Club questions

If you swim for a team or club what are your facilities? I am attached to San Diego Swim Masters, but never work out with them. My workout group is Mottino YMCA in Oceanside, CA. 6- lane 25 yard shallow (semi) deep pool. what types of difficulties do you face..practice time, pool temp, etc? we have got the pool management to keep the temp at 82. The bobbers say it is too cold and we say it is too warm. Practices are 5:30 - 6:30 MWF, 9-10 T, Th and 7-8 Sat. There are also workouts Mon and Wed evening 7-8. The pool is open for lap swim any time the YMCA is open. do you pay annually or monthly? $41 a month for Y membership and $25 for three workouts a week and $35 for five workouts.

If you swim for a team or club what are your facilities? Excel Aquatics..We swim primarily at Williamson County Indoor Sports Complex, a gorgeous 5-12' deep pool with about 20 lanes SCY (we usually have 5-6) & 8 lanes LCM (every weekend, we get 4). Practice times for Masters are M/W/F 5-6:30a & 8:30-10a. The triathletes practice T/F 5-6:30a, W 6:30-8:30p & Sun 3:30-5p. There are also running form drills/sessions on Monday mornings from 5-6:30 & Strength/Power Conditioning & Short Swim practices on Thurs 5-6:30a. During summer the triathletes swim at a lake 6:30-8a & the Tues am practice is at a local Y with an outdoor LCM pool 5:15-6:30a, 3 lanes, shallow, odd currents. what types of difficulties do you face..practice time, pool temp, etc? Pool Management can be snarky. The AG team is massive, taking up most of the lanes almost all other times around school. The temp can be warm but not too bad & the lanes can get semi-crowded at times when everyone is there. If the kids have meets the pool will be closed, sometimes for part of all of the weekend. The weather can wreak havoc on the lake & outdoor swims (the Y guards have a very effective rain dance & they see lightning REALLY well...even when no one else can!). how do the swimmers handle these changes? Everyone tends to go with the flow fairly well, adapting as needed. how does the club communicate changes and do they offer make up times etc? Practice times don't change. Weekly emails are sent with practice availability, race updates & results and any news tidbits. Any other changes are sent via email & social media. do you pay annually or monthly? Pay @ least monthly, can pay in advance, $50/mo if attending more than 2practices/wk. All done via draft now online.

That's nice. One thing that annoys me about me team is I have to send in a check every month. That's the only thing I still have to pay by check! When I swam with the Tucson masters team (late 90s), we had to pay by check by I think the 5th, or there were late charges. Then when I first started with the ASU group, again it was check...until the management changed, then they started the credit card thing. For a while we had to sign in before swimming, which was rather annoying. I can imagine from a management process, auto billing makes it easier on the coaches, that they don't have to get involved with who's paid and who hasn't (and shouldn't be swimming), unless there are major issues. I'm sure that there's fees to do the credit card thing, but in the end, it makes it much easier, from both ends. Plus I'm able to get my frequent flyer miles :) Paul & Laura really run a well-organized program.

If you swim for a team or club what are your facilities? We rent space in the indoors season from the county rec centers. In the summer, we rent from the local private neighborhood pools. what types of difficulties do you face..practice time, pool temp, etc? Temperatures are all right, except for one of the pools. The biggest difficulty is that we are squeezed for the amount of lanes we can rent. The county always has lap swimming available to the public, and that is their first priority. So, we are swimming 7 to a 25-yd lane sometimes to give the public lappers one (maybe 2) to a lane lane. how do the swimmers handle these changes? What changes? Nothing changes. Swimmers accept the crowded conditions during popular times. Other workout times, there is space. Some swimmers have switched to less popular workout times. how does the club communicate changes and do they offer make up times etc? You mean cancellations? They rarely happen. Snowstorms and biohazard closures happen from time to time. They are out of our control, and swimmers accept it. The county refunds our $ if the pool closes. We send out an email blast for last minute changes, and for reminders if the cancellation is known ahead of time. do you pay annually or monthly? Neither. We pay seasonally. Sept-Jan / Feb-May / June-Aug. We have 14 workouts a week, and you can attend any at any of the 3 or 4 pools. Our philosophy is that everyone buys into the program and shares the cost of the coach/pool, so all are available. You use it as you want to. (We do have a reduced rate for averaging one swim per week, and prorate fees if starting in the middle of a season. We also have a one month fee for new members who want to try it out before deciding to commit and continue) We accept checks or online credit card payments using our Paypal account.