I was just wondering if anyone out there knows of masters swimmers who don’t compete and that have achieved Top Ten Times, American Records, World Records, etc. in practice. I know that stories have circulated around about swimmers like Mark Spitz who have done this (although I think he did compete :)). I was just wondering if there are similar stories in the masters ranks. It seems to me that it would be highly probable in masters swimming because so many of its members do not actually swim at meets. Therefore, I would think there are people out there who achieve these (unofficial) times during a practice session and are relatively unknown. If you’ve got a story to share, please do.
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Former Member
It would be interesting to figure out how many people would swim time trials if you factored out all the inconvenience of attending meets. Say the time trials were held in regular workouts so no extra time commitment were involved and only some lanes were used so you could still get on with your workout. That would deliver the value of measuring your performance, although for people who thrive on head to head competition it would depend on whether you have someone on your team to compete against, although at smaller meets there is no guarantee of close competition either. For people who don't like competition it might be better than a meet. I wonder what other factors make people swim faster at meets and whether they could be simulated in a team time trial setup.
Does anyone swim with a team that does this? Do more people participate (voluntarily) than go to meets?
It would be interesting to figure out how many people would swim time trials if you factored out all the inconvenience of attending meets. Say the time trials were held in regular workouts so no extra time commitment were involved and only some lanes were used so you could still get on with your workout. That would deliver the value of measuring your performance, although for people who thrive on head to head competition it would depend on whether you have someone on your team to compete against, although at smaller meets there is no guarantee of close competition either. For people who don't like competition it might be better than a meet. I wonder what other factors make people swim faster at meets and whether they could be simulated in a team time trial setup.
Does anyone swim with a team that does this? Do more people participate (voluntarily) than go to meets?
