Yesterday, I made my reservations at the Outrigger Reef for the upcoming Nationals. Much to my surprise, I found that the "special rate" for the Standard Room on their web page was $7/night cheaper than that offered for the USMS Group Rate. So I booked online for the Special Rate.
When I then talked to the woman who handles Group Reservations, she said that she had just become aware of the issue and was thinking about extending the Special Rate to the USMS people. Duh!! Seems like she will like or not once the word gets out.
Thank you, Janet, for addressing my concern about the water temperature. It is nice weather that results in a pool with competition temperature without heating or cooling. In Florida, (and Pennsylvania in August) I have been in several outdoor pools that could use some cooling.
As for Gail's concern, I have two points:
First, while the rules may say the pools are identical, Gail's response will be shared by many others - the pools will not seem equal, either physically (effects of depth, tilted pool bottom) or psychologically (17' is a lot different to dive into or swim over than 7', and many of us like to 'psych' by visualizing each step of the race before we get to the blocks). I do not know if the rules actually address the issue of equivalence of pools that are shared in a single event. Rather, they probably specify requirements for sanctioning, records, and top ten (OK, I will check after I post this). Many very different pools can satisfy those requirements.
Second, turning at a wall where the depth is 17' is a lot different than turning at one that is 7' deep, because of the visual cues that are used to determine the distance to the wall. As I recall from Santa Clara, the warmups are crowded, and we will not know which pool we will swim in during that warmup. That will make getting a feel for the pools during the warmup more difficult. It would be easier if we knew in which pool our event would be held.
Hi Phil,
The rule book states that when two courses are unequal in any way, male and female swimmers shall alternate courses by days. Historically the Championship Committee has deemed courses "equal" in depth for competition purposes if both courses are at least 7 feet throughout the course. This is the case in Hawaii, so the meet information has been published with the statement that women's heats will precede men's heats.
This is not written in stone for the future if it is decided to alter this policy, but it has been a consistent policy for some time now. The other advantage for running all women's heats before men's is that the timeline will be shorter for each day.
I totally understand your comments regarding warming up in the pool in which your event will be swum. Since we started deck seeding the entire meet, this is not possible to predict. So in a situation like Hawaii, it will behoove all of us to warm up in both pools to be totally familiar with the perspective in that pool.
Sandi Rousseau
Championship Committee Liaison to Hawaii Nationals
Hi Barbara,
We have two separate pools adjacent to each other we will be using for the meet. One of the pools is in a 50 meter pool. The racing lanes will be in the middle portion of the 50 meter pool with a buffer lane between the racing lanes and the warm up area. We will have a platform on one side for the officials.
Hope this clarifies.
Janet Renner
Co - Meet Director
