Picture that you have been suddenly transported to an alternative universe in which none of the swimmers enjoys competition. You find yourself the president of an organization sort of like USMS and have been put in charge of designing programs for swimmers who aren't at all interested in racing but who enjoy swimming and have a desire to improve. What do you think an organization like USMS would look like under such a scenario?
A couple of things have been suggested to me:
Think of swim clinics like TI offers but based on a largely volunteer basis like USMS is instead of having an entrepreneurial basis. Instead of going to meets to race swimmers would be going to clinics to learn, and yes, test their progress.
Consider the number of person-hours needed to organize a swim meet, just in terms of officials. A tremendous amount of effort is put into ensuring a "fair race" and that times swum at one meet can fairly be compared to times swum at another. If you were able to get the same number of people to volunteer the same number of hours and undergo the same level of training aimed in a more instructional vein what could you accomplish? It seems to me that you could organize really great clinics, that non-competitive swimmers would benefit from a lot more than swimming in a meet and perhaps still obtain a similar social experience.
Would it be possible to produce tools for evaluating swimmers progress that would be more informative than just time in a race? For example could one use stroke checklists to give more feedback on technique? Could you develop standardized evaluation tools that, for example, used inexpensive video equipment to do a detailed analysis of a swim, including all the stuff currently used for analysis of elite swimmers such as reaction time, distance under water, time to 15m, stroke count and turnover, turn time, etc..
I suspect that there is a lot of great stuff being done at larger more established clubs that have really good coaches that could be captured and documented and codified and used in the many clubs that are currently struggling to find a good coach in their area that they can afford.
What can you envision?
I'm still interested in hearing Geek's plan for including a swimmer like myself.
I think because you are not a member and haven't taken any time to understand USMS, you are missing all that is done for swimmers exactly like you. I will list a few below.
First, our magazine, love it or hate it, is quite diverse in it's presentation of all levels of swimming in USMS. There is usually a big color spread of stroke technique and/or dryland exercises. Of course, since you won't become a member, you don't see this. For goodness sakes, they put noodlers on the cover a few months back. There are articles on nutrition, human interest stories and product reviews. I would hazard a guess that less than 50% is devoted to competition, probably much less than 50%.
Next, take 5 minutes to look at the USMS web site. Have you ever done that? You will note a ton of info for non competitive swimmers. There are workouts for all levels. Or, take a FREE workout and modify it to your abilities. My favorite part is the places to swim section which has come in handy many times when I travel. There is a whole section on health and fitness.
Third, if you want a vision of USMS for swimmers like you, why won't you even bother visiting a team, just once in your life? You'd immediately realize that most swimmers don't compete. So, why are they there, FITNESS. And, they pay their dues, btw.
Lastly, you state you have no interest in meets or the social aspect. I can't help you with the social thing, swimmers like to socialize. But, you earlier stated you wanted a fitness meet with stroke judges. It's hard to follow you when you contradict yourself so often. Every USMS meet I have attended has stroke judges.
I didn't compete for my first 5 years in USMS. That made me a fitness swimmer. The technique work, coaching, friendships were what kept me around.
Today at our team workout, we had two new members. How many people asked if they competed? Zero. How many people welcomed them? All.
Apologies for the length of this. I'm just sick of the continued assault on Master's swimming from a person with absolutely no involvement in the sport and no knowledge as to what it offers.
Is there really much difference between a fitness swimmer and a meet swimmer?
A Fitness swimmers and a Meet swimmers can swim the same workouts - distance work, stroke work, speed work, etc. The two swim in the same pool - sometimes even in the same lane. Chances are one loves the sport the same as the other. Just a meet swimmer swims meets - which are essentially an extra workout if you really think about it.
I concurr with several folks that a lot of their teams are at least 50% Fitness swimmers - in fact in my locale, we have had ~15-20 new teams registered with USMS in the last couple of years, and I have yet to see a team representative for 60% of them at a meet. Also, the LMSCs in our region (we have 3 in the area) host several 1000/1650 or 800/1500 meets throughout the year - essentially "fitness meets."
At the end of the day, whether you want to train for a meet/tri or just to get in shape, any swimmer knows - you just jump in a pool and swim because you love it!:wave:
Geek, all you did was list what is already available. I may be wrong, but the purpose of this thread was to come up with NEW IDEAS, a non-competitive vision.
The continued problem with your years' long argument is that you are clammoring for new ideas yet have never taken a single moment to learn about what USMS already offers, most of which is suited very well to the fitness swimmer.
To date, perhaps a dozen people have told you that USMS is composed primarily of fitness swimmers. Just because you don't take the time to learn or participate does not mean that USMS is neglecting fitness swimmers.
What is preventing you from starting a USMS team in your town that you can mold as you see fit? Nothing. You have told us time and again you don't want to compete, you don't want to be coached, you don't want to leave your tiny hamlet, you don't want to learn about USMS. Seems all you care to do is complain about something you don't care to learn more about. If you'd like, private message me your address and I'll send you the USMS Swimmer Mag when it comes out.
Take a minute, look at the website, visit a team, you might just realize we have most of what you already want. Better yet, visit our team and see it in action. Alternatively, continue being uneducated, the choice is yours.
Geek, all you did was list what is already available. I may be wrong, but the purpose of this thread was to come up with NEW IDEAS, a non-competitive vision. Since you didn't provide any new or creative ideas I must assume you don't have any. Or, that you feel there isn't any need for new ideas.
You must not be reading the entire thread. I suggested a time standard as one criteria. Others have suggested that technique might be another criteria. I included the idea of a stroke judge, who should probably be called a 'technique judge,' as a means of demonstrating how two ideas could be merged.
In 'think tank' situations ideas are not criticise, they are merely put out on the table. If the idea(s) have potential it is elaborated and expanded on. If not it is discarded. Now, do you have a NEW idea to contribute to this thread, or not?
Elaine -
Here are some random ideas for the fitness-based swimmer:
1) A benchmark can be set - this would either be a given time for a distance, a total yardage for a set time, or total yardage for a longer period of time (e.g. month/season/year.). Once the benchmark is set, then for every x percent of improvement or user-defined improvement, the swimmer would receive a certificate attesting to the fact. Obviously, this is an "on your honor" system and the certificates could be made available off the USMS website as a pdf file to be filled out by the participant. Minimal cost/administration/fuss.
2) On-line workout/benchmark tracking database. Available to any USMS member (sorry, but this probably has a cost associated with it) to keep his/her training log, goal tracking etc. Maybe some snazzy graphics, etc. Benchmark achievement automatically sent (if person allows) to a new forum, the purpose of which is to announce same. Also, it would be possible to have this trigger the user receiving an above-mentioned certificate(s). No idea if something like this is available commercially. If it would have to be developed by USMS, it's probably too involved/expensive.
3) Achievements (again, on your honor) result in a small discount on USMS merchanise (or a sponsor) - not enough to make it unprofitable for the sponsor, and hopefully the increased volume would result in greater volume discounts for the providers.
4) Arrange for discounts through USMS for a fitness member to get a discount at one of the diet services (Weight watchers, etc...)
5) Arrange for a discount at one of the fitness clubs (Curves, Gold's Gym, etc...)
6) Certificate if you compete in your first meet, regardless of time, place, etc.
7) Larger rewards if your name is "S. Elaine" and you tell me what the "S." stands for, since I am still curious.
-LBJ
Your memory fails you Geek. I have attempted to start a team and coaching is ONE of the things I want.
You still haven't offered any new innovative ideas. That is what this thread is about. All you are doing is attacking me for offering some.
Masters Swimming Canada has a new website, MyMSC.ca where swimmers can enter the metres swum each workout and be recognized with certificates and swim caps and such as they reach various distance milestones in a program called the Million Metre Challenge. It will summarize your monthly totals and you can look at a calendar view with a graphical representation of your daily training. It has been quite popular, over a thousand people having participated. The site also allows you to record your running and cycling workouts, and you can record your times in all the events, official or unofficial. On the competitive side you can look up all your meet results and see how you rank nationally or by province, and it will automatically list any national records you hold and provincial records for some provinces. The plan is to add a lot more functionality for tracking training and improvement (time for 1km, "golf scores", etc.).
Geek, Lainey has never joined USMS because she does not believe the organization has anything to offer her as a fitness swimmer (aside from this discussion forum, apparently, which is of course supported by our dues). So it's safe to assume that the services you listed (as well as others you did not) are of no interest to her. Are there things USMS could do to improve itself as an organization? Sure. But the concept of improvement implies that there is something of value to improve upon.
