Synchronized Swimmers Sink Snide Remarks

Today’s misadventure finds Moby Doug gasping and floundering like a harpooned manatee in the chlorinated waters of the Shadle Park High pool.

He is surrounded by a jeering gang of inhumanly fit teenage girls who hoot with great glee at Moby Doug’s love handles.

At the water’s edge is a woman who possesses all the sensitive feminine charm of Marge Schott.

Her name is Ann Murphy. She is the head coach of the Spokane Silver Mermaids, a synchronized swimming club founded in 1954.

Murphy is trying very hard to drown Moby Doug.

She orders him to swim 50 yards. Then another 25 yards underwater. She makes Moby Doug tread water for about a lunar cycle and then commands him to perform an unnatural act she calls a “split-crash.”

This, Murphy explains, is a classic synchro move where the swimmer suspends herself gracefully upside down underwater, sticks her legs in the air and then does the splits with each toe touching the water.

“The hips should be well out of the water,” barks the coach into a microphone.

Moby Doug’s hips have the buoyancy of a bridge abutment. His split-crash looks more like a fatal highway accident.

The Titanic going under was a prettier sight.

All the flailing makes Moby Doug’s heart flutter and chug as if he has suddenly traded tickers with Boris Yeltsin.

What, Moby Doug wonders aloud, would happen should cardiac arrest occur in the pool?

“Our girls have had lifeguard training,” snaps the unsympathetic Murphy.

Moby Doug is learning a valuable lesson. The polar ice caps will probably melt before he writes any more nasty things about synchronized swimming.

That’s how he got into this unholy stew.

During a recent column on pro foosball champ Laurette Gunther, he made a seemingly innocuous remark.

“If the Olympics have room for silly pursuits like synchronized swimming, can gold medal foosball be far off?”

That word “silly” scalded the Silver Mermaids, three of whom stormed into the newspaper last week to read an official dare:

“Whereas synchronized swimmers have the endurance of long-distance swimmers, the agility and strength of gymnasts and the grace and poise of dancers …

“The athletes seek to challenge you to join us in the water for a workout and demonstration.”

So Sunday night, Moby Doug leaves his family to go take his lumps.

Four times a week, the 34 rock-hard girls swim 1,000 to 2,000 yards. They learn to hold their breath for a minute at a time while practicing complicated, precise naval maneuvers.

Kicking their legs in a weird egg-beater motion, they can keep their upper bodies well above the water line for up to five minutes.

The girls roar with laughter when Moby Doug shows up wearing swim fins, a snorkel and mask.

“You can’t wear that stuff!” they holler.

What sweet little angels, these synchronized swimmers.

Somehow, Moby Doug survives the humiliating evening. In appreciation, the Silver Mermaids present him with an autographed stadium cushion.

This is an extremely appropriate gift, considering how thoroughly the Silver Mermaids have kicked Moby Doug’s ample butt.

“So-oh Mr. Clark,” says 15-year-old Mead High sophomore Beth Moore in the sing-songy sneer of victory, “do you still think synchronized swimming is silly?”

“Only when I do it,” says Moby Doug, dripping a watery trail as he slinks to the locker room.

It could have been worse, Moby Doug tries to tell himself. He could have hacked off the local karate club.

, DataTimes