Swim Rant

This weekend our local club hosted its annual December meet. 500 kids each day in an indoor, 6 lane 25y pool. Fortunately, it's split session, with 11-14 in the am, and 10/u and 15/o in the pm. My 7 year old swam his first competitive 200y free ever the first night (Fri). Although he shows no fear, he was worried about losing count. So I told him I would use the lap counter for him. He went 3:30(!). The next morning, within 30 secs of arriving on the deck, I got cornered by the meet director and was told that I had violated several USAS rules, the main two being "interfering with the swimmer" and "using a counter for a race of less than 16 lengths". I absolutely lost it (I don't care for anal retentive meet directors, and his approach tee'd me off), and told him that that had to be the stupidest of many stupid USAS rules, and if they wanted to discourage young kids from swimming more than a 50, this was the way to do it.:bitching:

This weekend our local club hosted its annual December meet. 500 kids each day in an indoor, 6 lane 25y pool. Fortunately, it's split session, with 11-14 in the am, and 10/u and 15/o in the pm. My 7 year old swam his first competitive 200y free ever the first night (Fri). Although he shows no fear, he was worried about losing count. So I told him I would use the lap counter for him. He went 3:30(!). The next morning, within 30 secs of arriving on the deck, I got cornered by the meet director and was told that I had violated several USAS rules, the main two being "interfering with the swimmer" and "using a counter for a race of less than 16 lengths". I absolutely lost it (I don't care for anal retentive meet directors, and his approach tee'd me off), and told him that that had to be the stupidest of many stupid USAS rules, and if they wanted to discourage young kids from swimming more than a 50, this was the way to do it.:bitching: