Pool Events - Recent Threads

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 22:47:36 GMT

A new feature by request: Nationals Event Picker.

The Nationals Event Picker helps you select events to register for at Summer or Spring Nationals, recommended based on your likelihood of earning a Top 10 medal, using data from the last three years of Nationals.

Go to https://www.tryopenlane.com/ -> Enter your USMS ID or your profile (if you have an account and have saved it) -> Nationals Event Picker tab.

On the Nationals Event Picker page, you can add various filters, including LCM/SCY events, specify the maximum number of events, compare your times by age group (useful for those moving up), and compare different types of personal best times (default shows all of your events with your personal bests that you've swum in the last two years). For the LCM Summer Nationals, you can select the days you'll attend the 2026 USMS Nationals in Sacramento, and it will recommend events corresponding to those days.

Events are shown with the following labels:

Highly Likely:
Less than 10 swimmers in your age group swam these events at Nationals in at least 2 of the last 3 years. Finish legally, and you will likely score in the Top 10'

Likely:
Your time is better than the 10th place finishers at Nationals from the last 3 years

Stretch:
Your time sits between recent 10th-place cuts. Some years you're in the 10th-place cut; some years you're out.

Long Shot:
Your time is much slower than every recent 10th place.

For example, I'll attend the 2026 USMS Nationals on Thursday and Saturday, and my profile recommends 200 breast and 400 free, since 10 swimmers or fewer typically swim them, and I have swum them at least once in the past two years. It recommends the 50 free, but also advises me that, based on my personal best in the last two years, it's a long shot for me to get into the Top 10!

The descriptions provide me with data on how many swimmers have swum them in the past three Summer Nationals and, if more than 10 swimmers register, how far away I am from the typical Top 10 cut.

Any feedback is welcome!

P.S. It's a bummer that many mid-distance and distance events are currently capped for the 2026 Summer Nationals, but don't be afraid to add yourself to a waitlist for an event that you'll highly likely medal in.

USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Sat, 18 Apr 2026 21:08:08 GMT

I recently built this website that lets Masters Swimmers enter their Swimmer ID and view analytics of their progression with meet times: https://www.tryopenlane.com/. Think of it as a minimal Swimcloud for US Masters Swimming!

For example, if your USMS ID number is 456B-MZ99C, enter only the last five digits after the dash, which is your Swimmer ID. into the app. Here's my profile on the app in case anyone no longer has an active ID: https://www.tryopenlane.com/?swimmerID=MZ99C.

I built this to easily find my overall personal best times and PBs within my age group (as I get older and can't hit my previous PBs). Any feedback would be appreciated!

I am a swimmer from the Pacific Northwest LMSC. I learned to swim three years ago and went to my first meet six months after learning! I love the energy of meets.

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Tue, 30 Jun 2026 05:15:29 GMT

Hello all! I wanted to give another update on Openlane since last month!

Over 250 USMS swimmers have analyzed their results, accounting for nearly 2% of unique USMS swimmers who've competed in meets this year. A huge thank you for your support!

Here are a few feature updates based on various conversations with swimmers and LMSCs, and Masters swimmers abroad as well:

Open to anyone, no matter if they have a USMS ID:

1. Percentile-based Motivational Times - times based on the event ranking of the season best for each USMS swimmer in each age group during the 2024-2025 season. Some of you very competitive ones wanted to achieve a time within the top 2-55% of real times at meets (you guys are fast!).

2. Swimming Time Converter - We've heard that the swimswam.com time converter linked to Club Assistant can be improved. This converter allows you to enter your USMS ID and get an SCY, SCM, LCM conversion for your personal best times, age-group personal bests, or based on the time that you last swum in that event. If you are not a USMS member, you can still enter multiple swim times at once and save them.

3. Compare with USMS Top 10 - See the trends of the USMS Top 10 or how a swim time stacks up against every year of USMS Top 10 ranges. This is for anyone who wants to strive for a Top 10 finish in USMS!

4. Legendary Sets - list of famous workouts and sets by famous Olympic coaches and athletes. I think we should collect famous workouts and sets by famous Masters coaches and athletes!

For those who are going to their Openlane swimmer profile by searching using their ID:

5. All Race Results tab - The All Race Results tab is their full USMS Individual Results page with helpful filters which allow you to organize meet results such as by meet, event, age group, course, etc.

Here's an example of mine:

6. The Swimmers to Follow section on the main page suggests other swimmers whom you should aspire to and swimmers who've accomplished similar times in your best event. It shows accomplished swimmers in 2–3 age groups ahead that you should aspire to become and swimmers who matched your speed in your best event this season in your gender and age group for the 2025–2026 SCY season.

Here's an example of mine:

For those who are not USMS swimmers, they can use the Find Swimmers like you page to input their age, gender, time in one event (and optionally, their goal), and see where they would rank amongst USMS swimmers and which USMS swimmers have the most similar times to them, swimmers that have already accomplished their goal, and who they should aspire to.

Painpoints with seed times and converting times

Jennifer Tran — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 16:51:27 GMT

I've recently received a request to look into pain points related to entering seed times and converting course times during meet registration.

A few pain points I've gathered:

Currently, Club Assistant links to the SwimSwam Time Converter at the top of the meet registration page, where you input your seed times. I've personally been locked out of an extremely popular meet that a swimmer limit (2025 EBSC Love to Swim in Vancouver, BC. Yes, not USMS though!) because I couldn't convert my SCY times to SCM quickly enough using the SwimSwam Time Converter.
- The Time Converter only allows converting one event at a time. The converter does not save any previously input times.
- The Time Converter is not connected to any USMS meet data. Swimmers need to cross-reference their USMS meet times and manually enter them.
Currently, Club Assistant allows quick entry of the last previously swum time. This is challenging for swimmers who might have taken major breaks since they last swam the event or are not in as good shape. I'm still learning, like to challenge myself, and always use my personal best times as seed times, but most teammates find that it causes too much pressure and adds a few seconds to their seed times. Would it be valuable to choose from a list of previously swum times instead of just one? Or the ability to add x speed percent to your previously swum time or personal best times?

Anything else that I'm missing?

Here is a first pass at a new time converter that allows anyone to:

1. input multiple times

2. input their USMS ID (last five digits), and then get a SCY, LCM, and SCM conversion of their all-time personal best, current age-group personal best, and last swum time in the event. The open question here is what else would be helpful - any other previous times? Adding x speed percent? Or another suggestion?

Shoutout to Emily Lederman of Puget Sound Masters (@HJUF1) and the ORCA team for the request!

Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Jennifer Tran — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 23:43:20 GMT

For those who are interested in the USMS Top trends and want to estimate whether their target time will make it into a USMS Top 10 by event and age group, I created this tool: https://www.tryopenlane.com/compare-with-top-10.

It shows the historical ranges of USMS Top 10 by event, age group, and gender in one neat graph, compares them to the Percentile-Based Motivational Times, and lets you add your target time to see where it lands!

Here's an example:

I found USMS Top 10s during COVID were crazy, and some events (like the 500 SCY free in the 18-24 age group), you could have a non-NQT time and still make a USMS Top 10. Who was even hosting meets during then?!?!?

Any feedback is welcome!

RE: Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Karl_S — Sat, 06 Jun 2026 21:40:46 GMT

I suppose the woman who swam that 1:43 in 2010 was super-suited, but still, that's crazy fast!

RE: Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Jennifer Tran — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 16:09:32 GMT

Thank you, Elaine, for all of the support! I came up with this one after looking into streamlining getting USMS Top 10 results for another swimmer :)

RE: Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Jennifer Tran — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 16:08:49 GMT

Ah, yes, the 2019-2020 season starts technically in June 2019! That's crazy, I wish that I were swimming back then!

RE: Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Elaine Krugman — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 15:56:08 GMT

Thanks, Jennifer, for continuing to create useful tools for us swimmers! Although this particular tool doesn't apply to me, I can see how it would be great for faster swimmers!

RE: Comparing USMS Top 10 Ranges

Allen Stark — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 01:51:43 GMT

For 2020 if you swam an event before the end of March you could Top Top 10

I didn’t and it was the first year since 1978 that I didn’t Top Ten

RE: 2026 Motivational Times

Jennifer Tran — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 07:41:53 GMT

Both 2026 (Unofficial) USMS Percentile-based Motivational Times and USMS Motivational Times are now easy to view on mobile.

2026 Motivational Times

Jennifer Tran — Wed, 27 May 2026 18:38:00 GMT

2026 (Unofficial) USMS Percentile-based Motivational Times: https://tryopenlane.com/percentile-times

2026 (Unofficial) USMS Motivational Times: https://tryopenlane.com/motivational-times

I've calculated Motivational Times based on two different formulas:

1. Percentile-based Motivational Times are based on the percentile ranking of the personal best time of each USMS swimmer who swam the event in the same age group and gender (also known as Event Ranking) in the 2024-2025 season for SCY, and 2025 season for LCM and SCM: https://www.tryopenlane.com/percentile-times:

AAAA - overall top 2%

AAA - top 6%

AA - top 8%

A - top 15%

BB - top 35%

B - top 55%

2. USMS Motivational Times are based on the criteria USMS last used in 2024, which are 2026 NQTs with a flat percentage added to each standard:

AAAA - 2026 NQTs

AAA - 5% slower than AAAA

AA - 10% slower

A - 14% slower

BB - 24% slower

B - 33% slower

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Mon, 25 May 2026 18:41:15 GMT

Hello all! I wanted to give an update on the site! You can still access https://www.usmsdata.org, but we also have a branded site at https://www.tryopenlane.com/ to make it more appealing to swimmers who are not as familiar with USMS (but should certainly join our community).

A few updates have been made:

1. Race Quest - shows which events you've raced and what you haven't. You can see if you have raced all of the possible events in Freestyle, Butterfly, Breaststroke, Individual Medley, Backstroke, SCY, SCM, LCM, and overall.

Here's an example from Rick Colella, 1976 Olympic Medalist in the 200m breaststroke and a fellow Puget Sound Masters teammate of ours. It looks like he's aiming for racing a Grand Slam (all possible events).

2. 2026 USMS Motivational Times - based on the 2026 NQTs and the formula that USMS used l last time that they made all motivational times in 2024.

This was a special request made in this forum post, and we were happy to create it! You can also see the Motivational Times comparison in the NQT comparison table.

3. Recent Meets Raced on the first page - When a meet has been added to the Event Dashboard, you will then be able to compare it to your Personal Best (overall), Personal Best (current age group), Last meet, and Last time the event was swam.

Here's an example of mine at PNA Champs (Pacific Northwest Regionals!) in April.

4. NQT Dashboard now includes:

a. A quick overview of which events you've hit an NQT, events that you haven't qualified for, and events you've raced but not within two years (in order to have a valid NQT, you must have raced that time in the last two years).

Here's an example from my profile: https://www.tryopenlane.com/?swimmerID=005RJ&tab=nqt-compare&panel=status-needstime

b. Events where you're close to qualifying in:

c. World Masters Aquatics Championships Entry Compare for those who are aiming to swim at that (their time requirements are definitely less than USMS Nationals, though).

Thank you all for the feedback, and please keep them coming!

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Elaine Krugman — Fri, 22 May 2026 21:31:42 GMT

I received your message, but I was unable to get my response through due to your settings that you are not receiving messages. Please email me at: GAEditor@USMS.org, so I can respond to you via email. Thanks!

Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Elaine Krugman — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 21:57:03 GMT

I would love to see an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters swimmers. Does anybody out there have a more recent one? Thanks!

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Jennifer Tran — Thu, 21 May 2026 16:38:05 GMT

Of course! It was cool to understand the math behind it, and I'm glad that it's helpful to you! Remind me to do the 2027 one when 2027 NQTs are out :)

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Elaine Krugman — Thu, 21 May 2026 15:43:28 GMT

AWESOME, Jennifer! I am grateful to you for doing this! THANK YOU VERY MUCH! The Motivational Times chart is just what I wanted and I appreciate you taking the time to do it.

The profile was interesting to see, so thank you for that as well.

Cheers!

Elaine

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Jennifer Tran — Thu, 21 May 2026 04:33:30 GMT

Thank you for sharing this! I reviewed the 2024 Motivational Times and confirmed that it calculates the times based on 2024 NQTs and used this formula to apply the standards:

1. AAAA = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * Factor / 100)

2. AAA = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * 2 * Factor / 100)

3. AA = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * 3 * Factor / 100)

4. A = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * 4 * Factor / 100)

5. BB = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * 6 * Factor / 100)

6. B = Seed Time + (Seed Time * Adjustment * 8 * Factor / 100)

I applied the same formula to the 2026 NQTs to create these 2026 Motivational Times (for both SCY and LCM) on my website: https://www.tryopenlane.com/motivational-times

You can also download the PDF on the website using the Download PDF button.

Please let me know if you need anything else - I can also add filters so it's easier for you to filter through your age, for example.

I work on a lot of analytics tools for swimmers and wonder if it makes sense for me to add it to my main analytics website as well - for example, here's your profile: www.tryopenlane.com/

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Elaine Krugman — Wed, 13 May 2026 21:25:25 GMT

I just checked out swimminglevel.com and it is not helpful for me, because it is only for freestyle. I do not compete in any freestyle events, so I need it for the other strokes and IM.

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Elaine Krugman — Wed, 13 May 2026 15:40:04 GMT

Thanks for your response, Jennifer! I appreciate your like to swimminglevel.com . I was unfamiliar with this site and will check it out. I am very familiar with NQT's, but they are out of reach for me anymore. The last time I made them was in 2013 for all three breaststroke events, but two hip surgeries later, I have never been able to reach them again. I can relate more to the typical scenario you outlined.

The last time one was created (by another Masters swimmer) was a 2024 SCY chart, and I am still using it today, because it's all I have. Prior to that one, another Forumite, "Swimosaur" (from the old Discussion Forums) had created Motivational Times Charts. Not knowing how they were done, I am unable to create my own.

If you know how to create one, I would LOVE IT! Here is the one from 2024:

/cfs-file/__key/communityserver-discussions-components-files/1242/2024-USMS-Motivational-Swim-Times.pdf

RE: Has anybody created an updated Motivational Times Chart for Masters Swimmers?

Jennifer Tran — Tue, 12 May 2026 18:29:12 GMT

I think NQTs are the closest to what we have in Motivational Times, as they are the top 10 times + 10-15%: https://www.usms.org/events/national-championships/pool-national-championships/national-qualifying-times.

When I first started, I used to reference this Swimming Levels site, which provides times for distances by age and experience level: https://swimminglevel.com/swimming-times. However, they do not have a source. What do you think about this?

I would love a Motivational Times Chart! One way is to take times from the Event Ranking and create B, BB, A, AA, AAA, AAAA motivational standards based on percentiles: https://www.usms.org/comp/meets/toptimes.php. What do you think about this?

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 14:43:31 GMT

Thank you for feedback and kind words. It’s super helpful to get feedback.

I will think about adding splits. It can be done but is slightly more technically complicated.

It would be easier to implement when USMS provides API access to its data.

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

3URXX — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 12:04:16 GMT

I like the graphic display of events swam. I have always been a marh geek, and graphs are so cool! Your recent addition of events swam vs available is a plus. Once again, being a math head i am constantly analyzing splits, but adding them to this site seems a little cumbersome. I am very happy with what you have done, and thank you.

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 23:24:21 GMT

Hello all, I completely updated the website UI with a new design!

I added Event Coverage - Have you raced all distances in all strokes at meets?

This shows whether you have raced all of the events in the stroke and course. The idea is to encourage folks to try new strokes, events, and courses at meets, and to encourage our less "competitive," "time"-driven folks to come out to meets and eventually compete for a "bingo" card of all events.

You can also see your FLOG distance for those who are using it. And for those who don't, a link to use it!

RE: USMS Results Data Analysis

Jennifer Tran — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 23:16:24 GMT

Thank you so much for taking a look! Was there any feature that you really liked? Any feature that you would have liked to see?