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.
I may not need it; however, the chart comes in handy when I tackle a new event or one I don't often swim. The chart helps me compare how I am doing in that particular event compared to my core events, and it gives me goals to shoot for. It also helps me compare how I am doing in non-core events compared to each other, such as my 400 IM compared to my (extremely slow) 200 fly. Thanks to the chart, I have learned which events I was better in that I thought- and events that, well, never mind that negativity! :afraid:FYI - I believe Stevenson created this rating calculator www.vaswim.org/.../rcalc.cgi which is a little more user effort but is more detail (rating 2 decimal accuracy ) I find it useful in comparing events.
I may not need it; however, the chart comes in handy when I tackle a new event or one I don't often swim. The chart helps me compare how I am doing in that particular event compared to my core events, and it gives me goals to shoot for. It also helps me compare how I am doing in non-core events compared to each other, such as my 400 IM compared to my (extremely slow) 200 fly. Thanks to the chart, I have learned which events I was better in that I thought- and events that, well, never mind that negativity! :afraid:FYI - I believe Stevenson created this rating calculator www.vaswim.org/.../rcalc.cgi which is a little more user effort but is more detail (rating 2 decimal accuracy ) I find it useful in comparing events.
