Swimming Pool Race

Swimming Pool Race puts you in a lane rather than on a track, and the difference shows immediately. The stroke you pick changes the whole race: breaststroke, front crawl, backstroke, butterfly and freestyle each move at their own speed and cost you differently over a long distance.

Distances run from 100 metres up to 400, and they are not the same event scaled up. A short sprint is settled almost at the dive, while the longer relays ask you to hold form when your lead has already gone. You also choose the country and the athlete you swim as, so a tournament run is a set of races you have shaped rather than a fixed programme.

How to play

Set up the race first - country, athlete, distance and stroke - because those choices decide more than anything that happens once you are in the water. Then swim, watching the lanes either side of you, since the swimmers there are working towards the same wall. Shorter races reward a clean start, while the 400 metre events come down to who still has something left at the last turn.

Controls

The race is played with the mouse on a computer, clicking the on-screen prompts as they come up, and with a tap of the finger on a phone or tablet. Your country, your athlete, the distance and the stroke are all picked from the menus before you get on the blocks.