wasn’t pretty!

[Dave Mathijs]

Only at 10 years old, I still have my first 25 meter certificate! 😂

[Natalie Beiler]

I learned to swim at 10 when I went to summer camp for the first time. Loved it!

We have never lived close enough to water for swimming to be a common activity but at least I know I can if I need to.

[Laurie Sciutti]

I was in the pool before I could walk.  I love to swim.  🏊🏼‍♀️

[Sherilyn Tasker]

Also living on an island (New Zealand) swimming is important to learn and it was built into our curriculum at school so I learnt when I was about 7 and took further lessons outside of school. Luckily my small town had an olympic size pool which was 5 minutes from my house so I spent my entire childhood at the pools. Very glad of that skill as an adult.

[Summer Hogan]

I live in Gilbert, AZ; a suburb of Phoenix where there are a lot of pools and we have numerous cities in the list of top cities in the United States for homes with pools so I learned to swim very young as well @Kristján Geir Mathiesen! I think I was 8 or 9. I remember one time at my aunts house I got away from the edge and couldn't get back and just struggled and struggled until I made it to the edge. At that point I told my dad that I needed to learn how to swim and he taught me how. I took my swimming one step further and took lifeguarding classes in high school and became a lifeguard. 

[Rishabh Jhawar]

I was between 6 and 7 when I learned to swim. The first day was just splashing around, but the second day was a bit of a horror for me, as the coach was pretty tough. However, by the third day, I was able to start swimming short distances, and from there, it was all fun!

[Trudy Claspill]

I learned to swim when I was about 4 or 5, I think. There are lots of lakes where I grew up, and later we spent most of our summer time at a private campground that had a heated outdoor pool.

Unfortunately I never mastered the trick around keeping water from rushing into my nose. I have always had to use a physical nose-plug device (like you see synchronized swimmers use in the Olympics) to clamp my nose shut to prevent the influx of water.

[Mark Higgins]

Yeah, being English, and then arriving in Australia at the age of 4, never seing a real beach, it wasn't until I was 6 or 7, and had lessons at school, that I could swim 50m ;-)

[Vronik]

Hello everyone

I think I was about 7 years old when my parents taught me to swim, it is a very complete sport, it helps a lot the back, the body in general and for me in particular it allows me to relax my mind a lot.

Now I don't practice it much, but whenever I can I "take the plunge",

Jajajaja

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

Ah, what an excellent question. It's still unknown because I am utterly bad at swimming and don't have the guts to start at "old age."

[vikram]

I started learning at the age of 12 to 13 years but not perfect.

then I never had a habit of swimming.

now I am getting training.

vikram P

[Dave Mathijs]

@Teodora V _Fun Inc_ You're never "too" old, who knows what you're missing out on... and it can be fun too!

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

@Dave Mathijs I knooow, swimming is such a great thing to do (when you are not a scared chicken haha)

[Jack Brickey]

i cannot recall the age but it was rather young, maybe 6 or 7. My family was always big on going to pools and the beach so the encouragement was always present. I distantly recall taking lessons at the Y but mostly trial by fire. 

[Thorhalla Gudmundsdottir Beck]

Icelander as well so I should have learned early but I was terrified of the water so I didn't really learn to swim properly until around the age of 16. 😅 still don't like water. I don't mind going to the pool to swim or sit in the hot tub but anything like going out to sea in a boat is an absolute nope. 😅 

[John Funk]

When I finally learn, I will let you know.  :-)