Aside from the affected meet hosts, the real losers of this dilemma are the swimmers from the two affected SCM meets who stand to lose their placing in the USMS Top Ten. In short order, R&T will release the 2001 SCM Top Ten and we’ll discover who was denied placement on the list because their worthy performances were conducted in pools they believed were legitimate for sanctioned competition.
I do not yet know if I will be one of those people, but I expect to be. You might remember the story of my 1500m Freestyle that turned into the 1550m Freestyle (or rather the 1498.7m Freestyle that was the 1548.68m Freestyle) at the NWZ meet. My time was 19:04.76, a 50-second improvement from my previous lifetime best. (The 19:55 swim as well as a 20:05 swim both put me into the SCM Top Ten in those years)
Many folks in the discussion forums have sounded off about how important they view the Top-Ten rankings. I’ll simply say that in my case, if I had been told by the meet director before my 1500m Freestyle that the pool was less than 25m long, I probably would not have swam the event. There was no other swimmer in my age group at the NWZ meet. My “competition” was the other 30-34-year-olds nationwide.
The impending ruling by the EC could very likely demand that I and other swimmers at the affected SCM meets make a sacrifice for the betterment of USMS. Honestly, I do not know what greater good is supposed to result from locking out certain swimmers from the Top Ten. I do not even know if this sacrifice is even necessary.
The EC certainly is considering the relationship between USMS and its swimmers in making its judgment. It is inevitable that some swimmers will be affected negatively by whatever “final” decision the EC renders. My contention through all of this has been that (1) deserving swimmers ought to be appropriately recognized for there outstanding achievements, and (2) that if we must do harm to swimmers and strain the USMS-to-swimmer relationship, we affect the least amount of harm upon the least number of swimmers. I’m glad that we are soon to be bringing this matter to a close, but I do think that this decision does harm to more people than necessary, as well as to the wrong people.
If it turns out that the 10th place 30-34 swimmer went slower than 19:04.76, I will be happy to congratulate him publicly and acknowledge that he earned his position. If there is any kind of positive outcome from all of this that I can guarantee, this is it.
Since I don't swim too many USMS sanctioned meets--most of the competition around here in Western PA is YMCA Masters--I'm not sure about how different times either qualify or not for USMS Top 10 times. I'm assuming these do not need to be swum in national championship meets but rather in any local or regional competition that's sanctioned by USMS. (If this is NOT the case, ignore the rest of this.)
Anyhow, I know that in our YMCA masters league, some of the meets are electronically timed, and some are hand-timed. Depending on the luck of the hand timer "draw", you can sometimes get a highly beneficial time. The reason is the person's reaction time is slow, so they start the watch a split second after the starting horn sounds, then they anticipate your finish and help you out by stopping the watch prematurely on the back end. Net result: you get a significantly better time than you truly deserve. I've been at meets where two hand timers were a full second apart on my time. They split the difference to compute my "final" time, but even so, I feel like I was getting a significant break.
My question is this: are all USMS sanctioned meets electronically timed? Have they always been? If not, there are almost certainly Top 10 times that have benefitted from precisely the human error described above.
Other questions: are all pools laser-measured down to the hundredth of an inch? What if there's been some geological settling over the years, and a pool has either slightly contracted or elongated? Obviously no one is arguing about nanometers, but if you allow tiny reasonable discrepanices to be considered acceptable, you are, in fact, acknowledging there's some wriggle room for judgment.
George Bernard Shaw (I think it was him) once asked a society matron if she would have sex with him for a million dollars. She blushed but ultimately said yes. They he asked her if she would do it for a quarter. "Absolutely not!" she replied. "What kind of a woman do you think I am!?!"
"We've already established that," retorted George. "Now we're just haggling over the price."
When it comes to this decision about whether to count times for TOP 10 in a slightly off-distance pool, I think this is what it boils down to here in this forum: we're just haggling over the price. "Purists" argue that only the most demanding standards of exactitude can protect our sport from subjectivity. "Relativists" like me argue that some humane pragmatism should be given consideration.
I think everyone would agree that A) you shouldn't be able to swim 4 lengths of a 23 yard pool and claim a new record for the 100 yard freestyle, and B) you shouldn't have to require Caltech physicists, armed with laser-guided measurement devices, to assess every pool for exact length before each individual race (in case settling has occurred during a previous swim.) Between these ludicrous extremes exists, one would hope, some middle ground. But where this middle ground lurks is the nature of our spirited haggling.
Since I don't swim too many USMS sanctioned meets--most of the competition around here in Western PA is YMCA Masters--I'm not sure about how different times either qualify or not for USMS Top 10 times. I'm assuming these do not need to be swum in national championship meets but rather in any local or regional competition that's sanctioned by USMS. (If this is NOT the case, ignore the rest of this.)
Anyhow, I know that in our YMCA masters league, some of the meets are electronically timed, and some are hand-timed. Depending on the luck of the hand timer "draw", you can sometimes get a highly beneficial time. The reason is the person's reaction time is slow, so they start the watch a split second after the starting horn sounds, then they anticipate your finish and help you out by stopping the watch prematurely on the back end. Net result: you get a significantly better time than you truly deserve. I've been at meets where two hand timers were a full second apart on my time. They split the difference to compute my "final" time, but even so, I feel like I was getting a significant break.
My question is this: are all USMS sanctioned meets electronically timed? Have they always been? If not, there are almost certainly Top 10 times that have benefitted from precisely the human error described above.
Other questions: are all pools laser-measured down to the hundredth of an inch? What if there's been some geological settling over the years, and a pool has either slightly contracted or elongated? Obviously no one is arguing about nanometers, but if you allow tiny reasonable discrepanices to be considered acceptable, you are, in fact, acknowledging there's some wriggle room for judgment.
George Bernard Shaw (I think it was him) once asked a society matron if she would have sex with him for a million dollars. She blushed but ultimately said yes. They he asked her if she would do it for a quarter. "Absolutely not!" she replied. "What kind of a woman do you think I am!?!"
"We've already established that," retorted George. "Now we're just haggling over the price."
When it comes to this decision about whether to count times for TOP 10 in a slightly off-distance pool, I think this is what it boils down to here in this forum: we're just haggling over the price. "Purists" argue that only the most demanding standards of exactitude can protect our sport from subjectivity. "Relativists" like me argue that some humane pragmatism should be given consideration.
I think everyone would agree that A) you shouldn't be able to swim 4 lengths of a 23 yard pool and claim a new record for the 100 yard freestyle, and B) you shouldn't have to require Caltech physicists, armed with laser-guided measurement devices, to assess every pool for exact length before each individual race (in case settling has occurred during a previous swim.) Between these ludicrous extremes exists, one would hope, some middle ground. But where this middle ground lurks is the nature of our spirited haggling.
