Colonies Zone SCY Championships - Fairfax VA

I still fail to see what the members of Team Z did that is so wrong here. Possibly most anger is for the coach(es)/organizer(s) who urged the members to sign up, not realizing or caring that with such a large group everyone else would be closed out. Yes they are USMS members but I don't think the TeamZ people will actually integrate much with the other participants since it seems most are swimming the one event on Friday and then skipping the rest of the meet. This is compounded by their apparent unwillingness to ever organize such events themselves, which would also contribute to the local masters swimming community and might have helped avoid the situation. It's a Tragedy of the Commons kind of thing, with the Team Z group taking from the community and giving little in return beyond membership and entry fees. So viewed in that context, and with the anger of the people closed out of the event, it is natural that an us versus them mentality develops. While we need to look closely at solutions for future meets, integration and communication of triathletes and non-triathletes should also be on the table. Otherwise this sort of thing turns into an question of how to exclude the "wrong people" from zones in the future, and that's not good. But I have to say, if TeamZ continues to be (essentially) only takers and not givers, then that is exactly what will happen. I view triathletes very favorably, but if this sort of thing happens at LCM zones then it will probably cost VMST a significant amount of money.

I still fail to see what the members of Team Z did that is so wrong here. Possibly most anger is for the coach(es)/organizer(s) who urged the members to sign up, not realizing or caring that with such a large group everyone else would be closed out. Yes they are USMS members but I don't think the TeamZ people will actually integrate much with the other participants since it seems most are swimming the one event on Friday and then skipping the rest of the meet. This is compounded by their apparent unwillingness to ever organize such events themselves, which would also contribute to the local masters swimming community and might have helped avoid the situation. It's a Tragedy of the Commons kind of thing, with the Team Z group taking from the community and giving little in return beyond membership and entry fees. So viewed in that context, and with the anger of the people closed out of the event, it is natural that an us versus them mentality develops. While we need to look closely at solutions for future meets, integration and communication of triathletes and non-triathletes should also be on the table. Otherwise this sort of thing turns into an question of how to exclude the "wrong people" from zones in the future, and that's not good. But I have to say, if TeamZ continues to be (essentially) only takers and not givers, then that is exactly what will happen. I view triathletes very favorably, but if this sort of thing happens at LCM zones then it will probably cost VMST a significant amount of money.