I just heard that two more universities, Rutgers and James Madison, are ditching men's swimming while spending zillions on football and golf. My own alma mater almost cut women's swimming several years ago. They were saved by alumni fundraising, but not until the swim team put itself up for sale on ebay. Endurance sports get no respect. It makes no sense. I thought open water swimming and triathlons and road racing were on the rise even among young kids. If so, why cut all those sports in college? I guess it's still just a miniscule percentage that participate compared to other sports, like my least favorite youth sport -- travel soccer.
Geek:
You can always use my "it's too far to travel excuse" or my "I don't like 3 hour time changes" excuse.
I agree that there are more girls than boys at meets especially in the younger age groups. But I still think interest is up in the sport where I live (outside DC). I had to wait 5 years to get into my own neighborhood summer league swim club!
From my observations, if there are fewer boys, it is because boys in elementary school just don't like swimming very much. It's tedious. They swim up and down the lanes. It's mostly indoors. It requires hard work and inflicts pain. I've had many boys tell my 6th grade daughter that they just don't like USS swimming very much. They'd rather play travel soccer, the only sport that seems to matter here.
Geek:
You can always use my "it's too far to travel excuse" or my "I don't like 3 hour time changes" excuse.
I agree that there are more girls than boys at meets especially in the younger age groups. But I still think interest is up in the sport where I live (outside DC). I had to wait 5 years to get into my own neighborhood summer league swim club!
From my observations, if there are fewer boys, it is because boys in elementary school just don't like swimming very much. It's tedious. They swim up and down the lanes. It's mostly indoors. It requires hard work and inflicts pain. I've had many boys tell my 6th grade daughter that they just don't like USS swimming very much. They'd rather play travel soccer, the only sport that seems to matter here.
