Seeding at Nationals

Dearest Anna Lea, Thank you for the poll mention. :rofl: And I did, in fact, scratch an event last weekend in which I was in lane 8. I'm sure they didn't miss me. At Nationals, I prefer to swim with the fast chicks in my own age group. Uh, seriously, they are way fast. Why would this ever need to be changed? You whiney boys can redo your seeding, but leave mine alone please. Although I know Allen Stark is with me on this. So pfttttt.

The comments in the "PB vs. winning" thread gave me the idea for this poll... What poll?

I would go for the idea of seeding by time only if swimmers were required to enter their best times within a designated time period as well. The sandbagging of times to swim in a slow heat with clear water sucks. I wouldn't mind a little clear water myself, but swim hard to get in front of my heat for it! I swam an 800 free in AZ last month. A gigantic beautiful man swam in the lane next to me. After the start when I took my first pull, I noticed the lane next to me was empty. I remember thinking, oh geez the big guy didn't start! And then suddenly I was smacked with a big wave and swallowed water! Turned out to be one of my favorite sprinting masters swimmers, Mr. A. Rasmussen who vaporized on the start on his way to a WR attempt in the 50 free. FYI, I am 50 and swam a relatively cruiser paced 10:23. and still got lapped! I am a sprinter myself, but I still say... SPRINTERS - sheez!

Dearest Anna Lea, Thank you for the poll mention. And I did, in fact, scratch an event last weekend in which I was in lane 8. I'm sure they didn't miss me. At Nationals, I prefer to swim with the fast chicks in my own age group. Uh, seriously, they are way fast. Why would this ever need to be changed? You whiney boys can redo your seeding, but leave mine alone please. Although I know Allen Stark is with me on this. So pfttttt. YES I am.I like the mano a mano factor.At Nats if you win you win your age group,if your second,your second etc.It's straight forward.

About Allen's fear of racing in an outside lane: the 2008 USMS Rule Book states (102.10.1C) that "It is recommended that when swimmers are seeded by time and not by age groups, the fastest two swimmers in each age group should not be seeded into outside lanes. It is recommended that they be moved inward one lane or given the center lanes in the next slowest heat, whichever is the more appropriate placement." This is only a recommendation, but I don't see why it should be difficult to implement. It is a little less efficient, time-wise, then straight-up seeding by time...but still more efficient than the current method at nationals. I seem to recall -- and Jeff Roddin reminded me of it recently -- that meet directors at LCM Nationals have the option of time-based seeding for 200s (as well as 400s and up) if they think it will help avoid ending the meet at an unreasonable time. At least, I THINK it is only at LCM nationals; I can't seem to find it in the Rule Book. The seeding at LCM Nats in Portland last summer seemed to strike the right balance between age group and time-based seeding. Perhaps it was just my mix of mostly middle distance events and good-but-not-great seed times; a sprinter or elite swimmer might feel differently than I do, but I thought Portland got it right.

Also - I would like to make seed times more accurate - time has to be achieved within the last year (Nationals) . I would go for the idea of seeding by time only if swimmers were required to enter their best times within a designated time period as well. I like seeding by time, but I can live with it the way it is now as my two favorite events are already that way (400 IM/500 free) and I'm not in danger of winning my age group in any of the other events (yet!) so I can get a good race when seeded with the old guys my age. On the quotes above, I agree to a point. I'd extend the time limit to 24 months only because some of us have some "off" years or years where we can't train as much as we'd like to. I think the real "lobby" against seeding by time are the 20 somethings and 30 somethings (Mr. Commings excluded) who don't want to get whooped by us 40 somethings ... oh, wait a minute, let me rethink that as I'm pretty sure Jim McConica still kicks my butt.:)

I like the idea of seeding after times and not age. like we do in the 400 and 800 fri.

The comments in the "PB vs. winning" thread gave me the idea for this poll... But I bet the results will not be similar. In the other poll, a strong majority (>85%) prefers PBs to winning. The reason I prefer time-based seeding is because you are more likely to be in a good race. I still prefer separation by gender, though. Partly (okay mostly) because I don't want to be beat by a woman :) and partly because I think we tub-o-lard men produce more waves, especially in the sprints.

One problem with seeding by time only at Nats is having the top swimmers in an age group in the outside lanes.For instance,at SPMA I was the top seed in the 55-59 age group in the 100 BR and was in lane 8.Another is that the guys I want to swim against,my competition,my very well not be in my heat.Even if we are less than a sec apart at a meet like Nats that can be a lot of swimmers.We could even have the same seed time and one end up in lane 4 in one heat and the other in lane 8 of the next.I am as competitive as the next guy,but if "Joe 25 Yr Old" starts to pull away from me on the last length of the 200 BR I won't have the same visceral response as if it's Jim Clemmons.

But you should have the same visceral response, Allen. A competitor is a competitor, no matter the age. By your line of thinking, I should have coasted into the end of my 100 and 200 IMs simply because I knew I would win my age group. I didn't coast in, because I wanted to beat Erik Hochstein, who is two age groups ahead of me. Anyone who knows me knows I want straight seeding at nationals. I talked with Erik in Long Beach, and he agrees with me. No offense to others in my age group, but if they had seeded by age group in Long Beach, the IMs would have not been as fun for me.