Nationals Scoring: Regional vs Local Club Categories
The USMS House of Delegates passed a rules change regarding club scoring at Nationals that took effect beginning with 2009 Short Course Nationals in Clovis.
Previously, club awards at Nationals simply went to the top ten highest scoring clubs in Men’s, Women’s and Combined categories. The new rule established two separate club categories: Regional and Local. A formal description of the two club categories is below (104.5.6B & from page 34 of the 2010 USMS Rule Book):
(1)Regional - For competition at national championship meets, a Regional Club consists of a club made up of those swimmers who represent a club at nationals, but at competitions within their LMSC, they compete for an entity or subgroup (such as a workout group) that is different than the one they compete with at nationals.
(2) Local - For competition at national championship meets, a Local Club consists of a club that does not qualify as a Regional Club.
Based on these definitions, the following scoring categories will be in place for 2010 Nationals:
Regional Clubs:
AFAM
AKMS
ARIZ
CMS
FACT
GAJA
HIMA
HMS
IAMA
IM
MICH
MM
NCMS
NEM
NIAG
NMMS
OREG
PNA
SKY
SMS
SWOM
UTAH
WMAC
WMSC
Local Clubs: all other registered USMS clubs.
Please note clubs may contest their designation or the designation of another club by filing an appeal with the chair of the Championship Committee (Jeff Roddin, Championship@usms.org) at least 45 days prior to the national championship meet (those deadlines would be April 5 for Atlanta and June 25 for Puerto Rico).
Jeff Roddin
Championship Committee Chair
I will be interested to know if or how much controversy this causes at nationals, and/or how many appeals get filed, and how they get resolved.
I think part of what I'm fearful of is that the rule is necessarily a bit vague.
For example - NEM (New England Masters Swim Club). NEM is, completely, absolutely, a "regional club". Absolutely no doubt in my mind and I would never claim otherwise. We have 1500 or 1600 swimmers, spread across dozens if not over 100 workout groups.
However, here in New England, there are only three meets per year where NEM swimmers compete as separate workout groups. Those meets are our SCY, LCM, and SCM championship meets. At all other New England meets, NEM people are simply NEM.
Further, at our championship meets, we do have NEM swimmers who still swim as NEM, without a workout group. At our SCY meet a week ago, there were about 20-25 people in this category.
So I could see some of those people making the claim that they're not swimming for workout groups, and they are swimming on the same club, NEM, in their local meets as they do at Nationals. As such, their club, NEM, should not be considered a "regional" club, per the letter of the rule.
I'm not saying I would agree with that at all. NEM is a regional club, period, in my book. I'm just saying that it's admittedly very difficult to write an ironclad rule that leaves no room for interpretation. I wonder if there are any regional clubs out there that are more borderline cases than NEM is, and who might have more gray area to appeal in. :-)
-Rick
I will be interested to know if or how much controversy this causes at nationals, and/or how many appeals get filed, and how they get resolved.
I think part of what I'm fearful of is that the rule is necessarily a bit vague.
For example - NEM (New England Masters Swim Club). NEM is, completely, absolutely, a "regional club". Absolutely no doubt in my mind and I would never claim otherwise. We have 1500 or 1600 swimmers, spread across dozens if not over 100 workout groups.
However, here in New England, there are only three meets per year where NEM swimmers compete as separate workout groups. Those meets are our SCY, LCM, and SCM championship meets. At all other New England meets, NEM people are simply NEM.
Further, at our championship meets, we do have NEM swimmers who still swim as NEM, without a workout group. At our SCY meet a week ago, there were about 20-25 people in this category.
So I could see some of those people making the claim that they're not swimming for workout groups, and they are swimming on the same club, NEM, in their local meets as they do at Nationals. As such, their club, NEM, should not be considered a "regional" club, per the letter of the rule.
I'm not saying I would agree with that at all. NEM is a regional club, period, in my book. I'm just saying that it's admittedly very difficult to write an ironclad rule that leaves no room for interpretation. I wonder if there are any regional clubs out there that are more borderline cases than NEM is, and who might have more gray area to appeal in. :-)
-Rick
