Colonies Zone SCY Championships - Fairfax VA

Here's my take on the subject (a note, though--I have absolutely zero interest in ever swimming the 1000 or 1650 ever again after my USAS coach making me swim the 1000 in pretty much every meet throughout high school, so none of this personally affects me): Yes, Team Z did follow the rules. I still consider it to be highly unethical. Yes, the entry procedures are first come, first serve. But, given that we are ~2.5 months out from the meet, does anyone have any reasonable expectation that they'd need to register within the first hour or two to make it into the distance events, especially when there are 80 slots for the 1000 and 48 for the 1650? One of my teammates signed up for the 1000 about 2 weeks before Zones last year and got in. There are plenty of meets in the area that offer the 1000 and/or the mile during the season, and I can't recall any of them filling up remotely near that quickly. I know plenty of USMS swimmers do wait till the last second to register for meets (I've done it myself a few times), but the majority of my teammates who compete regularly do things in a timely manner. Like me, they're planning on registering for Zones by the end of the month, giving a full month and a half till the meet. Per all the meets I've participated at in the last 1.5 years as a Masters swimmer, that is normally quite sufficient for a large meet like Zones. For a team, whether it's a team primarily comprised of triathletes or us "normal" Masters swimmers, to take up over 80% of the available slots within the first few hours of entries going live for a Zone level meet seems unprofessional and disrespectful to everyone else who has no reasonable expectation that they'd need to be up at midnight on the first day of entries just to have a fair shot at entering. This is supposed to be a championship meet. I only started swimming at the Colonies Zone meet last year, so I can't speak for previous years, but I saw a LOT of very fast swims last year, as befitting a championship meet. For people to enter with NTs in space limited events or enter with ridiculously slow times again seems to be abrogating the purpose of a championship meet. I personally think that any meet with a hard limit on entries for certain events should have QTs for those events. Or potentially have a hard check on QTs for the events, and if the events aren't filled by a month or so into the entry process, then open it up to all swimmers, QTs or no. The defending female champ in the 1000 from last year's Zones was shut out from entering...because she waited a day or two after entries went live before trying to register. For an event with 80 entries, that's not an expected result. Again, for a non-championship meet, that's fine, but for a *championship* meet, why are defending champs being shut out by NT swimmers in space limited events? In addition, my team hosted a meet at the beginning of February. While we didn't offer the 1000/1650, we did offer the 500, and it was space limited. The 500 stayed open for about 3-4 weeks, I believe, till it filled up, about 2.5 weeks before the meet. That's been my experience with all space limited events up until the current situation with Zones. And in regards to the argument that Zones should be open to people swimming their first meet, I think that's a specious argument when it comes to space limited events. For non-space limited events, by all means, go ahead. If these Team Z swimmers, or anyone else, want to swim the 1000/1650, there are plenty of opportunities in the VA/MD area to swim that at other meets. Just off the top of my head, there was a meet in Richmond this past weekend that offered both the 1000 and the 1650 and there's a meet at UMBC in early March that offers the 1000. If all these NT swimmers *need* to swim the 1000/1650, why not swim it at one of these meets rather than at the space limited zone championship meet? Looking forward to future Colony Zone Championship meets, here are my recommendations for handling the 1000/1650 entries: Institute QTs for the two events, and have them apply on a two year rolling window like the NQTs work for Nationals. If someone can't find the opportunity to swim the 1000/1650 in the previous two years, especially since there are other meets that offer those events, why should they swim it at a championship meet? As I mentioned before, maybe have the entries for those two events only be open to swimmers who've been verified to have swum the QT via the times database for the first month entries are open--if they don't have a time in the database, tough luck. If the events aren't filled within that first month, then open the entries up to everyone. Just my $.02...

Here's my take on the subject (a note, though--I have absolutely zero interest in ever swimming the 1000 or 1650 ever again after my USAS coach making me swim the 1000 in pretty much every meet throughout high school, so none of this personally affects me): Yes, Team Z did follow the rules. I still consider it to be highly unethical. Yes, the entry procedures are first come, first serve. But, given that we are ~2.5 months out from the meet, does anyone have any reasonable expectation that they'd need to register within the first hour or two to make it into the distance events, especially when there are 80 slots for the 1000 and 48 for the 1650? One of my teammates signed up for the 1000 about 2 weeks before Zones last year and got in. There are plenty of meets in the area that offer the 1000 and/or the mile during the season, and I can't recall any of them filling up remotely near that quickly. I know plenty of USMS swimmers do wait till the last second to register for meets (I've done it myself a few times), but the majority of my teammates who compete regularly do things in a timely manner. Like me, they're planning on registering for Zones by the end of the month, giving a full month and a half till the meet. Per all the meets I've participated at in the last 1.5 years as a Masters swimmer, that is normally quite sufficient for a large meet like Zones. For a team, whether it's a team primarily comprised of triathletes or us "normal" Masters swimmers, to take up over 80% of the available slots within the first few hours of entries going live for a Zone level meet seems unprofessional and disrespectful to everyone else who has no reasonable expectation that they'd need to be up at midnight on the first day of entries just to have a fair shot at entering. This is supposed to be a championship meet. I only started swimming at the Colonies Zone meet last year, so I can't speak for previous years, but I saw a LOT of very fast swims last year, as befitting a championship meet. For people to enter with NTs in space limited events or enter with ridiculously slow times again seems to be abrogating the purpose of a championship meet. I personally think that any meet with a hard limit on entries for certain events should have QTs for those events. Or potentially have a hard check on QTs for the events, and if the events aren't filled by a month or so into the entry process, then open it up to all swimmers, QTs or no. The defending female champ in the 1000 from last year's Zones was shut out from entering...because she waited a day or two after entries went live before trying to register. For an event with 80 entries, that's not an expected result. Again, for a non-championship meet, that's fine, but for a *championship* meet, why are defending champs being shut out by NT swimmers in space limited events? In addition, my team hosted a meet at the beginning of February. While we didn't offer the 1000/1650, we did offer the 500, and it was space limited. The 500 stayed open for about 3-4 weeks, I believe, till it filled up, about 2.5 weeks before the meet. That's been my experience with all space limited events up until the current situation with Zones. And in regards to the argument that Zones should be open to people swimming their first meet, I think that's a specious argument when it comes to space limited events. For non-space limited events, by all means, go ahead. If these Team Z swimmers, or anyone else, want to swim the 1000/1650, there are plenty of opportunities in the VA/MD area to swim that at other meets. Just off the top of my head, there was a meet in Richmond this past weekend that offered both the 1000 and the 1650 and there's a meet at UMBC in early March that offers the 1000. If all these NT swimmers *need* to swim the 1000/1650, why not swim it at one of these meets rather than at the space limited zone championship meet? Looking forward to future Colony Zone Championship meets, here are my recommendations for handling the 1000/1650 entries: Institute QTs for the two events, and have them apply on a two year rolling window like the NQTs work for Nationals. If someone can't find the opportunity to swim the 1000/1650 in the previous two years, especially since there are other meets that offer those events, why should they swim it at a championship meet? As I mentioned before, maybe have the entries for those two events only be open to swimmers who've been verified to have swum the QT via the times database for the first month entries are open--if they don't have a time in the database, tough luck. If the events aren't filled within that first month, then open the entries up to everyone. Just my $.02...