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.
Well - I compare swimming times - and I know the records in my age group pretty well. I will give you the LCM 200 records in seconds above the world record...
200 Free + 13 /// Back + 21 // *** + 16 // Fly + 14 // IM + 18
In your theory they are all equally strong -- I just totally disagree. Here the Free / Fly and *** are about the same - but Back is way off. Maybe we disagree because I am a Freestyler and you are a Backstroker :bump:
You chastise me for cherrypicking my data, and then you do the exact same thing? :) The rating system does not say those particular records are equally strong; in fact it more or less agrees with your analysis of the records in your age group.
200 free: 101.2
200 back: 99.3
200 ***: 102.6
200 fly: 102.4
200 IM: 100.6
What the system does is say that, across all age groups, the records in a given event (ie, combination of distance/stroke/gender/course) are equally strong. (I should point out that I use a "statistically robust" regression method that devalues records that seem abnormally strong or weak.)
I think that if you want to evaluate MASTERS times, using MASTERS records makes the most sense, rather than using elite WRs or other standards. There are several reasons:
-- using masters WRs/ARs allows one to model the effects of age, where elite WRs do not easily lend themselves to this
-- masters are not elites. Or, as you say, apples should be compared to apples.
-- there are already some age-independent rating systems out there based on things like WRs. You can use them if you don't think you get a fair shake from this one.
Well - I compare swimming times - and I know the records in my age group pretty well. I will give you the LCM 200 records in seconds above the world record...
200 Free + 13 /// Back + 21 // *** + 16 // Fly + 14 // IM + 18
In your theory they are all equally strong -- I just totally disagree. Here the Free / Fly and *** are about the same - but Back is way off. Maybe we disagree because I am a Freestyler and you are a Backstroker :bump:
You chastise me for cherrypicking my data, and then you do the exact same thing? :) The rating system does not say those particular records are equally strong; in fact it more or less agrees with your analysis of the records in your age group.
200 free: 101.2
200 back: 99.3
200 ***: 102.6
200 fly: 102.4
200 IM: 100.6
What the system does is say that, across all age groups, the records in a given event (ie, combination of distance/stroke/gender/course) are equally strong. (I should point out that I use a "statistically robust" regression method that devalues records that seem abnormally strong or weak.)
I think that if you want to evaluate MASTERS times, using MASTERS records makes the most sense, rather than using elite WRs or other standards. There are several reasons:
-- using masters WRs/ARs allows one to model the effects of age, where elite WRs do not easily lend themselves to this
-- masters are not elites. Or, as you say, apples should be compared to apples.
-- there are already some age-independent rating systems out there based on things like WRs. You can use them if you don't think you get a fair shake from this one.
