Clovis in 09??

I may be wrong, but I see from some of your posts that you think in primarily the competitive mode. There is nothing wrong with that, I am only establishing a baseline. USMS is made up of over 75% non-competitive swimmers. I do not call them fitness, because I presume that even the highly competitive swimmers derive some fitness benefit from the activity. We cannot ignore them to charge about only looking for competition venues, but have to balance our efforts in order to serve all of the membership. This results some times in no one being happy. Michael, I am very confused by this paragraph. Are you saying that consideration for the location of Nationals should also consider the non-competiive USMS members? If so, why? Isn't Nationals a swim meet and by that fact a competitive affair? Therefor only the competitive swimmers would attend? If that was the case, then you could hold Nationals in Upper Slobovia and you would get a large percentage of the competition contingent. BUT......... For a moment here, let's pretend that Nationals are about increasing the participation, then you have to consider methods to draw out the non-competition folks. And rather than put Nationals in non-attractive locales (and I for one, consider Fresno a non-attractive locale, we can have a private discussion on that one if you wish), consideration has to be given to incentives to come and see what a Nationals is like. Speaking for myself (the only person I CAN speak for), having Nationals in locales that offer more than just a swim meet can only be a positive thing. I don't have a long history of attending Nationals as I just started in Masters a year ago but I have attended both Austin and Portland. Maybe that was just first year euphoria that I attended both. I seriously doubt I will be able to do that again unless one of the Nationals is within easy driving distance. But I do plan on attending 1 Nationals a year until I leave this planet and so I have to evaluate the cost-benefit for SCY and LCM. And for me, 2009's winner is Indy. For the following reasons, in no apparent order: - It's closer, I can drive to Indy in less time than it would take me to travel to Fresno. (9 hour total drive, when I want to leave versus 11+ hour total plane trip with limited options) - It's indoors - I don't do well in outdoor, open air venues. - There are things for my family to do there (museums, a nice local zoo, etc.) while I am swimming. - More of my friends will be attending Indy than Fresno. But, in my limited experience with USMS, it appears to me (there may be things going on that I am not aware of but as this is MY perception, it is 100% accurate) that USMS is failing in it's primary responsibility concerning Nationals. And that is to make Nationals as attractive AS POSSIBLE to all USMS members and in doing so, to possibly attract new members. If Clovis was the only SCY bid for 2009, then so be it. But WHY was it the only bid? What is USMS doing to reach out to it's 44,000+ members to try to HELP generate more bids. I know what folks here such as Mark, Paul, etc. are doing and that is fantastic but where are the indications that USMS leadership is doing something about it? It might be out there, but I can't see it from where I am.

I may be wrong, but I see from some of your posts that you think in primarily the competitive mode. There is nothing wrong with that, I am only establishing a baseline. USMS is made up of over 75% non-competitive swimmers. I do not call them fitness, because I presume that even the highly competitive swimmers derive some fitness benefit from the activity. We cannot ignore them to charge about only looking for competition venues, but have to balance our efforts in order to serve all of the membership. This results some times in no one being happy. Michael, I am very confused by this paragraph. Are you saying that consideration for the location of Nationals should also consider the non-competiive USMS members? If so, why? Isn't Nationals a swim meet and by that fact a competitive affair? Therefor only the competitive swimmers would attend? If that was the case, then you could hold Nationals in Upper Slobovia and you would get a large percentage of the competition contingent. BUT......... For a moment here, let's pretend that Nationals are about increasing the participation, then you have to consider methods to draw out the non-competition folks. And rather than put Nationals in non-attractive locales (and I for one, consider Fresno a non-attractive locale, we can have a private discussion on that one if you wish), consideration has to be given to incentives to come and see what a Nationals is like. Speaking for myself (the only person I CAN speak for), having Nationals in locales that offer more than just a swim meet can only be a positive thing. I don't have a long history of attending Nationals as I just started in Masters a year ago but I have attended both Austin and Portland. Maybe that was just first year euphoria that I attended both. I seriously doubt I will be able to do that again unless one of the Nationals is within easy driving distance. But I do plan on attending 1 Nationals a year until I leave this planet and so I have to evaluate the cost-benefit for SCY and LCM. And for me, 2009's winner is Indy. For the following reasons, in no apparent order: - It's closer, I can drive to Indy in less time than it would take me to travel to Fresno. (9 hour total drive, when I want to leave versus 11+ hour total plane trip with limited options) - It's indoors - I don't do well in outdoor, open air venues. - There are things for my family to do there (museums, a nice local zoo, etc.) while I am swimming. - More of my friends will be attending Indy than Fresno. But, in my limited experience with USMS, it appears to me (there may be things going on that I am not aware of but as this is MY perception, it is 100% accurate) that USMS is failing in it's primary responsibility concerning Nationals. And that is to make Nationals as attractive AS POSSIBLE to all USMS members and in doing so, to possibly attract new members. If Clovis was the only SCY bid for 2009, then so be it. But WHY was it the only bid? What is USMS doing to reach out to it's 44,000+ members to try to HELP generate more bids. I know what folks here such as Mark, Paul, etc. are doing and that is fantastic but where are the indications that USMS leadership is doing something about it? It might be out there, but I can't see it from where I am.