what is your height?

You people! At 80+, with 2 artificial hips and an external pace-maker going faster than my PR from when I was 19! You make me want quit swimming, hit the Ponderosa and take up Sumo wrestling! Seriously, those are some pretty impressive times, regardless of which piece of conversion software you use. Congrats. Matt

Originally posted by Matt S ... At 80+, with 2 artificial hips and an external pace-maker going ... Matt Matt, I think there is a misunderstanding: Ian is age 60, which is quite young, has one artificial hip, and has no extenal heart pace-maker. Still, he did a 27.87 for a 50 free in a 50 meter pool, after a lay-off from swimming for many decades, and to me that's a strong sprint performance.

Ion: I think Matt was injecting humor into the posts.... Matt, you forgot the heart transplant swimmers...

Gents, Appreciate the complements but was not actually looking for any comment on my 50m time at 60. Soon it will appear as sucky to everyone as the 24.9 of my youth does today. If my current time seems ‘a nice swim’ it is probably due more to the good swimmers of my era not participating in masters rather than any skill on my part. Although I never swam in the US, I saw times reported by the top US sprinters from around 1960/61: Larson, Hunter, Alkire, Follett, Padovan, Lyons, Jackman, etc, etc. – all comfortably faster than me in the 100 at the time. All stopped swimming? In fact, Jeff Farrell and Steve Clark are the only currently active names I recognize from that era. My recent 50m looks pretty sad relative to Farrell’s – he was faster than me in 1961 and obviously still is (although I was closer back then). For forecasting purposes, I was really rather unsubtly fishing for comparative feedback on the 24.9/21.66 in 1962. The 50 was an unofficial distance at that time and I hardly ever saw published 50m/yds times so don’t have anything to compare it to. Just trying to work out if there is hope for further improvement based on what others have done or has old age taken over already and I should get used to times getting slower. It must be great motivation for the swimmers in the ‘celebration!’ discussion thread who are able to beat their college times and produce their ATB’s at close to 50 – amazing! - Wish I could do that. Ian. PS: Tin man talk for Tom (& anyone who might need an artificial hip): Hip replacement parts have a certain amount of adjustment capability. Knowing I wanted to flip turn, my orthopedic surgeon set mine so I can lift my knee closer to my chest than is normally the case. Theoretically this takes away some backward range of movement but I don’t notice; it feels the same as my real hip. The setting does not prevent me from screwing up the turn by going in too close to the wall before flipping but I won’t pop the joint pushing off hard from that position.

Originally posted by Tom Ellison Ion: I think Matt was injecting humor into the posts.... ... I got it now.

Bruce Hunter does swim on occasion for New England Masters. He has recently hinted that he might return to attack the 50 free so you might see another one of your "contemporaries" back in racing form.

The area the plastic cup sits in my right hip was shattered (crushed). I lost the entire right side of my buttocks, which makes my hip very vulnerable. So, you add both the shattered areas where my plastic hip socket rests with the loss of my entire right buttocks...the Doctor didn't have much to work with. I got the best they had to offer. Sorry to use this forum for this. I guess I should have e-mail Ion. :(

Originally posted by Tom Ellison The area the plastic cup sits in my right hip was shattered (crushed). I lost the entire right side of my buttocks, ... Sorry to use this forum for this. I guess I should have e-mail Ion. :( I wrote "I got it now" in reference to Matt's humor by exaggeration, as opposed to accuracy. I didn't underestimate artificial hip issues.