How about this year we don't dedicate so many lanes to slower swimmers in warm up. Last year there were about 4 end lanes out of the total 16 lanes dedicated to the slowest older swimmers. That's 25% of the entire warmup space !
We need a better way to keep the slow people in the slow lanes and the faster people in the faster lanes during warm up. Warm up turns worthless after the first 10 minutes.
John Smith
Former Member
First ...if you don't mind my asking.....Who's the "badsmith"? (j/k as I think I can guess for myself!)
Anyway, I haven't been to a Nationals yet...but it would kinda suk if I can't practice any turns or starts during warmups.....Isn't the facility at Ft. lauderdale pretty big though? (...Like two 50m pools with lanes running along the widths?)
Newmastersswimmer (just another future victim of yours at another nationals!)
When nationals was here in AZ 2 years ago I was shocked at the number of people who 'had' to swim in the competition pool during warm up, and in the diving well/warm-up pool in the same facility. At times it seemed like there were 10+ per lane. There is another pool across campus, I went there, it was practically wide open, got a lane to myself, a nice long slow warmup, went back to the compeition pool, and did some there just before the meet.
While it is very helpful to warm up and use the competition pool and facilities, I really don't understand why more people don't take full advantage of all of the facilities available at nationals.
With hundreds of participants, any quality lane time is at a premium, much less the lane time to swim how you want. I've never seen so many people in pools as I have at Nats.
The Bad Smith is obviously Paul Smith. He reached over underwater on the push off last year on the 50 free and 100 free and punched me. Then he held my head underwater afterward as punishment for losing..... :-)
You can certainly practice turns in one of the warm up pools after the main warm up. The problem is the main warm up is like a sardine can. They should start it an hour earlier and extend it or something to get it thinned out.
Peter,
Truth be told, thanks to Johns sage advise in training last year I was able to go over to the "dark side" and sprint a bit......something that I don't consider natural.
Part of that training which John purposely left out was "tactical" tips" (something I haven't seen Ande write about yet) that would include:
- grabbing, kicking, holding underwater, etc. all taught to me by John who then conplains when I use them on him.
- attaching a water ski rope, which came in very handy every time John "the Evil Rabbit" Smith led me out in a race.
- last but not least, was to make every atttempt to offend all other swimmers in any way possible, preferably in a public forum. I've had a bit of a hard time grasping this concept as well as JS however!
I plan my warm ups very carefully. My favorite time to get in is the Wednesday before when not too many have arrived yet. I have a conversation with the pool as I warm up... :p
I definitely try to avoid warming up before any of the men's sprint events! Although if I were looking for a husband there'd be a huge pool to choose from (pun intended)... nah, I married a 400IMer. Anyways, warm ups aren't generally as crowded around the 200 fly events, and the longer distance events are pretty sparse, because there are hours to warm up before you swim!
Unless I'm in the first event of the first day and haven't been in the competition pool I don't worry about warming up in the comp pool. And I really only care to check the targets on the wall (maybe it's my vision but some look farther away than they are and vice versa), and "feel" the wall (some are slippery, rough, etc.) And I always check those backstroke flags. They've never been off in 13 years of Masters Nationals, that I've noticed. It's nice not to be surprised during a race at Nationals!
here's the perfect solution
Let's just reserve one lane at nationals for john and his posse
have a guest list and a set of written rules
Each guest will sign an affadavit that they will adhere to the rules and vouch it with a substantial security deposit.
we'll place a velvet rope at each end with four gigantic-body- builder-roid-rage bouncers.
Plus have 2 observers at 25 and 50 feet along the side video taping and looking for rule violators to boot.
it's the perfect solution.
raz
