Lapping it up: Columbia Falls woman logs 50 miles in city pool

By the time you read this story Carolynn Moritz will have swum 50 miles in the Pinewood Park this summer. Catching up with her at the Columbia Falls city pool, she figured she would likely wrap up the effort this week.

Moritz is 78, but has the energy of someone half her age, maybe quite a bit more. Ask the teenage lifeguards watching her if they would consider swimming 50 miles in a summer and the answer is a unanimous “no.”

But Moritz is a staple at the pool come lunchtime, when other long-distance swimmers gather at the facility to do lap swims. Moritz has been swimming since age 6. Her father was in the Air Force.

“Every base had a pool,” she recalled.

She swam competitively in her youth and went on to teach swimming. She worked as a lifeguard, a water aerobics instructor and even coached synchronized swimming in Kalispell.

She did the Long Bridge swim a few years ago with her daughter and grandson, it’s just under 2 miles along a bridge in Sandpoint, Idaho.

“It was a big challenge,” she said. “But very, very fun.”

At the Pinewood pool, the swimming is a bit easier, and warmer (a wetsuit is required to do the bridge swim, even in August). It takes her about 42 minutes to swim a mile, as the pool is 25 meters long.

“That pool is so nice, what a blessing,” she said. “It’s a great place to swim.”

She alternates strokes, sometimes freestyle, sometimes backstroke. Backstroke is easier, but freestyle is faster.

Moritz is an artist and fashion designer by trade. Her mother, Caroline Michels, had a master’s degree in museology (those with the degree design displays at museums) and the two worked together, traveling the United States and going  overseas to sell clothing to women as far away as China.

Moritz’s husband, Chris, is a gifted landscape architect, but he was also good at pricing and helped with the fashion business as well through the decades.

They spent 30 years living in Bigfork, but moved to Columbia Falls a few years ago.

They have five children and seven grandchildren.

Moritz is happy in the pool and wishes it was open longer. It closes in mid-August, as the city can’t find enough staff once school athletics start and the lifeguards start fall sports.

“I was born and raised in chlorine,” she said with a laugh.

    Carolynn Moritz swims in the Columbia Falls city pool. (Chris Peterson/Hungry Horse News)
  

    Carolynn Moritz at the Columbia Falls city pool. (Chris Peterson/Hungry Horse News)