Call me an old fashioned cynic, but Gary Hall's oh so exclusive "Race Club" seems to generate more amusement than intimidation. To review the bidding for those with real lives, Mr. Hall announced a few months ago his intent to form his own club dedicated to elite swimming. It has a fabulous location and training facility in the Florida Keys. It will cover travel, training and living expenses. (I'm tempted to ask who is fronting the money, but I won't denigrade Mr. Hall's ability to raise funds.) If you want to join them, send in a resume; don't call us; we'll call you. Let us look over your accoplishments and decide whether you are worthy.
Hmm, great facilities, don't have to share pool time with the non-world class members (i.e. 99%) of a Swim Club, just about all expenses paid. Unless you have your own lucrative endorsement deal, what swimmer wouldn't want to join this team?
Well, the initial members of the "Swim Club" were announced last week. www.swiminfo.com/.../6097.asp Eight Olympians sounds real impressive. But then you look at the list a little more closely. Eleven swimmers, and although I have not googled everyone of them, all of the ones I have googled are in their late 20's or older. Or in other words, 3 of the 11 swimmers are chronologically at the back end of their careers, and they have not yet made their nation's Olympic Team. Closer scrutiny reveals 10 of the 11 are men. Just about all of them swim the 50 free or 50 fly, and few of them seriously compete in anything other that the 50 or 100 free or fly. In contrast to the lack of age, gender and event diversity, the team does have members of many nationalities and ethic backgrounds. However, the most telling stat of all is that roughly half of the members I checked are not currently ranked in the World Top 20 Rankings, LCM or SCM, in any event.
Overall, the "Swim Club" sort of reminds me of the kind of team a rookie fantasy league coach would assemble--there are a lot of names you would recognize, but their most productive years may be behind them. To be fair, all of these folks are amazing, world-class swimmers. Their careers to date have been awesome, and they remain extraordinary today by any standard, except arguably World Rankings. In contrast, I am an opinionated loud mouth. I would be delighted to see them find new speed and light up the scoreboards next year with medals and records, and make a complete monkey of me. As of right now, I think may the "Swim Club's" gloss may have exceeded its actual capabilities.
Matt
Former Member
Hey Geek:
Can I have one of those passes? I need a new TV and a sofa...:)
A couple of years ago in Santa Clara a guy missed checkin for the mile because his plane was late and the meet officials wouldn't let him swim even though there was going to be an empty lane. Without telling anyone, he jumped up on the block and swam the 1650. No harm done. He wasn't the slowest in the heat so it took no more time. He just wanted to swim the race he'd been training for. At convention that year he was given a one year suspension.
Knowingly broke the rule and no harm done.
At the next nationals, lets all just throw some relays together and see the reaction. Doesn't really sound like a bad idea. It's all just for fun and that's why we're there.
Originally posted by mattson
I'm thinking about the relays at the end of last years Nationals, at Arizona. Due to the time overrun and changed flights, my team was scrambling to fill in empty spots on the relays. Well, when I was put on a relay, I noticed that I dragged them to a younger bracket. Fortunately, there was another scratched relay in my age group. I had just enough time to copy over all the names to the other card, before the race started.
Suppose I had missed that, until after the race. Should we have been given some kind of penalty (like a year's suspension??) for an honest mistake? (A penalty beyond a DQ.)
I realize I'm in a minority here but there's a difference between and honest mistake and entering into the race ahead of time in violation of the established "technicalities" or rules.
It doesn't matter. Everyone had fun. As I said, lets all come together and swim some relays next meet. Let's not declare it ahead of time and make the officials take the time to catch us and inform us that even though it was fun, we shouldn't have done it. No harm done.
Originally posted by swimmer
Could/Would there be any other potential sanction?
They got DQ'ed. They were punished. What do you want, a public flogging? Relax.
Originally posted by swimmer
They had a swimmer on the relay that wasn't a member of their club. That's the bottom line. They had to know it wasn't going to be a legal relay. Ages may have eventually played into it. Am I the only one that has a problem with they did?
I'm sure they just wanted to swim a relay whether they were DQed or not. Maybe they should have specifically declared the relay was exhibition, but are exhibition swims even allowed? So as it happened, they got to have fun swimming a mixed relay and it didn't count for anything. That seems like an acceptable result to me.
Originally posted by Phil Arcuni
Thanks to both of you. The rule looks pretty clear.
Remember also that you must "declare" the relays to be entered in advance (that is Men/Women/Mixed plus the age group). You may however, change the names on the card before your heat is called. Since the race club declared themselves a Mixed 19+ they would have eventually been disqualified by the computer when the ages of the participants where checked.
Originally posted by seltzer
Remember also that you must "declare" the relays to be entered in advance (that is Men/Women/Mixed plus the age group). You may however, change the names on the card before your heat is called. Since the race club declared themselves a Mixed 19+ they would have eventually been disqualified by the computer when the ages of the participants where checked.
They had a swimmer on the relay that wasn't a member of their club. That's the bottom line. They had to know it wasn't going to be a legal relay. Ages may have eventually played into it. Am I the only one that has a problem with they did? Put a relay up that you know is illegal and get everyone excited even though you know it's a sham? Or do they get cut some slack because of who they are? I know there are people out there that have run nationals before. Could/Would there be any other potential sanction?
If the race club is elitist, then they showed a very humble side at the meet this last weekend. Along with providing us with some fun swims to watch, they were posing for pictures constantly and signing many forms of memorbilia. As a long time masters swimmer and coach, the race club exposed many masters swimmers to see in person what elite level swimming looks like. The race club coming to Masters nationals was a great education for all of our members and they did so with class.
