Dave Concannon

It is not the critic who counts;
not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles,
or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly;
who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming;
but who does actually strive to do the deeds;
who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;
who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement,
and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

- Theodore Roosevelt

When people ask me what my parents-in-law-to-be do for a living, I usually just say that they “Build Pools”. In terms of understatement, that description almost borders on insulting. Their company Natare (@NatareCorp) just finished creating the most impressive pool I’ve ever seen.  This pool is three times the size of an Olympic pool, 55 stories high, and spans three towers.  The engineering complexity of such a project is staggering; the pool joints have to handle stretching, compression, and torsion and the pool itself is designed to prevents waves forming – something that could be catastrophic in a pool like this.

The bigger story is in the company itself – 35 years ago it was a small company selling pool supplies! Through their ambition and focus they’ve grown to become the world’s premier supplier of aquatic facilities, water features, and movable bulkheads – having invented most of the techniques and systems themselves along the way. They’re the two hardest working people I’ve ever met, and lovely to boot. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves:

Natare's Infinity Pool on top of the Marina Bay Sands, Singapore - Nice View!

No, I can't get you a room

The Marina Bay Sands Hotel, Singapore