Most regular indoor swimmers will have witnessed or even been involved in a lane rage incident. In an article in the Sunday Times, Josephine Perry reports how a male swimmer went beyond lane rage to what was tantamount to a physical assault. Perry was held under water by the ankles by a man in the shared lane who apparently objected to being overtaken. This was largely put down to his ‘fragile male ego’. Ironically though it was Perry who had to leave the pool after the incident. After posting this on social media, Perry received more than 100 responses from both women and men expressing sympathy. A 2009 academic article by Scott details the unwritten negotiated order within indoor pools which she says involves three important guidelines: ‘respect for personal space, respect for individuals’ disciplinary regimes and the desexualisation of encounters’. However, while there are etiquette guidelines such as these for lane swimming, they are rarely explicitly conveyed, universally understood or consistent across pools. Thus, in one swimmer’s mind, another swimmer can be clearly contravening a rule whereas in the other swimmer’s mind, there is no issue at all. This clearly does not excuse aggressive assaults and pool management should be proactive in discouraging lane rage. However, as another article by Collins and Pajak shows, this is not as easy as one might expect.

Stuff, which is an independent New Zealand media site, describes how one pool in New Zealand enacted a ‘friendly lane’ with some degree of success (apologies for the cropped photo) after numerous incidents of lane rage. While this is unlikely to be the solution, it at least is a step in the right direction by acknowledging the issue.

Resources

• https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/lane-rage-its-time-to-make-a-splash-about-mens-bad-behaviour-in-the-swimming-pool-0kfs6tjxs
• https://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/national/474045/Water-rage-hits-swimming-pools
• Scott, S. (2009). ‘Reclothing the emperor: The swimming pool as a negotiated order.’ Symbolic interaction. 32 (2), 123-145. doi:10.1525/si.2009.32.2.123
• Haynes Collins & Chris Pajak (2019) The performance of swimming: disorder, difference and marginality within a publicly-accessible pool, Language and Intercultural Communication, 19:1, 64-76, DOI: 10.1080/14708477.2018.1545027