Choosing the Right Swim Goggles

Love them or hate them, there are very valid reasons why swimmers need to wear goggles. 

Firstly, goggles help you to see better under water. Basically, our eyes aren’t designed to see underwater and those of you who’ve had goggles fill up during a race will know what we mean.  Goggles make up for this human deficiency enabling us to see underwater and what’s in front of us.  This is particularly important for competitive swimmers so they can see the upcoming wall, enabling them to judge their turns.  It’s also important for triathletes so they can judge distances and avoid crashing into other open water swimmers.

Another important factor is that goggles protect your eyes from irritation that comes from whatever chemicals the swimming pool is treated with (as well as other stuff like urine, sweat, skin that finds its way into the water).

Buying Swim Goggles

There are hundreds of different types of goggles on the market and at Sharks Swim Shop we stock around 120 different types ourselves (including ones for adults, children, polarised … to name but a few).  So, with all this choice, how do you choose the right ones? There are three things you need to take into consideration before spending your hard earned cash on a pair of goggles as follows:

When you are in the market for a pair here are the 3 key considerations:

• How the goggles fit on your face: we all have different size and shape faces and as result there are inevitably many different shaped goggles out there. The goggles you choose are going to be strapped to your face, digging in and around your eyeballs, for hours at a time making fit and comfort very important.  Comfort is crucial and we recommend when buying goggles keep them on for up to 4 minutes to make sure they don’t hurt your face.
• Colour of the lens: whether you swim indoors or outdoors matters when it comes to lens colour, or even how the pool is lit. Be wary of dark-lens goggles as if they get just a bit fogged up you won’t be able see much around you. Dark or reflective lenses are great on a sunny day for keeping water and sun out of your eyes.
• Cost of goggles: if you’re swimming just for pleasure, don’t be fooled into spending a huge amount of cash on expensive goggles. Competitive swimmers however will want to invest in a top of the range pair which are durable and performance enhancing. At Sharks Swim Shop our goggles for adults start from £10 for a pair of Maru Anti Fog Goggles up to £44.99 for the Michael Phelps Xceed Titanium Mirror We’re not saying that only competitive swimmers should buy more expensive goggles, just that you don’t have to spend an arm and leg to get a good pair!

You can check out our full range of Goggles on our website or pop into our shop in Sketty and we can help  you find the right pair for optimum comfort and durability.