Masters Motivational Times

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.

Guess I'm doing better than I thought since I kinda drug my feet about getting a tech suit, and have just raced in legskins and jammers. I see that I need more endurance since I'm at or just below the AAAA times in my 50s, but am in the AAA times for 100s. Also noticed that I fair better in scm than in scy, which I suspected, although I'm not sure why that is. Neat tool, I appreciate the time put into doing this. :bliss: This is probably because more US swimmers swim SCY than SCM, so the Top Ten is harder to reach. On various occasions, I have made TT in SCM or LCM, but never in SCY. Great tool!

I only wish I understood this argument so I could decide which nerd is winning. I feel equally lost when wookie tries to convince me sheep are better kissers than goats.

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. LOL. One of my best ever masters races was a 200 SCM free in a lane right next to Dave Radcliff, who was 74 at the time. I was 47. I had a modest lead at the first 50 and kept it until the final lap - he outkicked me and had a great finish. I was happy with my time (a 3 second PR) and really enjoyed the race. I shook his hand and offered congrats on a great race. A couple of weeks later he was in our area and worked out with us - a really fun guy to swim with and dangerous in any distance of free. He has a younger spirit than some of my 9 year old age group swimmers and calls me and my hubby, who is your age, "kids". It's all perspective. I also just had a relay experience where I was down over a 1/2 lap of the pool on the fly leg of a 400 Medley Relay and chased down and caught a swimmer 12 years my junior. She knew I was coming fast and her swim was a PR of 4 seconds - again, great race. I think one of the very best things about masters is getting to race against anyone who is close to you in speed. --mj p.s. I never get any sympathy from the DH about my age, as he's always 8.75 years older.

Yes - absolutely - use any point measurement system, FINA or I think US swimming has one as well and compare times. This is probably an ideological impasse since ultimately it is about a choice of what is the appropriate yardstick to evaluate masters times. (I prefer to use masters records, you prefer elite records or presumably other elite standards like US OT qualifying times.) But it occurs to me that possibly one way to check your assertion that the VA rating system undervalues freestyle times would be to rate all the TT times in freestyle -- or maybe just the top times -- and compare them to the other strokes. If the freestyle times are systematically lower then that would lend credence to your argument. I will do this over the weekend (it wouldn't take long but I can't do it now) and report back.

Chris, please don't forget to consider the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium: p^2 + 2pq + q^2 = 1 p = recessive allele q = dominant allele p^2, q^2, and 2pq are percentages. or the effect ofComplex (Imaginary) Numbers: i = SQRT(-1) i^2 = -1 1/i = -i SQRT(i) = SQRT(1/2) + SQRT(1/2)i or, for that matter, the occasionally bamboozling Frustum of Right Circular Cone Volume = (1/3)PI(r^2 + rR + R^2)h Lateral Surface Area = (PI)s(r + R) Total Surface Area = PI r = small radius R = large radius h = height s = slant height = SQRT I know that many of our current readers might find these possible cofounders unnecessarily complicated, but I think the only way to impress Mr. Ehoch and his fastidiously Germanic mathematical mindset is to be as detailed as possible. Just so long as the bottom line conclusion here remains what we all know it to be: that given the various age, psychiatric, physical, and character weakness handicaps that I, Jim Thornton, personally suffer, math proves that I am clearly the best swimmer of all time when the proper mathematical adjustments have been factored in. Thanks, Chris. And you, sir, are a very close No. 2! As for you, Mr. Ehoch, you appear to be the best German now swimming in America in your age group with your knowledge of math.

It's just my opinion - and I understand the math, but for the Men - all the strokes are valued way way too high compared to Freestyle. Have not looked at the women's records. You mentioned Mike's swim from last year" " to Mike's 100 SCY back from last year was 48.49, rated at 106.9" --- in order to get that same rating in Freestyle (same age group), one would have to swim a 42.60 in a 100 Free. Now, a 48.49 is silly fast, but it can't compare to a 42.6. There always exceptions, but for the most part the Free records are much closer to the Open world records than in the strokes. Look at the 200s in my age group - Free record is about 7 seconds above the NCAA record -- Backstroke is 13 / *** 12 sec / Fly 11 / IM 11 I set an IM record and almost a back record - I am not that good of an IMer.

What you are basically saying is that the masters freestyle records are harder than the others. Yes - absolutely - use any point measurement system, FINA or I think US swimming has one as well and compare times. I think you may be underestimating Mike's 100 SCY backstroke swim a little. At age 41 he swam the fastest masters 100 backstroke ever -- at any age -- by over half a second (0.63 sec to be exact). In 100 freestyle, on the other hand, the fastest record is 42.91; 0.63 sec faster than that is 42.28. Come on Chris - that is just nonsense. Of course it's a fast swim, but you can't just pick the fastest Masters times and start comparing. Just because Sabir Mohammad dropped into Masters for a meet and swam a 42 in Masters, does not mean you can just say that is the same as Mike's swim. You are comparing the old apples and oranges. So if Peirsol decided to swim a Masters meet - that would make Mike's swim less valuable ??? There may be another factor too: in her book, Dara Torres also comments on the fact -- and cites research to support her statement -- that aging affects sprinting the least. Certainly her own achievements seem to support that (and I keep meaning to chase down her references). I thought it was always that endurance was easier to be maintained -- all the aging runners go towards the Marathon ... plus I did not say that the sprint records are harder - I said Freestyle. So I don't know that it is a good idea to compare masters times to (say) college times. Aging -- and training volumes for typical masters swimmers -- will affect events differently. 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:

Look at the 200s in my age group - Free record is about 7 seconds above the NCAA record -- Backstroke is 13 / *** 12 sec / Fly 11 / IM 11 The two factors that might explain at least some of this apparent discrepancy: freestyle is the fastest stroke, so in percentage terms, a 7 second change in a 200 free is not quite so far off from a 13 second change in the 200 *** as the number of seconds indicates masters practices, at least in my experience, tend to focus more on freestyle than the other strokes. this is particularly true on "distance" day where almost everyone does freestyle. this might not be the case with top college swimmers, where I would image there would be more specialization in practice by non-freestyle swimmers Chris, I wish there was a way that Hy-Tech could incorporate your ranking system instantaneously with timing results. It would not be much of a boon to the youngsters like Ehoch or Michael Ross or, for that matter, you. But for those of us who have begun "rage, raging against the dying of the light," I suspect there could be some value in being able to approach a 20-something davatchka in the full flower of her youth and say, "Sorry I had to beat you so badly in that event. Is there anyway I might help console you?"

It's just my opinion - and I understand the math, but for the Men - all the strokes are valued way way too high compared to Freestyle. Have not looked at the women's records. What you are basically saying is that the masters freestyle records are harder than the others. I think you may be underestimating Mike's 100 SCY backstroke swim a little. At age 41 he swam the fastest masters 100 backstroke ever -- at any age -- by over half a second (0.63 sec to be exact). In 100 freestyle, on the other hand, the fastest record is 42.91; 0.63 sec faster than that is 42.28. It may well be that the sprint records are generally pretty hard: a lot of people train for them and swim them in meets. There may be another factor too: in her book, Dara Torres also comments on the fact -- and cites research to support her statement -- that aging affects sprinting the least. Certainly her own achievements seem to support that (and I keep meaning to chase down her references). So I don't know that it is a good idea to compare masters times to (say) college times. Aging -- and training volumes for typical masters swimmers -- will affect events differently. In the freestyle events I swim (mid-D and occasionally distance), I don't find the ratings to be downgraded; perhaps the opposite. My freestyle times are often rated pretty comparably to my butterfly times, but at USA-S meets I almost always do significantly better in the fly events. I don't believe the records for the free events at distances of 200 on up are any tougher than in the non-free events. Maybe the take-home message is pretty simple: take the road less traveled. Or, equivalently: it sucks to be a sprinter. But I didn't need any fancy statistics to tell me that. :)