Really silly inquiry regarding the barrier in a 50m pool.

One question to you - define "minutely?" Best, Paul Perhaps I was using it incorrectly, but...I was intending to mean measurements that are "scrupulously, meticulously, painstakingly" undertaken in order to address not just the letter of the law, but the precise kerning of the letter of the law, while off to the side a whoppingly flagrant loophole (hand timing) is hiding in plain sight. I admit that my passion on this subject is being fueled by at least three personal items of pique. 1) I had a No. 1 in the country time (and possibly for FINA tabulations, too) overturned in the 100 LCM freestyle. I swam this in a fully sanctioned meet at none other than Michael Phelps hometown pool in Baltimore. The sanction was granted based on what, in retrospect, was the meet director's promise that the pool was the correct length. But it was later discovered that he never sent in the paperwork, so USMS sent a team out in the dead of winter to measure the pool, which, for all I know, may have been somewhat contracted by winter's chill, and it turned out it was slightly too short. I remember calculating my "advantage" from the inch or so of shortness (remember, in a LCM pool, you swim 2, not 4, "short" lengths; I think the difference was tiny, and even if you added it back to my time, it took me nowhere close to the second place time, which was nearly 1.4 seconds slower.) Anyhow, I wonder how many Michael Phelps age group records from yesteryear should now have asterisks on them? 2) We have been swimming our championships at a Myrtha Pool at the Spire Institute. Every year, we need to do these measurements, over and over again, this despite the fact that the modern bulkheads in use at such state of the art pools are so precise that the measurements never vary! Never! If they ever were to vary, the likelihood is much higher that it would be a flaw in the measuring device, not the pool! The annual repeat before and after each session measurement are just an unnecessarily complicated bureaucratic hoop that, in my mind, serves little purpose than the satisfaction of somebody's OCD itch. Again, I can see the benefit of scratching that itch, but not when a much itchier source of uncertainty (hand-timing) is ignored altogether. It's like having a cardiovascular surgeon first spend a lot of time debriding a patient's hang nail before starting the open heart surgery needed to save his or her life! 3) Finally, and this is a more philosophical source of pique, I admit, but I generally find too much rule-mongering objectionable, especially when said rule-mongering loses track of the bigger picture. I agree with you that the devil is in the details, and I am not advocating total laissez-faire lawlessness in meet administration. But sometimes I get the feeling the reason that the devil is in the details is because devils feel at home hiding in the nooks and crannies of the law, and it is from this vantage point that they derive their power to spite their perceived enemies! mi·nute·ly /mīˈn(y)o͞otlē/ adverb with great attention to detail; meticulously. "systems of politics are examined minutely by academics" synonyms: exhaustively, painstakingly, systematically, meticulously, rigorously, scrupulously, punctiliously, in detail; More

One question to you - define "minutely?" Best, Paul Perhaps I was using it incorrectly, but...I was intending to mean measurements that are "scrupulously, meticulously, painstakingly" undertaken in order to address not just the letter of the law, but the precise kerning of the letter of the law, while off to the side a whoppingly flagrant loophole (hand timing) is hiding in plain sight. I admit that my passion on this subject is being fueled by at least three personal items of pique. 1) I had a No. 1 in the country time (and possibly for FINA tabulations, too) overturned in the 100 LCM freestyle. I swam this in a fully sanctioned meet at none other than Michael Phelps hometown pool in Baltimore. The sanction was granted based on what, in retrospect, was the meet director's promise that the pool was the correct length. But it was later discovered that he never sent in the paperwork, so USMS sent a team out in the dead of winter to measure the pool, which, for all I know, may have been somewhat contracted by winter's chill, and it turned out it was slightly too short. I remember calculating my "advantage" from the inch or so of shortness (remember, in a LCM pool, you swim 2, not 4, "short" lengths; I think the difference was tiny, and even if you added it back to my time, it took me nowhere close to the second place time, which was nearly 1.4 seconds slower.) Anyhow, I wonder how many Michael Phelps age group records from yesteryear should now have asterisks on them? 2) We have been swimming our championships at a Myrtha Pool at the Spire Institute. Every year, we need to do these measurements, over and over again, this despite the fact that the modern bulkheads in use at such state of the art pools are so precise that the measurements never vary! Never! If they ever were to vary, the likelihood is much higher that it would be a flaw in the measuring device, not the pool! The annual repeat before and after each session measurement are just an unnecessarily complicated bureaucratic hoop that, in my mind, serves little purpose than the satisfaction of somebody's OCD itch. Again, I can see the benefit of scratching that itch, but not when a much itchier source of uncertainty (hand-timing) is ignored altogether. It's like having a cardiovascular surgeon first spend a lot of time debriding a patient's hang nail before starting the open heart surgery needed to save his or her life! 3) Finally, and this is a more philosophical source of pique, I admit, but I generally find too much rule-mongering objectionable, especially when said rule-mongering loses track of the bigger picture. I agree with you that the devil is in the details, and I am not advocating total laissez-faire lawlessness in meet administration. But sometimes I get the feeling the reason that the devil is in the details is because devils feel at home hiding in the nooks and crannies of the law, and it is from this vantage point that they derive their power to spite their perceived enemies! mi·nute·ly /mīˈn(y)o͞otlē/ adverb with great attention to detail; meticulously. "systems of politics are examined minutely by academics" synonyms: exhaustively, painstakingly, systematically, meticulously, rigorously, scrupulously, punctiliously, in detail; More