Who would want to be a professional swimmer?

Seriously now, why would you want to put yourself through endless hours of training each day under the guidance of coaches who make the Marquis de Sade look soft around the edges and with the ultimate goals being the World Championships, which are separated by a whopping two years, and the Olympics by a career-crushing four?

Then there's the laps and laps and even more laps.

Sure long-distance runners and road cyclists put in the hard miles too, but at least they have something to look at as their hearts and lungs feel like bursting.

The swimmer? Well, he or she gets a glorious view of the little line at the bottom of the lane or, when coming up to suck some oxygen, the panoramic sides of the pool.

Then there are the events that most "splashers" have to compete and excel in to gain fleeting worlds or Olympic glory - if they can get to those lofty stages.

The people who invented the backstroke, breaststroke or butterfly either had rather warped senses of humor or just simply hated humanity in general.

The backstroke, yeah, any two-year-old can master that, but the "breast and butter"! C'mon now!

Oh, and don't get me started on all these new 50-meter races that have infiltrated international swimming pools and meets like chlorine gone bad.

If I ever have the misfortune to attend a 50m freestyle race, I will take my washing powder and dirty clothes and toss them in when the beeper blows or the starter's gun pops. All that thrashing and splashing would give you a clean you couldn't dream.

And what about the payback for all those merciless, tedious, mind-numbing and body-sapping hours in the pool? Sure, if you are a Michael Phelps and win a mere 14 Olympic gold medals you're not going to be too short of cash, and his compatriot Ryan Lochte, who has scorched the Shanghai pool at the worlds, is poised to make more than a few greenbacks, too - although he might want to be paid by his coming endorsers and sponsors in euros or, at least, Aussie dollars.

The bottom line is that you have to be a really big fish to make any sort of decent dosh from the pond.

I suppose passion is passion and to be the world's best, or at least among them, is motivation enough for some.

But I still really don't get it. I come from the biggest island in the world and all of its major cities are sprinkled along the coastline, "like jewels in the sand", some person of poetic inclinations once wrote.

I have the buoyancy of lead, but most of my compatriots take to the water like manic seals when the summer sun shines it's just what you do down there.

Funny thing is, I want my little son, who is a year and a half and lives on another island - Jamaica, to learn to swim soon; ostensibly for survival purposes.

Even funnier though, I have recently been dreaming of him winning World Championship or Olympic gold medals for Australia or Jamaica either, I don't care.

Maybe those ultra-determined swimmers aren't mad after all.

Maybe it's the rest of the world and over-ambitious parents? Nah!

Tym Glaser is a sports copy editor who likes sandy beaches, but the sea - not so much. He can be contacted at tymglaser@hotmail.com.

(China Daily 07/31/2011 page8)