Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Lazy River Speed Runs

Took the wolf pack to Great Wolf Lodge last weekend for our annual winter swim vacation. Good times had by all. Before the trip I started thinking what data I could collect and measure during the trip. I settled on Lazy River Lap times, mainly because the data collection would not take a whole lot of effort and not impede the vacation time too much.

I captured 30 laps in the Lazy River. I figure we completed around 50 laps total so a good sample from each vacation day was captured. Here are all 30 laps charted:


Average: 1:33.19
Max: 3:32.56
Min: 52.46
Std Dev: 31.46

Runs 12 and 13 were actually laps that I took in a tube letting the current do the work. Interesting that one lap took me 3 minutes and 32 seconds in the tube, while Lap 13 only took 2 minutes and 23 seconds in the tube. Run 12 I must have been behind some loafers with a blatant disregard of good Lazy River lap times. Sheesh people.

I removed Run 12 and 13 in the chart below. This chart shows the laps where I was either swimming, walking, or a combo of both.


Average: 1:27.13
Max: 2:28.77
Min: 52.46
Std Dev: 20.59

The distance information about the Lazy River is not on the web site. After a quick chat with an online rep, they gave me the number to the local location to ask them. After about 4 rounds of sitting on hold waiting for someone to pick up, I finally talked to a nice lady who was a bit puzzled by my request. She did however ask around for an answer. She finally came back to the phone and gave me a guesstimate of 50 yards. I am not sure how accurate that is but it is really all I have to go on at the moment.

Using the rough estimate on distance (150 feet) I came up with the following info.


  • Average Feet Per Second: 1.7241
  • Average Miles Per Hour: 1.17555
  • Laps per Mile: 35.2
  • Miles Traveled: 0.852
So there you have it. Lazy River Speed Runs 2014. There are a lot of variables here including loafers, number of kids hanging off of me, water temps, overall exhaustion level, etc. Its another data set to consume none the less.


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