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.
USMS really should just take this over and maintain it. They should create a Hy-tek file for use by Hy-tek's Team Manager and Meet Manager software so meet results could tag the times in result listings.
That would be very cool, to have times tagged automatically in meet results. Too bad I know nothing about Hy-tek.
I'm not sure everyone would want their times "scored" in public, though.
Between this and the masters rating calculator (mentioned on a recent thread, developed by Chris Stevenson) I feel like I've been handed some pretty useful tools for self-assessment. Thanks so much for your effort, Steve.
Very cool, thanks for the link.
I think if I had known about that rating calculator earlier, that would have satisfied my need for an objective benchmark, and I wouldn't have bothered with these time standard charts.
I think if I had known about that rating calculator earlier, that would have satisfied my need for an objective benchmark, and I wouldn't have bothered with these time standard charts.
Glad you didn't know: the chart provides an overview that has real value. Thanks again.
Great idea! This is actually a great idea on doing this sheet. Growing up we always had to have a AAA time (or was AA?) in order to be a Georgia All-Star and get the coveted "All-Star Towel" each year (of which I still have 3 from the 80's!). They would put what time standard you reached (could also be Senior Nats, Junior Nats, Olympic Trials) an had you name stitched on it.
Good to see that I'm somewhere between AA and AAA....I'm almost an All-Star again! :D:applaud:
I have a couple of those Georgia All-Star towels from the 80s as well - my daughter uses them now and loves to answer questions about them!
Steve, thanks for doing this! Having the motivational times will help me and my swimmers.
Chris - can you explain your rating calculator like you would to a second grader please? Say, for instance you have an 85% rating on an event, what does that mean to those of us with liberal arts educations?
Where did you get your education? UNC? Geez, if you had gone to Duke, you wouldn't need to be talked too like you are stillwater or dolphin2.
Chris, please explain to slugapuss grad in 1st grader terms, so that there is no confusion on his part.
Jim Jim Jim, don't worry so much. Alzheimer's will take care of your comparison worries. Each new time will become a personal best time as far as you can remember. There is greatness in your future!
A great idea I heard is to consider every new master's age group as a new baseline. So, Jim, you are only 2.x years away from aging up and doing all new PR's in your new age group. :applaud:
--mj
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:
Do you think that one of the factors here with backstroke could be that this stroke has changed more in recent years than the others? I am speaking specifically of turns and SDKS. Anyone in their 40s almost certainly did not learn these in the early part of their backstroke careers, back in the days when nobody SDK'd off the walls, and you had to touch each wall with your hand on every turn.
Maybe the reason the 200 backstroke masters records are so much further off the world records than other strokes is because most masters past a certain age had to learn these new techniques in later life. They might be very, very good at them--Chris and Mike Ross have superb SDKs. But perhaps the world record is held by somebody who learned these things when he was 4 or 5.
If this has any validity, then one might predict that breaststroke, too, would show some greater divergence in masters records since the wave stroke was also pioneered relatively recently. Watching guys swim this at Nationals, and you still see the flat style predominating in older age groups.
A great idea I heard is to consider every new master's age group as a new baseline. So, Jim, you are only 2.x years away from aging up and doing all new PR's in your new age group. :applaud:
--mj
Thanks. I will talk to the undertaker about the hull speed of my future coffin.
Perhaps this will keep me afloat as I cross the river Styxx, joining Dylan Thomas on the far banks in the not too distant future.
