Elite vs. Fitness

Ok, now that we are fairly off topic, I would like to add a couple more items. How about cleaning up the differentiation between "elite" and "fitness" swimmers to avoid the hand wringing about a subjective gray scale? It is simple: fitness swimmers are the ones who, under no circumstances, will compete in an organized competition. Everyone else is "elite". To address Matt's rant, in the foundry and other heavy industries, one of the hardest things to do is to say goodbye to a customer. Despite the fact that the customer eventually pays his bills, he makes unreasonable demands, takes up an inordinate amount of time with complaints both real and imagined, and generally costs you more money than the profit you realize doing business with him. You are ultimately better off asking him to take his business elsewhere. In the pool business, if more managers were to treat their facilities as a precious commodity rather than trying to whore out time and space to anyone who shows up, dedicated members would gladly pay more to swim, in circles, in peace. And the possible upside is that the arrogant, entitled, patronizing person may have a little time on his hands to reflect about what is REALLY important to him, getting in the water for a swim, or being indignantly dry?

Originally posted by BillS Has anyone noticed how civil this potentially incendiary debate is? Why, in the pre-Return to Civility days this would have devolved into a name-calling, trash-talking, late-blooming mudfest by now. That's because most of the fitness swimmers who come to this board realize that, as the poll shows, this USMS board is for adult competitive swimmers and they leave.

I think doing away with the three event limit for those who haven't made the cuts and/or making the cuts themselves more difficult would only drive the wedge further between the elites and the non-elites in masters. I personally think it's pretty cool that anyone can swim at Nationals. It's a great experience whether you win all your events or finish dead last.

Can one be a low keyed competitive swimmer? Our team is very informal, we have workouts of varying difficulty and quite a few of us like the adernaline of meets. I'd like more people on the team, but it is a Y team, and our practices are squeezed literally in between Aquatics classes and several different high school teams who rent out the lanes. Rumor has it the Aquatic instructors encourage their participants to make lots of waves, it is like an open water swim sometimes in the lanes... I hope there is a way that USMS can be both.

Originally posted by Paul Smith If USMS was really committed to growth, was able to reach out via marketing/PR and provided some tangible benefit then the amount of swimmers that would sign up should easilly push our membership into 100,000+ range. Heck, if we started just by really trying to tap into the high school swimmer who's not good enough to swim for a college team how many people a year would that equate to? One thing I've noticed in training with Sun Devil Masters over the years (at ASU) is they do a great job of tapping into this "customer base"........in chatting with a few of these swimmers it blew my mind that virtually none of them new what masters swimming was prior to stumbling upon a workout at the pool. I'd love to see us come up with some type of "invitation" to this group to try out a team in their area. Not sure how we could get access to high school swimmers but it might be interesting to see the response. I believe Illinois Masters has reduced the cost of joining for college kids. Now if I could just convince my son to join. He quit swimming last year and was fairly good. I keep telling him he could do quite well without doing the 4 hours a day he used to do, which drove him out of the sport.

Matt, I am well aware of the initial and ongoing costs of aquatic facilities. I am also aware of the incredibly bad management that is put in place of these facilities (not in all cases, but in enough to make a difference) because municipal, university, or military oversight reaches only to the door of the facility. If there is someone guarding the pool, the institution thinks they have done their job. Nothing is further from the truth. Every lap pool in the country can operate at a profit. Not on lap swimming alone, but on a variety of programs and classes, as well as enlightened management principles that will attract not only customers, sponsors and tenants, but will also attract and support good staff, coaches, guards and maintenance. "If you build it, they will come," is a simplistic yet moving saying, but true enough. Pools have a mystical quality of attraction that is there to be exploited, and the current management systems miss that altogether. Water in any form is an attractant, from ice rinks to fountains and water sculptures. It should be used to that advantage. YMCA pools are the closest I can think of that even approach maximizing the potential of their pools with numerous programs. But even they miss out by limiting the hours of operation and skimping on staffing. Most pools are not open as long as the rest of the facility (in a mixed use setting, likeYMCAs). And to the last poster, this DF is filled with competition of all sorts, each and every one of us trying to persuade all others that we are not full of hot air. Among us there are lots of very helpful, patient persons who go out of their way to explain or counsel even the most novice swimmer on any topic. I disagree with the notion that fitness swimmers are not made to feel welcome here, even though they may feel overwhelmed by the passion that exists in the posts.

Originally posted by aquageek More unsupported hyperbole. I swim on a USMS team with people of extremely varying abilities. I have found that almost all the people who join a USMS team solely for fitness will eventually catch the bug and do a few meets. And, let me tell you, a first time meet participant is great for USMS. I have never seen one fail to return to another meet. USMS members are very encouraging of all levels. You really should stop trying to drive a wedge here based on your own personal views. You can take any workout posted on this forum and adapt it to your fitness level. I have done that many times, either by adding or taking away from a workout. I'm pretty fortunate in this regard. Both my coaches have been flexible and respectful of all levels of swimmer, just asking for us to do our best with what we have. Also, it was mentioned that this was a thread for adult swimmers, which suggests that anyone who comes to this site, whatever his or her experience/skill level, will have the common sense to recast workouts according to individual need. I know the majority of the ppl on this board are swimming more yards than I do, which I expect since I haven't been at it as long. It's no big deal. So if a workout looks interesting to me, I ask myself what about it most interests me, and how I can make it "mine"--although lately, I mainly use the workouts my coach e-mailed to me, which are in fact adapted to my skills.

Originally posted by laineybug That's because most of the fitness swimmers who come to this board realize that, as the poll shows, this USMS board is for adult competitive swimmers and they leave. I don't believe this is the case and I challenge you to support this assertion with facts. The fact is that people who are passionate about swimming will seek out this site and join USMS. A lap/fitness swimmer may not give two shakes about competing and, therefore, find USMS or this DF uninteresting. But, a person truly interested in swimming would hopefully find lots of meaningful information here.

If USMS was really committed to growth, was able to reach out via marketing/PR and provided some tangible benefit then the amount of swimmers that would sign up should easilly push our membership into 100,000+ range. Heck, if we started just by really trying to tap into the high school swimmer who's not good enough to swim for a college team how many people a year would that equate to? One thing I've noticed in training with Sun Devil Masters over the years (at ASU) is they do a great job of tapping into this "customer base"........in chatting with a few of these swimmers it blew my mind that virtually none of them new what masters swimming was prior to stumbling upon a workout at the pool. I'd love to see us come up with some type of "invitation" to this group to try out a team in their area. Not sure how we could get access to high school swimmers but it might be interesting to see the response.

Originally posted by laineybug Add to that the unwillingness of USMS to find a coach who will post workouts for the lowest level swimmer and this site just turns people off. More unsupported hyperbole. I swim on a USMS team with people of extremely varying abilities. I have found that almost all the people who join a USMS team solely for fitness will eventually catch the bug and do a few meets. And, let me tell you, a first time meet participant is great for USMS. I have never seen one fail to return to another meet. USMS members are very encouraging of all levels. You really should stop trying to drive a wedge here based on your own personal views. You can take any workout posted on this forum and adapt it to your fitness level. I have done that many times, either by adding or taking away from a workout.