Saw one of the more interesting articles about the past, present, and future aspects of competitive swimming on SwimInfo's website the other day from Wayne Goldsmith..
www.swiminfo.com/.../7720.asp
I think it provokes a great deal of thought in this arena and specifically within this group since many of us either participate, have friends/relatives who participate, or remember participating in competitive swim meets.
I particularly appreciate the parents perspective provided in the article. While I have little children (5 and almost 3 years old), the thought of going through what my parents did with me makes me hesitate to sign up for the first set of SwimAmerica lessons or summer club swim team to introduce them to swimming. While I swam through my school age years, I didn't really consider just what my parents had to go through right along with me.. I was always thinking about what i was going through. Wow!
Check out the article and see what you think...
Rob
Parents
Former Member
Hi all,
In New England swimming, some of theses ideas have been running for YEARS! I remember distance meets, freestyle meets, 10 and under meets, run as part of the yearly meet schedule. I think we called them "specialty meets". Sometimes meets were run the races that age groupers in the younger brackets could swim some of the bigger races, 8-13 year olds get to swim 400 IM's, distance free, the 200's etc. It was a really good experience and the meets didn't run as long as a full meet.
For the what it's worth department I suppose,
Ali
Hi all,
In New England swimming, some of theses ideas have been running for YEARS! I remember distance meets, freestyle meets, 10 and under meets, run as part of the yearly meet schedule. I think we called them "specialty meets". Sometimes meets were run the races that age groupers in the younger brackets could swim some of the bigger races, 8-13 year olds get to swim 400 IM's, distance free, the 200's etc. It was a really good experience and the meets didn't run as long as a full meet.
For the what it's worth department I suppose,
Ali
