I'm guilty of it. I imagine we're all guilty of it: seeing a meet announcement and seeing our favorite two events back to back, or four events we want to swim on one day and then only 1 then next day. We get irritated and wonder why the meet director couldn't have designed this to better suit our needs? We moan at workout, whine on the forums, ***** on our blogs, etc. I'd like to encourage my fellow forumites to join me in taking a pledge:
I hereby pledge to:
just be grateful that there are volunteers, teams and facilities willing to host Masters meets,
recognize that no matter how hard these dedicated volunteers try, they'll never be able to create the order of events that satisfies all Masters swimmer,
recognize that, even if I can't swim those two favorite events in this meet because they are back to back (or whatever my complaint is), I've got a multi-decade Masters career ahead of me in which to swim them at different meets,
to, therefore, stop whining/moaning about the order of events, and
look at a different order of events as an opportunity to branch out and try new events!
Signed,
Patrick "Indebted to Masters Meet Directors/Officials/Volunteers" Brundage
I agree that events should be changed once in awhile to avoid past complaints. And 50 back should not be last so often!
The 50 back wil never be the last event at Nationals. It was a couple years ago and the Admin Refs told us to not do that again - that event has many missed pad hits and it's not good to end a meet with that kind of event because it takes too long to review all of the backup time data (people are waiting around for the final score instead of processing the 50 back while another event is being run). Also, the Admin Refs suggested we not end the last day of the meet with a relay for the same reason (delayed final score because relays can take longer to reconcile), so you'll note starting with Atlanta the last day relay(s) are toward the beginning of the day (just after the distance event) and not at the very end like they used to be.
Ande said:
A simple rule of thumb is to ask:
What percentage of the swimmers might want to double various events and attempt to put one or 2 events between them
Several years ago USMS conducted a survey to Top Ten swimmers on event preferences. The results of that survey have been used to do future event orders at Nationals to avoid popular "favorites." It is always a challenge coming up with an order of events to please the majority (note I didn't say all...). Particularly when there is a strange rule in the rulebook that prohibits the 400/500 free being the day after the distance day. That is why the 400 IM is almost always on Friday (assuming the meet starts on Thursday). Seems that the distance freestyle swimmers are so tough they want to swim both distance events on the same day, however, they are not able to swim the 400/500 the next day..:bolt:
Jeff
I agree that events should be changed once in awhile to avoid past complaints. And 50 back should not be last so often!
The 50 back wil never be the last event at Nationals. It was a couple years ago and the Admin Refs told us to not do that again - that event has many missed pad hits and it's not good to end a meet with that kind of event because it takes too long to review all of the backup time data (people are waiting around for the final score instead of processing the 50 back while another event is being run). Also, the Admin Refs suggested we not end the last day of the meet with a relay for the same reason (delayed final score because relays can take longer to reconcile), so you'll note starting with Atlanta the last day relay(s) are toward the beginning of the day (just after the distance event) and not at the very end like they used to be.
Ande said:
A simple rule of thumb is to ask:
What percentage of the swimmers might want to double various events and attempt to put one or 2 events between them
Several years ago USMS conducted a survey to Top Ten swimmers on event preferences. The results of that survey have been used to do future event orders at Nationals to avoid popular "favorites." It is always a challenge coming up with an order of events to please the majority (note I didn't say all...). Particularly when there is a strange rule in the rulebook that prohibits the 400/500 free being the day after the distance day. That is why the 400 IM is almost always on Friday (assuming the meet starts on Thursday). Seems that the distance freestyle swimmers are so tough they want to swim both distance events on the same day, however, they are not able to swim the 400/500 the next day..:bolt:
Jeff
