first of all, congrats to the meet directors and all the volunteers on a job well done. so organized and efficient!! very impressive. the only thing i wish someone could explain to me is why the usms champ. committee changed the team scoring from large, medium and small team to clumping everyone in the same category. seems extremely unfair to have what i call "real teams" competing against state mega teams. there is no possibility for "real teams" to ever come close to competing against them. if you are going to give team awards at the end of the meet, is there any way you can do it fairly? our team is extremely proud to have gotten as many team members as we did to go to natls. (most of them for the first time), but unfortunately they were very disillusioned (as was i) with the idea that we would be competing against state teams. as one of the coaches i didn't have an explanation. even though we were very proud of our 7th place finish in men's division, and our 12th place in combined, we were only one of a few "real teams" in the top ten. would appreciate responses. maybe even someone from the champ.committee could explain how they felt this scoring system would be more fair to the majority of swimmers. then i can pass it along to my teammates.. i don't want them to be so disillusioned that they lose interest in attending any future natls. thanks
Swim4Life- Thanks for clarifying, and I'm glad you took my question the right way. I feared it might seem accusatory, and it wasn't meant to.
I hadn't heard that the reason for doing away with the SML was due to people trying to "beat the system". And it's probably doubtful, one, that anyone who has done that is on this forum to discuss it; and 2, would admit it!!!
So, to prevent this kind of thing from happening, it would make sense to go to a straight 1-10 placement with two categories: club vs. regional. Those are the two types of teams competing at Nationals. If you (the collective us) fall into one of those categories and you want to win, you will motivate others to join in.
Just my :2cents: (although I'm probably up near a dollar by now!)
Swim4Life- Thanks for clarifying, and I'm glad you took my question the right way. I feared it might seem accusatory, and it wasn't meant to.
I hadn't heard that the reason for doing away with the SML was due to people trying to "beat the system". And it's probably doubtful, one, that anyone who has done that is on this forum to discuss it; and 2, would admit it!!!
So, to prevent this kind of thing from happening, it would make sense to go to a straight 1-10 placement with two categories: club vs. regional. Those are the two types of teams competing at Nationals. If you (the collective us) fall into one of those categories and you want to win, you will motivate others to join in.
Just my :2cents: (although I'm probably up near a dollar by now!)