celebration!
I know there is something unseemly about bragging about ones swimming times. I think for many masters swimmers, a sense of personal accomplishment is best savored inwardly. John Wayne, were he to have taken up masters swimming, certainly would never have jumped up and down in giddy pride over a personal record. Nor, I suspect, would Clint Eastwood.
Having said this, I would just like to take a moment to jump up and down in shameless giddly pride over a recent swim I had!!!
At Y nationals in Ft. Lauderdale a couple weeks ago, at the age of 49, I swam the best 200 yard freestyle of my life--a 1:55.11, which beat my high school and college time by nearly a full second. I realize this may actually say a lot more about my former mediocrity that it does about my current prowesss, but the fact remains that as I near semi-centenarian status, I was able to whoop my teenage self!!! (Sorry about that, youngster Jim; you just didn't know how to race smart back then.)
I went into the race hoping just to break two minutes; I had never before broken 1:56, and this didn't even enter my consciousness as a possibility. When I finished the race--splitting 57 and 58 respectively--I wasn't even all that exhausted. I looked over, saw my time on the big board, and I have been ludicrously, bumptiously proud of myself ever since.
Anyhow, I'm hoping that rather than annoying my fellow masters swimmers who may read this post, this exercise in self-congratulations/aggrandizment will encourage others to pen their own moments of personal satisfaction. Where better to celebrate than here, where your fellow swimmers actually know about swimming times and (unlike the world at large) conceivably even care?
Parents
Former Member
Jim,
I agree with your analysis of which are the tough age groups. At the risk of over-simplifying, one can illustrate it by looking at the trend of the winning 100m Olympic times as an indication of the abilities of the vast majority of competitive swimmers in each 'era'.
The hypothesis being that all swimmers of a particular era will have benefited from the progress and implementation of improved research in technique and training methods even if they were not the top swimmers.
1924 59.0
1928 58.6
1932 58.2
1936 57.6
1948 57.3
1952 57.4 'first string' in his day)
* The top 50-54 times are significantly better and would have been world class in 1960.
* The top 45-49 times have surpassed the world records of 1960 even by masters who may have been 'second string' in their era.
* Times in younger groups will level out like the open times of today, with records going to 'first string' swimmers who stay in the sport. (e.g. 37 year old Olympic Gold medallist, Richard Saeger setting a new world record of 1:54.86 for the LCM 200 at Federal Way last year)
If you do the same exercise with the women's 100m Olympic winning times, the same phenomenon occurs but later in time. The big drop in times happening in 1976. As a result, there are a bunch of really good women in the 35-39 and 40-44's.
In summary:
Masters records will continue to be demolished until the current 45-49 age group has moved right through the system (and I am long gone)
The age groups younger than the 45-50 are ALL tough. With the usual exceptions, older age groups are "easier".
The 'average' masters times will also improve in unison with the 45-50's moving through.
After this there will be a leveling out as you point out - unless there are some major technical breakthroughs.
Jim,
I agree with your analysis of which are the tough age groups. At the risk of over-simplifying, one can illustrate it by looking at the trend of the winning 100m Olympic times as an indication of the abilities of the vast majority of competitive swimmers in each 'era'.
The hypothesis being that all swimmers of a particular era will have benefited from the progress and implementation of improved research in technique and training methods even if they were not the top swimmers.
1924 59.0
1928 58.6
1932 58.2
1936 57.6
1948 57.3
1952 57.4 'first string' in his day)
* The top 50-54 times are significantly better and would have been world class in 1960.
* The top 45-49 times have surpassed the world records of 1960 even by masters who may have been 'second string' in their era.
* Times in younger groups will level out like the open times of today, with records going to 'first string' swimmers who stay in the sport. (e.g. 37 year old Olympic Gold medallist, Richard Saeger setting a new world record of 1:54.86 for the LCM 200 at Federal Way last year)
If you do the same exercise with the women's 100m Olympic winning times, the same phenomenon occurs but later in time. The big drop in times happening in 1976. As a result, there are a bunch of really good women in the 35-39 and 40-44's.
In summary:
Masters records will continue to be demolished until the current 45-49 age group has moved right through the system (and I am long gone)
The age groups younger than the 45-50 are ALL tough. With the usual exceptions, older age groups are "easier".
The 'average' masters times will also improve in unison with the 45-50's moving through.
After this there will be a leveling out as you point out - unless there are some major technical breakthroughs.
