When I started swimming masters a few years ago, I soon found myself wanting some time standards to compare myself against. Sure, tracking my own PRs is motivating, but I also wanted some sort of objective mark to measure myself against.
There is the Top 10 list, of course, but I'm not close enough to those times for them to serve as realistic motivation. Nationals qualifying times provide a slightly lower bar, but these are still out of many masters' reach. It seems like there should be some sort of time standards that are more widely applicable -- like the A, AA, ... motivational times in kids' age group swimming.
I did use those USA Swimming motivational times for a while, but I got tired of comparing myself to 12-year-olds. Eventually I decided to create my own masters' motivational time standards, using the same method that is used for the kids.
I have really enjoyed using these motivational times over the past couple of years, and I'm guessing they might be useful to others as well. Especially for those, like me, who are competitive enough to be motivated by a quantitative benchmark, but not fast enough to aspire to the Top 10 list.
I have just updated the SCY list, and figured I would post it here for others to use.
Please enjoy. I'd also love to hear any feedback.
What do you think the odds are that the two best and most active, mathematically proficient, swim-data curve fitters would both be from the south and have surnames beginning with St?
Better than the odds that they'd also both have the same profession.
I'll point out, though, that my table only required addition and multiplication -- purely 4th grade arithmetic. Chris' nonlinear least squares curve-fitting with power laws requires at least high school algebra.
St. Chris, for his part, knows of this other formula, but it is possible that St. Steve does not. It's an age regression swimming time calculator that Phil Arcuni posted a number of years back on this forum, that is, in the pre-speed suit era.
You are correct in assuming my ignorance, so thanks for the link. The only age-based normalization formulas I knew of before this thread were specific to track & field, so it's great to have swimming-specific ones.
Would either of your fellows care to turn your keen mathematical minds to the job of predicting "equivalent times" with and without such suits--and do so before we need to wait several years for new data to filter in upon which your new curves can be fitted and hung?
Not a chance. I don't know a B70 from a B52, having never been inside either one. My table adopts an "ignorance is bliss" approach on the question of tech suits.
What do you think the odds are that the two best and most active, mathematically proficient, swim-data curve fitters would both be from the south and have surnames beginning with St?
Better than the odds that they'd also both have the same profession.
I'll point out, though, that my table only required addition and multiplication -- purely 4th grade arithmetic. Chris' nonlinear least squares curve-fitting with power laws requires at least high school algebra.
St. Chris, for his part, knows of this other formula, but it is possible that St. Steve does not. It's an age regression swimming time calculator that Phil Arcuni posted a number of years back on this forum, that is, in the pre-speed suit era.
You are correct in assuming my ignorance, so thanks for the link. The only age-based normalization formulas I knew of before this thread were specific to track & field, so it's great to have swimming-specific ones.
Would either of your fellows care to turn your keen mathematical minds to the job of predicting "equivalent times" with and without such suits--and do so before we need to wait several years for new data to filter in upon which your new curves can be fitted and hung?
Not a chance. I don't know a B70 from a B52, having never been inside either one. My table adopts an "ignorance is bliss" approach on the question of tech suits.
