I'm upset. Here's what happened: today was my first time at the Olympic-length swimming pool in the city I've just moved to. I am very keen on my swimming, as I've been working really hard to lose weight, and swimming has been a large part of that effort (I am not exactly overweight, but I am very tall, and a chubby tall person is a really bad look). So I went to the new pool today for the first time, quite nervous, as by dint of my height, I find it hard to share the lane with other people, and so I'm constantly having to veer away from other swimmers so as not to 'nick' them, or they me, as we pass each other. I was doing well, ten laps in and having successfully avoided any 'collisions'. I was in the medium lane, and I was going at exactly the same speed as all the other swimmers - except for one. There was this lady, all decked out in swimming cap and goggles, looking very serious indeed about her swimming. She was going SO much faster than everybody else - in fact, she was clearly going faster than even the swimmers in the adjacent Fast Lane! Why wasn't she in her proper lane?? But that's not the problem; on every lap, she would come up behind the swimmer she was following, and pass them - fair enough. But she did this to me a few times, too, and every time it happened, I would first feel an angry 'swipe' against my foot as she came up behind me. She was wearing goggles, for crying out loud; she could SEE where I was, and yet she still went to the trouble of hitting me. Then, when she went to pass me, she wouldn't even move over properly; rather, she would push me out of the way, and pass me IN MY LANE, so that I was shunted right into the barrier. At the end of one lap, we both happened to reach the end of the lane at the same time. She spun around angrily and glared at me, then hissed, "F**k!" very loudly, to demonstrate her 'exasperation', and swam off. Now, I'm usually a non-confrontational person, being quite shy - not least of all by virtue of my height and bulkiness. But I was so enraged at this, at her audacity to infer that WE, the other swimmers, were out of order, that I left the pool to go and get changed, and resolved to report her to the pool staff after I was dressed - possibly calling on a few of the other swimmers to back me up. Alas, she had disappeared by the time I came back to the pool. What should I have done? Anyone else had an experience with an abbrasive swimming pool patron? And can anyone PLEASE say something to make me feel better about this, because it reduced me to tears of frustration?!?!
Thank you all for your answers. I'll just point out the following, in response to one of the comments: I was swimming in a straight line, keeping to my side of the lane, etc. My mention of 'collisions' was in reference to what I said about sometimes accidentally 'nicking' someone with my fingers as I have long arms, and since I swim breastroke style, sometimes if I'm not careful, my fingers come into contact with the swimmer passing me in the opposite direction. I didn't mean actual 'collisions' where I would veer off course and into the other person's path!! I'm a competent swimmer; I'm not a champion at it but I don't have problems with basic things like that. Re not seeing potential swimmers coming towards us who the lady could have been avoiding: I swim breastroke style, as I said, where I duck my head under water with each stroke and then come up for breath; so I could clearly see that the lane in front of us was empty. I agree w