Colonies Zone SCY Championships - Fairfax VA

To answer Jeff's questions. Yes, I do realize this is more restrictive than nationals. Nationals has a qualifying time and more time to run the event. I think the majority of the submitted times can be verified from the national database. I have not thought through how to verify others, but if the meet director decides to try this, I will volunteer to assist in verifying times. I am going to make a suggestion and I don't know if it will do any good but in the Michigan LMSC we have experienced this and had to make changes to accommodate all of the swimmers. We allow any swimmer to swim the 1000 and 1650 Free and we do not cap the entries at this time. We had 90 swimmers swim the 1650, about 110 in the 1000, and about 133 in the 500 Free. Those events are offered on 3 separate days and if they weren't we would not able to do this. I looked at the entry for George Mason and they are using the pool as much as they can so there is no suggested improvement there. I noticed that the meet on Saturday and Sunday gets done between 2:30 PM and 3:00 PM and that seems a little early In Michigan we go until 6:00 on Saturday and between 5 and 6 on Sunday. This year we are in a 10 lane pool and start at 1:00 for the Friday session We will run an early session starting at 2:00 and have until 5:00 and then a second warm up starts then and then have a 6:00 session for people that can't make the early session. We will hope to finish up at 8:00 PM and have gone until 9:00 PM but this is the first year we have had a session earlier than 4:00 PM. I have been the Meet Director 11 times and this year will be my 12 year and I have learned something new every year. Betsy idea of verifying times is something I always do and its easy for me because I know most of the swimmers swimming and there capabilities and have past meet results and the USMS National Data Base to check entry times for accuracy and for the sand baggers. I have changed many entry times because of this and the USMS Rule Book allows me to do this. In past years this has saved huge amounts of time. If someone does not have an entry time in the event for the last two years, they can swim the event in the warm up pool. During the distance events when warm up is over we run an additional 8 lanes with stop watches if we have to meet the time line. Usually we only use 4 lanes and this year we will have additional timing pads in 4 lanes with 4 lanes manual. We only do this for the distance events (500, 1000, and the 1650) and all of the other events are swam in a 10 lane course and we start at 9:00 and end at 5 or 6 with a break of 2 hours at mid day on Saturday. The one thing we do not offer is the 3 long relays of the 400 Free, 400 Medley, and 800 Free. And depending on how long those take could make it impossible for any changes to be made to the current format. Its a lot of extra work getting timers and making accommodations for the distance swimmers but to me its worth it. A lot of our triathletes will not swim in the meet unless they can swim those distance events and when they are swimming 3 days they will swim other events plus relays to get there moneys worth. We have about 50% of our LMSC participate in our State Championship meet and we have found in the last 5 years that swimmers want to swim distance events and so we try to think of ways to best service this and keep the entries up. I will provide a link to the 2012 meet and you can see the statics at the bottom of the page on the Michigan Masters website. www.michiganmasters.com/

Has anyone suggested that Cheryl did anything wrong? She is an outstanding meet director and did send out a first come first serve email notice to those swimming the distance events the prior year. I think the disappointment is directed at Team Z for snatching all the spots and only participating in the meet one day. They are essentially using a Zones Meet for their own Distance Meet. I share Neill's concern about it causing people not to swim on Sat & Sun. As it is, the women's events go more quickly than the men's events and, for a Zones meet, they run about the same length as an in season local meet. (From my POV, this already short duration makes Zones a poor choice for a taper meet.) Nope, it is all geared at Team Z. Cheryl runs a good meet and goes the extra mile to submit times to the SWIMS Database for USAS swimmers. Several DV swimmers aren't coming now. I am sure that there will still be a good contingent for Sat. and Sun. Maybe the 400IM, 200 fly, 500 free might have less swimmers than previous years.

I think that "regular swimmers" at USMS bash triathletes way too much. Definitely. This discussion is becoming exactly that. Look, I'm not that excited that this situation happened. I, like many, have selfish reasons to want to swim that night. But the reality is that we probably have 100 or so people swimming what could be their first meet. That is a huge number! Where else are we getting 100 brand new swimmers in one event? It is something we should be encouraging. If you feel yourself shaking right now, I think you're experiencing a Paradigm Shift.

At a local meet, I would welcome 100 or so people swimming their first meet. At a championship meet, with limited space, I think it is a different story. No need to argue, we won't agree, but I had to state my opinion.

The 1650 & 1000 event entries lock out for the CZ Zone SCY Championship was unexpected as well as obviously very irritating to the locked out USMS swimmers specifically preparing for those events at this meet. Team Z affiliated registered USMS swimmers, however the mass entry initiative was intended, did what was allowed, so should not be "blamed". There is no easy way out of this, but to accept that it slipped through and is more a "no fault" issue. The focus now should be to learn from it towards improving entry criteria and protocol according to event competition level and facility capacity. Many constructive ideas are being provided indicating that the discussion can facilitate several possible win/win strategies to implement. For now, the meet director is obligated to manage the event as best possible under the current relevant USMS policies and terms of sanction. Hopefully the issue will not be blown out of proportion.

If you feel yourself shaking right now, I think you're experiencing a Paradigm Shift. New paradigm: East coast Zones meet becomes local meet and distance events are swum by triathletes who likely don't give a rats ass about their times and are just swimming for "practice." Because there are only X number of spaces and this is a champs meet, time standards seem more fair than "first come first serve." Wookiee, I'm sure it's a pool availability issue. Not sure if GMUP can't get the pool longer on Sat and Sun or if the rent/CZ entry fees would increase.

The CZ meet is one of the best one meets in the country. I thoughly enjoyed my meet there a few years ago. I don't really see where Team Z members did anything wrong. They have to be usms members to regrister for the meet. So what if they a group decision to sign-up when the entry went live? They wanted to race those events and didn't wait until the last minute to get a spot. If the 1000/1650 are that popular, could the distance events be run on the Saturday/Sunday before the shorter events? Or run some the shorter events on Friday, to see about making more room for the distance folk on Saturday?

Now as a sprinter swimming unpopular events, I am exiting the discussion! Nice to see a distance person sticking up and helping out her distance friends...well, other than sticking the counting boards in the water for us (which is what sprinters are useful for) :bolt:

Nice to see a distance person sticking up and helping out her distance friends...well, other than sticking the counting boards in the water for us (which is what sprinters are useful for) :bolt: Since none of my friends can swim any distance events, no need for me to count!

A little off topic but having swam,run 5k's to marathons and biked a lot (but only 2 races, long time ago) I was really never interested in triathlons because I felt they missed the boat by not having the swim leg last.