Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Former Member — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 06:16:20 GMT

Jim. Great Idea, I like it. Also a lot of good idea replies. Now all you have to do is to condensed all the ideas . Dom in AZ.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

The Fortress — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 09:53:49 GMT

And be honest, Leslie. Wouldn't you just love to wear a T-shirt that proclaimed, "# 14th Nationally in the USMS 30-34 year old Freestyle Sexathlon". Yes, that appellation holds great appeal. Always ready to lie about my age. But I would rather compete in the British Sexathlon. Why don't we have that?! It's awesome. The check off challenge t-shirt, while a good idea, doesn't rock my world. I need a little more of that vicious competition gridging thing to actually contemplate a distance event like the 200 IM.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

smontanaro — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 09:30:41 GMT

There is already such a thing in British Masters swimming: www.britishswimming.org/.../0,10853,5157-183850-201068-nav-list,00.html I think that makes it easy. Just copy from the Brits' homework. :D Skip

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

jim thornton — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 08:55:02 GMT

Leslie, your point is well taken. Check out the British site that Chris mentions--it's really quite impressive. I think the point of this is to motivate people to swim more meets/events of a variety of stripes, and let the He/She mulitply talented swimmers have a place to excel. And be honest, Leslie. Wouldn't you just love to wear a T-shirt that proclaimed, "# 14th Nationally in the USMS 30-34 year old Freestyle Sexathlon" Really, you're better off not being #1 in this event, the way I currently am with my 88.1 score. I have had to fend off all kinds of inquiries from the industry. You know the industry I'm talking about. They don't like to take no for an answer. That said, Chris, I will pay you all I can to maintain my #1 ranking via software manipulation.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Chris Stevenson — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 06:18:06 GMT

And isn't a real decathlon something that involves more than just one thing? There is already such a thing in British Masters swimming: www.britishswimming.org/.../0,10853,5157-183850-201068-nav-list,00.html USMS can have both kinds of events. I think that there are people out there with impressive "range," who are good at both distance and sprints...(S)he-Man comes to mind...

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

The Fortress — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 05:56:07 GMT

It's called: HUMILITY! Again, Ande: the operative word here is HUMILITY! No need for more of that! I agree with Ande and Quicksilver that the distance swimmers would dominate easily over the true (not faux) sprinters. And isn't a real decathlon something that involves more than just one thing? Decathletes don't just run a 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1 mile, 2 mile, marathon! Jim, I think you need to solve your shoulder woes and get back to doing some real strokes. Signing up for the five pack freestyle every meet is no way to live.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Chris Stevenson — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 05:32:57 GMT

Chris, I just emailed you some fodder for software thought. I also sent this to Mary Sweat, who does the Go the Distance program and seems intrigued with the concept of the Freestyle Decathalon. For what it's worth, I used your VA Masters age calculator, and my friend Bill's 100 pace caclulator, and established an 88.1 ranking. Since I am the first and only person, to my knowledge, to ever do this, I am now the undisputed #1 Freestyle Hexathlon Champion of the universe and will remain so until someone, Ion Beeza?, does the calculations and beats me! Yep, I got it and replied by email. Our LMSC webmaster could easily set something up, I bet, depending on how busy "real life" is at the moment for him. Now, for a modest fee, I can probably jigger the calculations to keep you on the top of the heap. ;) I'll give you my agent's contact info to set up the necessary negotiations...

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

jim thornton — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 04:41:42 GMT

Chris, I just emailed you some fodder for software thought. I also sent this to Mary Sweat, who does the Go the Distance program and seems intrigued with the concept of the Freestyle Decathalon. For what it's worth, I used your VA Masters age calculator, and my friend Bill's 100 pace caclulator, and established an 88.1 ranking. Since I am the first and only person, to my knowledge, to ever do this, I am now the undisputed #1 Freestyle Hexathlon Champion of the universe and will remain so until someone, Ion Beeza?, does the calculations and beats me! I guess Naithsmith was the best basketball player in the universe, too, for the few minutes where he was the only one to know the rules! If anyone else with programming interest would like to help create a plug in calculator, I will be happy to email you directly the background. Jim

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Former Member — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 14:48:53 GMT

I'm not so sure. Say a sprinter beats a distance swimmer by two seconds in the 100. That mean the distance guy/gal needs to beat the sprinter by 33 seconds in the 1650 to erase the sprinter's 100 advantage. This example is possible. In my case, there's this gal that I swim with who is on the SR I team (she's 18). She beats me by about 2 seconds in the LCM 50 FR and more on the 100 (3 seconds or so). She has Senior National cuts and is very near trials times in these events. Anything over a 200 and she falls apart. I start lapping her at 500s and certainly at the 1650 (more than 33 seconds.) It's interesting nonetheless. . . Perhaps this is an extreme example. But don't underestimate the ability of sprinters to fall apart mentally and physically on distance. :rofl:

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 12:49:08 GMT

I suppose this might be hard to enforce, so if we had to, just to get things rolling, we could skip the hour swim and make it the SCY Sexathalon, which, now that I think of it, might actually attract more interest. Technically it would be a hexathlon, but obviously that doesn't have quite the humor factor of a sexathlon :)

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

jim thornton — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 12:28:00 GMT

Ande, I actually do see a huge reason for sprinters to do "dentrimental" distance swims--and vice versa. It's called: HUMILITY! Anyhow, in my personal age group--55-59--the sprints are dominated by Paul Trevisan and the distance events by Jim McConica. Paul had the top 50 time last year with a 22.47, or 44.94 per 100 pace. Jim had the top 1650 time with a 17:11.12 or 1:02.49 per 100 pace. Both are phenomenal. Alas, neither swam--or made the Top 10--in the other's bailiwick. I say that the Freestyle Sexathalon would be incentive for us little guys, with no reputations to protect, to dare to swim all the events. Our humility might just allow us to best some of the greats in the age group who are reluctant to compete in distances where their greatness might not emerge! Perhaps it could be called the USMS Freestyle Dare to Die And/Or Look Slow Sexathalon With Finnish Formula Adjunct (or USMSFDDLSSFFA for short). Chris, my friend Bill wrote this little Excel spread sheet that let's you plug in your time and distance, and it automatically calculates your average 100 pace. Your age adjustment web site is great, by the way. What I would love to see, barring any kind of official embracing of the USMSFDDLSSFFA, is a one-stop web site where you could enter your age, gender, time for the official SCY freestyle events, and it would automatically crank out your average pace, do the percentile ranking for each event, and come up with some specific number--again, I humbly suggest we call this the Jim Index, or maybe the Jim Score--which quantifies your age-adjusted performance at freestyle overall. Then, at meets, we could argue about who's Jim Score is better, and what we events we need to concentrate on to get that Jim Score up. Again, Ande: the operative word here is HUMILITY!

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Former Member — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:29:09 GMT

I often lose count right around the 300 yard mark. Great idea though. Sounds like the distance people would dominate this event.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:17:39 GMT

I see no point for sprinters to do those detrimental distance swims Detrimental to your psyche, you mean? :)

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

ande — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:12:55 GMT

sprinters could do a 25 50 100 & 200 calculate the 25 pace per event then calculate the average 25 pace for all the events I see no point for sprinters to do those detrimental distance swims

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 11:05:20 GMT

Perhaps this is an extreme example. But don't underestimate the ability of sprinters to fall apart mentally and physically on distance. :rofl: Sprinters in Masters don't have to worry about falling apart because they'd never dream of actually swimming a 500, much less a 1650. Kid sprinters only do these events if their coaches force them to. So, actually quicksilver's point is well taken. Distance swimmers would dominate because only distance swimmers actually would swim the entire complement of events required.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 10:23:30 GMT

Sounds like the distance people would dominate this event. I'm not so sure. Say a sprinter beats a distance swimmer by two seconds in the 100. That mean the distance guy/gal needs to beat the sprinter by 33 seconds in the 1650 to erase the sprinter's 100 advantage.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Chris Stevenson — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 04:49:13 GMT

I suppose if we really wanted to make this complicated...we could take each person's final "average 100" yard time and subject it to the Finnish formula. No need to take the "average 100," you can use a similar age-adjusting calculator on the Virginia LMSC web site: www.vaswim.org/.../rcalc.cgi Right now it is set up only for events up to the 1650 but I could easily calculate the records curve for the other swims -- it works for anything that has national records (though Jason, our web master, may not like me much if I ask him to add it!).

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

jim thornton — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 11:11:27 GMT

Thanks Skip and Marcia. I suppose if we really wanted to make this complicated...we could take each person's final "average 100" yard time and subject it to the Finnish formula. This was the subject of a much discuss thread years back, and the magnificent Phil Arcuni created a very fun little web plug in that allows you to "age grade" swims. You can check this out at: http://n3times.com/swimtimes/ Phil, or another computer whiz, could no doubt create a little plug in where you would enter a swimmer's 50-1 hour swims, do all the calculations, spit out the average 100 time, then subject it to the Finnish formula. That way, we could not only decree the All Around Freestyle Swimmer in each age group, but also an All Around Age-Adjusted (by Finnish scientists!) Freestyle Swimmers in the entire association! BTW, I am now 55, and I must thank Phil for giving me the ability to abuse my 20-something teammates endlessly ever since he created that plug in. It's nice to know that when I swim a 53.53 at my age, my friend Robert, 24, must do a 45.7 to equal it!

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

smontanaro — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 10:44:15 GMT

I passed this thread along to Marcia Cleveland. She asked me to pass along her reply: Jim, This is a fun idea. You actually forgot 2 swims: the 3000 & 6000 yard swim, which are part of the OWLD Postal Series. Have you thought about doing that series, which includes the OHP, 5K, 10K and the 3000 and 6000. If you complete all, you receive a patch, your name in the magazine, and bragging right forever. There are a few things to consider with this type of series: 1. Ages. Is the M18-24 who goes :26 for the 50 a "better" swimmer than the W90-94 who goes :59 for the same distance (she'd be the star in the eyes of USMS). This series would be something to rank by age groups. 2. The OWLDC has the aforementioned Postal Series (my brainchild in 2002 - long story some other time) which awards those who put all these distances together. Across USMS, some are easy to put together and some are nearly impossible. The amount of planning that goes into completing this series deserves it's own patch. Then there are the REAL Beautiful People of these events: the TIMERS... 3. Ask the Fitness Chair, Marcia Anziano, "Marcia Anziano" , her thoughts about this and tell her Marcia C. thought it was a fun idea. (In USMS Admin, there are 4 of us Marcia's: A. B. C. & M.) The Half Hour Swim is a Fitness event, and this may be it's last year (Marcia A. would know for sure.) Some of this is covered in the Check off Challenge. 4. Not sure if we need to put a gold star and/or a list of rankings here. Instead, just completing all of these events at some point during a calendar year is an accomplishment and may garner something like the Postal Series Patch. It's a fun idea and has some potential. Thanks for generating an idea like this. Best Fishes, Marcia Cleveland Chair, USMS Open Water Long Distance E: MarciaC944@gmail.com

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Former Member — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 10:34:57 GMT

Nice idea. I'd participate. I agree with Kirk's logic. However, I would guess that distance swimmers would rule this series. Where's the 25K? I guess that would totally cut down on participation. :(

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

Former Member — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 08:52:34 GMT

I'd consider doing it... I think that the inverse points scoring method might be a tad more leveling of the playing field than the averaging of paces...but not completely sure?

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

jim thornton — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 07:17:36 GMT

Maybe the answer would be to limit the number of events to the following: 50 100 200 500 1000 1650 hour swim Call it the SCY Freestyle Septathalon. Even the most committed sprinter is used to doing 1-hour or longer swim practices, and if he or she really didn't want to swim for a continuous hour without breaks, they could just use their total yards for an hour practice (no cheating!) I suppose this might be hard to enforce, so if we had to, just to get things rolling, we could skip the hour swim and make it the SCY Sexathalon, which, now that I think of it, might actually attract more interest. Imagine being able to wear a T-shirt that proudly declares: #4 in the 2009 USMS SCY Freestyle Sexathalon! It would force people to go to at least two decent sized meets, since you usually can't swim the 1000 and the 1650 at the same meet. Too bad that USMS doesn't have the 25 yard event. Our regional Y meets actually allow us to race 25s of all strokes, which is kind of fun--almost impossible to get tired. If we could add the 25, then sprinters would be thrilled--and perhaps willing to add the hour swim! Does anyone out there know how the actual Decathalon is scored?

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 05:05:31 GMT

I'd consider doing it... I think that the inverse points scoring method might be a tad more leveling of the playing field than the averaging of paces...but not completely sure? I think it should be based on time. If someone kicks butt in their 1650 and beats everyone else by 30 seconds they should be awarded for this. Just giving them one more point in the ordinal system wouldn't reflect that like the time would.

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

pwolf66 — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 04:30:18 GMT

Interesting idea but as I would never go above 1650, I would be out. Paul

RE: Freestyle Decathalon Event? All Around Freestyle Honors?

knelson — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 04:10:51 GMT

Those longer events would tend to blow most peoples' averages. Yeah, but that's sort of the idea, isn't it? The people who are good at shorter distances will have an advantage in the short stuff, the distance swimmers will have an advantage in the long stuff. Average it out and you get the best all-around freestyler. The biggest problem I see is getting enough people to do all the events. You could allow people to have missed events, but then how would you handicap them? You obviously wouldn't just let people skip an event with no penalty because then they could just skip the longest event thereby decreasing their average. How about this? Have four categories of events. The sprints would be the 50 and 100 free. Middle distance would be 200 and 500 (or 400). Distance would be 1000 (800) and 1650 (1500). Long distance would be the hour swim, the 5K and the 10K. In each one of the four categories you could pick which event you wanted to use, but only one event in each category would count. For example, in the sprint catgeory if you swam a 24 second 50 free and a 50 second 100 free, you'd use the 50 because that equates to a 48 second pace per 100. However, if you never got around to swimming a 50 that year, you could still use the 50 second 100 as your swim in the sprint category. You could also choose to use whatever course (SCY, SCM and LCM) you want. Obviously short course yards would be ideal, but, again, if you didn't get around to swimming the one hour postal you could still used your 10K long course postal result.