Elite vs. Fitness

Steve, Dude..... if anyone has mastered the art of dragging and cheating to go fast with minimal effort it's me. I guarantee you that if you move over next to someone that is half a body length ahead of you, you WILL catch a draft. As Martha would say....."It's good thing"..... and the bigger the monster in the other lane the better the wave. Hawaii Five-O dude ! Never waste a good drag.... so move over. John Smith

Not swimming related, but here's another example of the "I got mine, Jack" mentality. "LONGMONT, Colo. - A man who said he bought a device that let him change traffic lights from red to green received a $50 ticket for suspicion of interfering with a traffic signal. "Jason Niccum of Longmont said the device, which he bought on eBay for $100, helped him cut his time driving to work. “I guess in the two years I had it, that thing paid for itself,” he told the Daily Times-Call on Wednesday. "Niccum was cited after city traffic engineers who noticed repeated traffic light disruptions at certain intersections spotted a white Ford pickup passing by whenever the patterns were disrupted." Full story at: www.msnbc.msn.com/.../ Now we've all fantasized about changing ill-timed or long cycle traffic lights. We don't actually do it because to speed one vehicle on its way causes far greater delay for everyone else caught in the same traffic pattern, so we reserve that for emergency vehicles who really need it. This is intuitively obvious to everyone, except this narcissistic , and it speaks volumes about this so & so that after he's caught, after the disruption he's caused for two years becomes apperant, his attitude is that he feels it was worth it because he got away with it for two years! Some might ask what has that to do with us? I'll grant you this is peripheral. I would like to point out that I feel Masters is similar to a traffic pattern in that we are all in this together. We all have to contribute towards building the roads, or they won't exist, just as all of us have to contribute towards building USMS. We all use the roads, just as all of us participate in Masters events, and no one will be able to get anywhere without all of us being able get to where we are going. I'm not saying NQTs, lap swimming, or any particular aspect of Masters swimming is sacred, but I am saying that the minute you start thinking "I got mine, Jack" and everyone else can take care of themselves, you will do damage to what we have all built together. BTW, all of us owe a great debt to the pioneers and the leaders of Masters swimming who put in the volunteer hours with little thanks other than their personal satisfaction, who started the meets that are now big deals, but at the time were crappy little local events with a half dozen people showing up that they nutured into what they are today. I could go on, but the point is we can NEVER repay the June Krausers or the Bill Earlys, etc. etc. for what they did that all of us are living off of right now. Where then do some of us get off staking out as if they own it a corner of the sandbox that belongs to everyone? Matt

Did not think drafting was cheating it is to go with the flow... Smeone else's flow.

I've heard that this years Nationals in Coral Springs will be lower in attendance. Let's see how this affects the duration of the meet each day. Matt S....... stop rambling. From now on, you are required to say what you have to say in less than 5 paragraphs..... :-) John Smith

Originally posted by Steve Ruiter and you agree that it is monotonically increasing with age over 18 I certainly don't agree with that. I'll agree that when you get to a certain age it's probably difficult to better your personal bests, but that age is significantly over 18.

Originally posted by Steve Ruiter I think we should change all the age groups to 25+, 30+, 35+, ... and report results that way Boy, that's pretty harsh on the young swimmers, isn't it? After all they have to beat everyone, regardless of age. The older swimmers only need to beat those their age and older. Catch my drift on this? It sure doesn't seem to defy "ageism" in my book.

On drafting in a race, I've done it myself and I still disagree, but really don't care. Re my 25+, 30+ agegroup idea being harsh against younger folks, that is the intent, if harsh = realistic. If you consider age a race time "handicap" in the golf score sense, and you agree that it is monotonically increasing with age over 18, how can you argue any other way? My use of the word "ageism" may not be right. I don't like the effect of cutting all the competitions into enough pieces so that everyone is a champion or gets their own record.

What about the self produced solution? What if anything is stopping a like minded group from renting there own fast pool in a nice location? Then setting mandatory and provable qualifying times or restrict the heats. Do a little marketing to get the fast boys & girls out etc. I don't know of anything in USMS rule book that would prevent this or stop sanctioning. You could still set records and get Top Tens.

Re; seeding for Nationals-ABSOLUTLY KEEP IT THE WAY IT IS. I go to nationals to swim head to head with the best in my age group. I certainly don't go to watch close races. I doubt many people watch any heats at nationals that don't have a friend or teammate or someone REALLY fast in them.

Peak Performance Age: OK, its probably over 18, but where would you say it is? 25? 30? Can you show anything to back that up statistically? (it will take more than mentioning a small handful of names of people that have done PRs over that age). What is the distribution of open-age WR times? I think that the theoretical "handicap" curve is pretty flat from 18 to maybe up to 40, but then it has a more noticeable slope. In the flat parts, it can be overcome by other factors, but that does not make it invalid, does it? Nationals Seeding: Its not about watching races, but making optimal circumstances for fast swimming, which I believe is closer races for the fastest swimmers, regardless of age. Self Run Meets: we can't get more than one bid for nationals now, its a pipe dream to think that we could either put on such a meet or if we did that we could attract the competition (I wish I were wrong.) Maybe it is possible but would take a number of years to catch on, but I guess that is what got USMS here today...I still think that USMS could and should make that happen a lot faster.