Having just finished another summer league season of interminably long meets, 4-5 hours each, twice a week (and that's with no rain delays), I was wondering if anyone had good ideas for reducing the time it takes to run a meet. Some ideas I've had are:
1 - only announce event, heat and then full description of that event for the first heat. Subsequently, only announce heats.
2 - have kids on blocks when previous heat finishes
3 - drink more to make it less painful
We had one starter at an away meet who would spend 30-45 seconds after each heat talking to folks before she would get the kids on the blocks. I almost lost it.
In all honestly, any tips would be greatly appreciated.
Cripe! Geek - our slowest summer meets here in MoCo, MD are right about 2.5 hours. Divisionals and All stars, where they run two heats of everything, is only about another hour longer. B-Meets - those can last forever b/c of the massive number of heats (of the cute little guys swimming "the moth" during butterfly).
The league employed the use the whistle starts, like USMS, about 10 years ago. Subtle change, but it did make the meets faster (the shortest ones I swam in lasted just over 2 hours). Last swimmer enters flags, whistle blows, everyone gets out and the next heat steps up. Pause for timers to write down times and announce names. Long whistle again, everyone shuts up. "Take your mark;" beep.
30-40 seconds max.
How many heats are you guys running?
Maybe you can have the names being announced while the heat is in the water.
I'd certainly be tiffed at that 45 second talker dudette too. Hopefully she wasn't trying to hit on a married man. :dedhorse:
That's similar to No. Va. We have over 100 swim teams divided into 18 divisions. Within the division, we have 6 A meets (dual meets between teams in the division) on Sat am. Top three swimmers from each team swim, so there's only one heat of each event. Each swimmer can only swim two events and 1 relay. Done in 2 hours. Monday night developmental B meets are longer, usually 3 hours. To reduce the length of the B meets, there are no relays. Only the last two B meets of the summer include the 100 IM. And if a kid places first or second at an A meet, that kid is not eligible to swim at a B meet. This latter rule works great for the USA kids, who are not developmental. Not always so great for the non-USA 10 & Unders and 8 & unders would probably improve more if they swam more. At the end of the dual meet season, there is a divisional championship for each of the 18 teams where each team send 2 swimmers per event. After all 100 teams have their divisional champs, the top 18 times go to All-Stars. That is a 5.5 hour meet. We never use fly over starts though. But then we don't use starting blocks either.
4-5 hours is way too long for a meet ... Are your teams divided into divisions? Are the swimmers limited in the number of events they can swim? Sounds like you need a good referee.
Now, those prelim-final USA meets are the worst. Everyone in the family, especially the swimmer, is ready to die by the end.
Cripe! Geek - our slowest summer meets here in MoCo, MD are right about 2.5 hours. Divisionals and All stars, where they run two heats of everything, is only about another hour longer. B-Meets - those can last forever b/c of the massive number of heats (of the cute little guys swimming "the moth" during butterfly).
The league employed the use the whistle starts, like USMS, about 10 years ago. Subtle change, but it did make the meets faster (the shortest ones I swam in lasted just over 2 hours). Last swimmer enters flags, whistle blows, everyone gets out and the next heat steps up. Pause for timers to write down times and announce names. Long whistle again, everyone shuts up. "Take your mark;" beep.
30-40 seconds max.
How many heats are you guys running?
Maybe you can have the names being announced while the heat is in the water.
I'd certainly be tiffed at that 45 second talker dudette too. Hopefully she wasn't trying to hit on a married man. :dedhorse:
That's similar to No. Va. We have over 100 swim teams divided into 18 divisions. Within the division, we have 6 A meets (dual meets between teams in the division) on Sat am. Top three swimmers from each team swim, so there's only one heat of each event. Each swimmer can only swim two events and 1 relay. Done in 2 hours. Monday night developmental B meets are longer, usually 3 hours. To reduce the length of the B meets, there are no relays. Only the last two B meets of the summer include the 100 IM. And if a kid places first or second at an A meet, that kid is not eligible to swim at a B meet. This latter rule works great for the USA kids, who are not developmental. Not always so great for the non-USA 10 & Unders and 8 & unders would probably improve more if they swam more. At the end of the dual meet season, there is a divisional championship for each of the 18 teams where each team send 2 swimmers per event. After all 100 teams have their divisional champs, the top 18 times go to All-Stars. That is a 5.5 hour meet. We never use fly over starts though. But then we don't use starting blocks either.
4-5 hours is way too long for a meet ... Are your teams divided into divisions? Are the swimmers limited in the number of events they can swim? Sounds like you need a good referee.
Now, those prelim-final USA meets are the worst. Everyone in the family, especially the swimmer, is ready to die by the end.
