Why swimming with a Garmin 920xt is not good for your swimming

Before you get all twitchy on me and say "but I have to track my yard" " I need to know how far I went" " I want my swims on Strava" please listen to this....

IMHO Garmin's are ideal for OW swimming to track distance, pace and see how straight you swim.

Yesterday I swam 10k in the pool with my garmin.  Trying to manage the stop/start button was a challenge.  If Garmin had auto pause that I would say go for it, just be careful of your lane mates with that big watch swinging on your hand. 

I did 2k warm up - garmin is perfect for that.  Then Masters swim started and we are doing 50's, 75's, 100's, 150's, 200's and 300's on varied intervals.  On the B+5 or 10 it is manageable to stop and start each time you hit the all, as  long as you remember (which I did not) but I assume it becomes a habit.  

the original pace clock.  you can use this
for intervals.  the black hand is the minutes
on the hour.

BUT on a set on your B (base interval)  it is nearly impossible to do this if you are coming in with 1-2 seconds rest.  Instead of reaching for the wall, catching your breath and pushing off I was stressed about stopping and starting the watch.  I than decided that with such a tight interval there was no need to stop it.   

But the focus was on the watch and not on the workout.   

1- following the workout given is what the workout is 
2- logging the yards is for your sake or training peaks - if you are off a few yards in writing no big deal

digital clocks make it SO easy

3-  USE THE PACE clock for sets given to you by your coach. if you have 10x100 @ B (base)  and she asks to record times-   you should be able to remember the times - give or take.  The idea is did you make the interval?  Next time you do 5x100 on b-5 and than you are focused and working on making the interval not the clock.

As Coach Hux noted one day.... "I don't see any big watches in lane 1/2/3"   just sayin....

I challenge you to use the pace clock!  Understand you can keep track of distance using the clock.