Invitation to the 2013 Open Norwegian Masters Championship
Former Member
Hi everybody!
Let me first of all let me say that the USA and all of you who have been affected by the attack of hurricane Sandy have our thoughts and symapthy. We are sorry for your losses and impressed by the detarmination and speed with which you set about rescuing, clearing and rebuilding.
And now I would like to invite you to the Open Norwegian Maters Championship. The meet takes place in Stord outside of Bergen March 8th-10th 2013! :bliss:
www.svomming.no/.../Invitation Open Norwegian Masters Stord 2013_061112.pdf
If you are looking in vain for events, let me explain: The Norwegian Masters community is not that big, the Championship is actually our only pure Masters meet during the year. We go abroad for meets, and some of us swim ordinary (like USA-S) meets. The record attendance for our national Masters championship is just above 500 swimmers.
So, to ensure that there's more swimmers competing in each event, the longer (200+) events are alternated. The short nine (50+100) are always on the program. The other events alternate like this:
Even years (like this year):
200 IM
200 fly
200 breaststroke
400 free
800 free, women
1500 free, men
Odd years (like 2013)
200 back
200 free
400 IM
800 free, men
1500 free, women.
That way both the swimmers in a given age bracket that is considering to swim a longer free event, will compete against each other!
The meet is also arranged this way so that it can be held in three days - Fri-Sunday.
I don't expect a huge rush, but you are very welcome, and, anyway, I thought some of you might be interested jsut to read about it. I like reading invitations and checking results from all over. Could be just me. Confessions of a split stalker. :blush:
The other Scandinavian countries - Sweden and Denmark - usually have their own championships the following weekends
Yes, after you posted this I checked the Swedish federation site and saw their meet is also in March.
How many athletes from outside Norway typically attend? I was expecting the link to the meet info to be in Norwegian.
Hi Knelson, the nationals have been open for at least four years (as long as I've been swimming), and I think someone after a while found out that if was gonna be any point to calling it Open, the invite would have to be in English. 'Open to all Norwegian-speakers in the world!' wouldn't be that inclusive.
There are not that many foreign swimmers coming, we usually get between two and 20 guest from abroad. There's an Italian club who visits from time to time, and one or two British teams. This year and in 2009 there were five or six russians. Great breaststrokers. Mark Vogel, the Danish swimmer, have been to the meet a couple of times, I think.
The other Scandinavian countries - Sweden and Denmark - usually have their own championships the following weekends, so there's very seldom any exchange there, which is a shame, really. It's quite close, often a shorter journey to Denmark than to the venue in Norway, and there are so few Masters meets. And I really enjoy these all Masters two or three day meets with a variety of events. But it's not that easy to find the time (or money) to go away for a three day weekend two weeks in a row.
Takk for the invite!
Ingenting å takke for, bare hyggelig!
Yes, after you posted this I checked the Swedish federation site and saw their meet is also in March.
I'd very much like to go there some time, but if it means missing our own nationals, it's a tough decision. Maybe when the kids are grown and I can spend (even) more time on swimming, I'll do both. There's also a yearly meet in a small town in Scotland I've wanted to go to, the Inverclyde Open Masters Short Course Swimming Meet. They have the 800 free as the 'main' event, keeping stats for each swimmers year by year.
I feel I shall give a little positive plug to the Norsk Masters Championships. Norway is a beautiful country, unparalleled to anywhere else. A trip to this championship could provide a competitive swimming atmosphere combined with breath-taking sights.
This championship provides most all disciplines one would be used to in the US sanctioned meets, plus the additional 25 free(not found in many meets) and 4x50 fly mixed relay. Plus, the added bonus of meeting others with the same love of swimming. Although most swimmers are competitive during the race, it is great to discover we are actually a very tight knit community no matter where in the world we reside. We all share the common swimming bond that those outside the swimming community frequently cannot understand.
I am hoping to make it to this championship and would love if there was a presence from the US. Naturally, I would hope this would develop a reciprocation with Norwegian swimmers and therefore their participation in some championship events in the United States.
So please consider the possibility of attending this event. You will definitely not regret a thing. Be sure, if possible, to extend your stay, so you have plenty of time to enjoy the amazing country. And I hope I make it and am able to see some of you there.
