team scoring

Hi, Per Carolyn: "No scoring was done by small, medium, and large. The Woodlands scored 2nd in women's, third in combined, and fourth in men's against Arizona and Colorado. One other team that is not what is called a regional team (Longhorn Aquatics) placed in the top 3, as they took third in the Men's. The top ten teams in men's, women's, and combined received awards, with no regard to "type" of team. You may post this fact on the website, siting me as the source. Carolyn" I do not know if there was any unofficial team scoring, using any of the other methods..... Leianne ^^^^

Regarding whether to define one term or two, I once again agree with you Leianne. It's best to only define one term to avoid confusion. I remember hearing, however, that at Convention many people who voted on this insisted that there be two definitions. Is that accurate? If so, we may need to appease those people in order to get this passed. Regarding other classifications, could you please verify that there will be scoring and awards for Men's, Women's, and Combined under the new proposal? Thanks.

Personally, I would still like to see USMS spend more time with projects and discussions that have greater consequences, such as the professional management guidelines. However, we do have a "Splashback" column on the topic in the May/June issue of SWIMMER, which should be hitting your mailboxes any day now. One of the most interesting things we discovered during the process of researching the column was the USMS History and Archives Committee doesn't have a list of Club Champions dating back to the beginning of club scoring. So, basically, we're having this whole discussion without even knowing what our history truly is. IMHO, that's completely lame.

Personally, I would still like to see USMS spend more time with projects and discussions that have greater consequences, such as the professional management guidelines. In the marketing report that Tom Boyd chaired, he said that 28% (about 12,000 swimmers) of the membership were serious competitive swimmers and it could be assumed that they have a rooting interest how the results of the team banners are awarded. While the professional management guidelines are important, I would assume that only a minority of the House of Delegates (200 members) have an much of an interest in them. Those who do get worked up about the PMG would tend to join the American Management Association or the Association Management Services for Professional Associations, Trade Associations, and Non Profit Associations. :-) Since ~5% of USMS swimmers actually attend one or both National Championship Meets in a given year, I think too much time is being spent on this topic. I hear discussions to this topic are lengthy and animated at convention. Perhaps USMS would be better served addressing the needs of the large portion of its membership who do not compete in Nationals (or meets, for that matter), and figure out how to keep those swimmers interested and how to bring in new members. Is there any reason that we cannot do both?

Leianne, we've reached a point I actually disagree with you on!! LOL. I don't think that the additional cost of awards constitutes an adequate basis for not presenting awards for Men's and Women's divisions. The banners given as awards are not expensive. If, and only if, it is really that much of an issue, then I would propose awarding banners 1st-5th place in the Regional team division and 1st-10th in the Local team division for Men, Women, and Combined. My argument is twofold: 1) When we seperate Regional teams into their own division, you'll notice that there are not all that many Regional teams, only about 20 total (it's just that they take all the top spots, so we notice them more). Therefore, I don't feel it's necessary to present an award to a Regional team for being in the top half of their division. Point of interest: Virginia Masters was the 5th place Regional team in Austin with 683 points. There were 7 Local teams that finished ahead of them. Michigan Masters was the 10th place Regional team with 312.5 points, and there only seems to be 4 other Regional teams that scored over 100 points. I think that awarding a Regional team banner down to 5th seems sufficient. 2) Within the Local team division, however, there are over 150 teams competing. I don't feel that 1st-5th recognizes enough of these teams for their achievements. I understand that, generally, most of the teams who would receive a banner for Men's or Women's would also receive one for Combined, and vice versa, so it would seem to make sense to do away with the Men's and Women's divisions. (In Austin, only Masters of South Texas women (9th) and West Hollywood Aquatics men (9th) would be deprived a banner if awards were given only for the Combined team.) However, assuming the proposed Regional/Local team divisions is passed, there will be more of a discrepancy between how well a men's team versus a women's team fare at Nationals, particularly among Local teams where the gender inequities are not leveled out over an entire state. For example, Red Tide brought 9 women and no men to Austin and they did exceptionally well, scoring 209 points. This would have put them in 8th place in the Local Team Women's division, but only 20th Combined, given their absence of men. I feel like their women deserve some recognition. Similarly, West Hollywood Aquatics brought 25 swimmers: 23 men and 2 women. Their men scored 374 points, which would have placed them 6th in the Local Team Men's division. Since West Hollywood is well known to be a predominantly gay team, as well as DC Aquatic Club (bringing 8 men and no women) and other clubs, eliminating the Men's and Women's divisions would have a disproportionate effect on these teams as well as others. Finally, on a mere traditional argument, Men's and Women's swimming has always existed seperately through high school and NCAA's. That would even satisfy Justice Scalia. Therefore, it is wrong to eliminate awards for Men's and Women's divisions.

I'm the coach of AGUA Masters in New York City and we brought 17 swimmers to Austin and we placed 20th overall in the combined standings. I think percentage wise we did exceptional and I am happy to be in the company of the independent swim clubs ahead of us. When I got here 3 years ago we were a part of Metro Masters--in Coral Springs we comprised 20% of the "team" but we scored 70% of the points. That's when I went to the Board and we went independent. I did it specifically for branding and so that our swimmers could be better recognized nationally. Personally I don't really care that there are conglomerate teams. I'm very happy we finished 20th, I think with more team involvment we can do better, we certainly have the athletes. I will say that I don't want USMS to get to the point of East of the Mississippi versus West of the Mississippi. To what Paul referred to L/M/S teams when the standings were posted Saturday morning (I assume by some renegade)--the men's small team divison had us ranked second behind Maine Masters (thanks Michael Ross) and the men's cap was 9 swimmers. The women's small team was capped at 10 swimmers and had our friends Red Tide of NYC ranked first. Our women with 11 swimmers were in the Intermediate Division ranked 8th. If I remember correctly the cap for all Intermediate Teams with that posting were 25 swimmers for both genders. I know Red Tide and they too have the same philosophy as us regarding branding and recognition. They did great and finished 16th in the women's scores with only 9 swimmers. I think it's good to be independent, I think it elevates our program locally and nationally, and I think it fosters better team camraderie. The result of our showing is that I've received emails from our team wanting to compete either more or for the first time. On a side note I heard two women from Colorado meet each other for the first time--and that was behind the blocks for a relay. Great meet everyone, look us up if you are ever in NYC. Patrick

Hi, In the Pacific proposal, there are only two divisions (Regional and Local Teams). This was done in response to concerns raised on this forum about (1) keeping the scoring method simple, and (2) keeping down the number of awards. If people feel strongly about adding other classifications, please feel free to speak up. AUSTIN RESULTS As a reference, here are the scores for each of the Mens/womens/combined classes at this year's short course Nationals at Austin. Teams that would be classed as "Regional Teams" under the Pacific proposal are noted with a "*". Leianne, I notice you classified Virginia Masters as a regional team, but the way I read the proposal, we would be considered a local team (eg, all our swimmers register for VMST and always swim for that team, at nationals and elsewhere). Or maybe I'm missing something? Now, this is a fairly minor point but brings up the difficulties of classification of local vs regional. We are geographically spread out, no question about that, so I can appreciate that we should probably be called a "regional" team. But I don't believe we would be under the proposal as written, and maybe other teams are similar. As an aside: VMST has a single board of officers -- I guess that's our "single management structure" -- and fewer than half the members of our LMSC swim for VMST. Personally, I don't really care how we are classified -- or about club scoring, really -- for me it is all about relay opportunities with people I know. Again, my larger point is that defining "local" and "regional" is not easy; maybe the language in your proposal (which I think is the language that was voted on last year at the convention) is the best we can do. I'm for any uncomplicated, practical proposal that maximizes opportunities for local teams to be recognized. I also agree that more banners should be available for these local teams, that such banners are usually less meaningful for regional teams.

...the professional management guidelines are important, I would assume that only a minority of the House of Delegates (200 members) have an much of an interest in them. Those who do get worked up about the PMG would tend to join the American Management Association or the Association Management Services for Professional Associations, Trade Associations, and Non Profit Associations. :-) Interest and consequence are two very different things. More people are interested in scoring (I agree). Call me crazy if you want, but I'm more concerned with empowering an Executive Director to manage employees, because I feel it has greater consequence for USMS than the decade-long debate about who gets to take home a vinyl banner. Is there any reason that we cannot do both? That's honestly a very good question, and I think we can do both if we start thinking globally. Club scoring is not a global issue. Less than 5% of our members attended SC Nationals this year - not 28%. If 28% attended Nationals, we would have more than 10,000 swimmers competing. :bouncing:

Does VMST's board take care of pool rental and coaches for all the workout groups? I think that would be the part that really separates out whether a club is local or not. Although one should never underestimate people's willingness to bend practice to meet the legal requirements when it comes to winning something! No, I don't believe so; but I'm not on the board and don't know exactly what they do. They do SOMETHING that I'm guessing would properly be called "administering the club's activites" (eg we have a single account for the team's expenses). Betsy Durrant can chime in when she sees this. But if your suggested criterion -- a parenthetical comment given as an "example" -- is going to be the overriding/determining factor in classification, then the rule is poorly written.

Point of clarification: NCMS is set up like the classic LMSC team setup (compete for workout group in LMSC, compete for NCMS out of LMSC). I was trying to phrase it as if the setup were changed (and I wouldn't put it past some team to try, no offense intended by saying that). The point I was trying to originally make is that this is not going to be the only weak point of this definition that is found. And given the push back and forth about whether or not Article 104 issues should be Championship Committee policy with minimal results, I'm not sure that kind of "or at the Championship Committee's determination" clause is going to fly. If we're going to go out set down these definitions, we need to do it right so a club can read these definitions and know exactly where it falls. Is there any particular reason we can't say: A regional team is so-and-so. A local team is any team that is not a regional team. Patrick King