Motivational time standards

Not that I have came across, but it would be a great idea.

I would love to see something like this. As my situation stands, I competed (sort of), my freshmen year in High school, but my primary focus was diving. Since then I did a short masters swimming stint in St. Petersburg, FL until I moved, but didn't get a chance to compete. I have a feeling I'm terribly slow, but I don't have any idea what is slow for my level of training, age, and time in the pool etc... I would love to have times to shoot for that are not too over my head, like nationals times, or looking at high school records etc... I know I tend to push myself a bit more through competition, and since my area has very few meets (though I'm thinking of entering a meet in May here in OKC), it would be nice to have something to look at for motivation on more of a regular basis. great idea!

Originally posted by craiglll@yahoo.com Originally posted by LindsayNB Has there ever been an effort to produce some sort of motivational time standards for masters swimmers? Many would say that goes against the philosophy of masters swimming. I guess that one can argue that providing external standards violates the idea of personal best, but I think one could argue that the idea of competitions with placings, records, and rankings also violate that idea. But these things provide motivation for some people. I know that for some people who went through age group swimming time standards bring back memories of failing to meet standards necessary to progress to higher levels of competition. I would guess the nationals qualifying times may have the same drawback. My idea here is to have standards that are purely for motivation, giving people something to shoot for and a way to measure their progress that isn't dependent on what other swimmers are at the competition that you go to. These standards would not be for use in qualifying for meets. Again, for the elite among us records and rankings provide motivation, I'm trying to find a way to provide similar motivation for a broader array of swimmers. One way to measure progress is by who you can beat, another way is to have defined levels of achievement, in our case times. The advantage of the latter is that there is no limit on the number of people who can achieve any given standard, whether you attain the goal depend on your own efforts not whether someone else beat you. I think this is quite in line with the philosophy of masters swimming.

Originally posted by LindsayNB it would probably be more motivating if I didn't have to compare myself to ten year olds, especially as the comparison is not favorable :-) Well, there was a time when I actually had to compare myself to 6-year-olds! When I realize that I can now compare myself to 10-year-olds, that's pretty motivating (for me, anyway)!

Do you know what the categories AAAA, AAA, AA, etc mean? You can probably find a column that is one for you to shoot for, (although it's mentally hard to come to grips with "chasing" A-level times for 11-12 boys when you remember turning 50)!

Has there ever been an effort to produce some sort of motivational time standards for masters swimmers? Mnay would say that goes against the philosophy of masters swimmign. How can you quantify something for everyone (no matter what they do) to fit into?

Originally posted by Old Flyer Do you know what the categories AAAA, AAA, AA, etc mean? I didn't see an explanation of how the letter based numbers were derived, only the "top 16 based" label. Perhaps it is based on the top 16 times at various levels? Just guessing. I think I prefer the percentile based times anyway. As I understand it USMS has a large database of times from meets that could be used to help derive percentiles. I think providing external standards to shoot for could be a valuable motivational tool and would be useful for people who don't compete, as well as encouraging people to compete. It would be particularly useful for those of us who came to swimming late and have not yet worked up to speeds where records and top 10 rankings are useful motivational tools. In that regard, it would probably be more motivating if I didn't have to compare myself to ten year olds, especially as the comparison is not favorable :-) Although it would be more difficult to produce it would be very nice if it were possible to provide standards that included a factor for how long one has been swimming, so that people with no competitive background wouldn't be comparing against people who have swum competitively since they were six. This might encourage newcomers to the sport.