FISH runs a meet like that once a year. It's called the Derby meet and everyone picks a horse name to appear in the heat sheet and on the scoreboard. Confusing for the spectators (and I'm sure the coaches) but the kids get a kick out of it. I believe they also hand out heat winner trinkets so it's just a little different and breaks up the monotony of a regular age group meet. (Mollie they use the preferred name field for the horse name so your real name is still in hy-tek.)
I have actually done this at a meet using "wookiee" as my first name. I think it was a pv meet. I can't remember who, either Muppet or King Roddin, changed it back to my birth name before the meet started. For several days leading up to the meet, it stayed on the list of registered swimmers.
Another meet that I attended, it was printed in the heat sheet.
Unfortunately for USMS Top Ten Recorders, the way that the Club Assistant software is coded causes issues if anything other than the swimmer's first name (the one they've registered for USMS with) is in the preferred name field (i.e. that field supersedes the first name field when the meet file is being created). Which means, for every person who puts a true nickname or shorter version of their first name given at that year's registration, they're causes additional time in processing every meet. Thankfully, our IT crew at the national office has developed a suite of tools that makes it much easier to correct, but it's still a hassle to go through and fix the swimmers who use the preferred nickname field, every meet.
The long and the short of it is- if you've registered with your full, given first name, and you'd rather be called by a shorter nickname in heat/psych sheets and results, please, please, please register for 2015 with your nickname- that's totally allowed!
FISH runs a meet like that once a year. It's called the Derby meet and everyone picks a horse name to appear in the heat sheet and on the scoreboard. Confusing for the spectators (and I'm sure the coaches) but the kids get a kick out of it. I believe they also hand out heat winner trinkets so it's just a little different and breaks up the monotony of a regular age group meet. (Mollie they use the preferred name field for the horse name so your real name is still in hy-tek.)
I have actually done this at a meet using "wookiee" as my first name. I think it was a pv meet. I can't remember who, either Muppet or King Roddin, changed it back to my birth name before the meet started. For several days leading up to the meet, it stayed on the list of registered swimmers.
Another meet that I attended, it was printed in the heat sheet.
Unfortunately for USMS Top Ten Recorders, the way that the Club Assistant software is coded causes issues if anything other than the swimmer's first name (the one they've registered for USMS with) is in the preferred name field (i.e. that field supersedes the first name field when the meet file is being created). Which means, for every person who puts a true nickname or shorter version of their first name given at that year's registration, they're causes additional time in processing every meet. Thankfully, our IT crew at the national office has developed a suite of tools that makes it much easier to correct, but it's still a hassle to go through and fix the swimmers who use the preferred nickname field, every meet.
The long and the short of it is- if you've registered with your full, given first name, and you'd rather be called by a shorter nickname in heat/psych sheets and results, please, please, please register for 2015 with your nickname- that's totally allowed!
