Opportunity to Grow Masters Swimming?

I was wondering whether USMS might consider sponsoring a college club championship next year. It would grow membership and it would introduce young swimmers to our organization. Anyone out there from USMS listening? ... Just a thought for USMS.....college club swimming. Tim - Are you suggesting that the clubs would all join USMS, and then be subject to USMS rules? Or would you impose NCAA or USAS rules on the meet to keep it more in line with NCAA's? I also think there might be issues with insurance if not all the swimmers were USMS registered, and the meets were not officially "sanctioned". I guess the question would then be, would the college club "championships" only be opened to college clubs so designated, or would it become just another national USMS meet? Food for thought.... other ideas?

I knew Kieth for a long time and he seemed an OK guy.I lost contact with him right before he formed ASA.I didn't understand it then and I still don't.I think the joke is that ASA is the organization that sponsors the College club championship.I don't know who should run it,but if it is a serious meet then it should be an organization that takes rule seriously,if it is just for fun then lighten up.I think the idea that they make up there own rules and then take them seriously is ridiculous.You don't see FINA doing that(no,wait,I guess you do:bolt:)

In addition to trying to snag the club championships, we could double down on our growth potential by swimming under our rules and by telling FINA to piss off for SCY and allowing the suits. Like ASA, we already have our own set of wacky rules. In addition to allowing the suits through June of this year, we race 50s of stroke and the 100 IM. (And of course there is always Allen's perennial favorite, the butterfrog). But considering that we have the likes of Cullen Jones, Nick Brunelli, and Mark Gangloff coming to Hotlanta (and presumably wearing magic suits); and with Gangloff and Brunelli competing in the 100 IM, I'm guessing our wacky rules have an appeal to some. I believe that continuing to allow the suits would allow USMS to continue to attract top swimmers to our events. It would also no doubt result in a load of free publicity, especially if the times were tantalizingly fast. Attracting a top level championship in the younger age demographic, or even just signing up more members in the underrepresented 18-24 and 25-29 age groups, would only benefit our organization.

Tim - Are you suggesting that the clubs would all join USMS, and then be subject to USMS rules? Or would you impose NCAA or USAS rules on the meet to keep it more in line with NCAA's? I also think there might be issues with insurance if not all the swimmers were USMS registered, and the meets were not officially "sanctioned". I guess the question would then be, would the college club "championships" only be opened to college clubs so designated, or would it become just another national USMS meet? Food for thought.... other ideas? Yes, my thought would be that the college club teams become USMS registered as well as all their members. USMS rules would apply. My first thought was a separate USMS nationals meet for any registered USMS college club and maybe you could open it up to any USMS member that is attending college or something just in case they don't have a registered college club. I guess you could also do it as part of our normal short course nationals, but have a separate scoring for the college teams or you could just have a separate meet altogether. A combined meet might be too large though. It seems like with many colleges don't have opportunities for their students to compete in swimming and I guess if there is a demand, then there should be a supply and USMS seems like a logical organization to step-in. ASA seemed to be growing prior to this incident and they have 60-plus schools involved some of which have Division I programs. Someone commented that it was unfortunate that there is a need for such a championship and it is unfortunate, but probably more and more a reality. These swimmers appear to fit squarely into USMS. They are 18 and over and swim only for fitness and fun and they have no opportunity to compete in an NCAA sanctioned meet. In the Big 12 there are only 3 schools with NCAA mens programs. There is pent-up demand for swimming competition and the comradery that comes along with it. There are a lot of college pools going to waste. Tim

That part was good, but my very favorite part was the part about re-doing the awards: "Reports also indicated that after the meet was rescored, some teams were requested to restage their podium photo shots, but it is unclear if any team complied." I understand the importance of having a club championship, but what a joke of an organization! If they want "fun" rules, then they will get that type of behavior from the swimmers. Yes, they will take it seriously to an extent but its there for the swimmers to have a good time. Dr Keith Bell is taking this a bit too seriously... From what I can gather about this, it all started off with a letter that offended the ASA? That was proposing a few rule changes. The fact that they got all worked up over a proposal is pretty sad. I don't think CU was trying to change how he ran the ASA, but just giving what they thought was a good idea, and then get kicked out is a bit drastic. Dr Bell is a joke for doing this. :blah:

Another 400 IM that went completely off the rails: in a Division I dual meet, we ran the normal college dual meet format except that the 200 IM was a 400 IM. Our coach told us the day before that the change was at the other coach's request. I would later wonder if that was really true. Here's what happened: the 400 IM started and 6 guys swam fly down the pool. 5 of them continued to swim fly; the guy in the middle lane for the other team switched to backstroke and of course was DQ'd. He completed a 100 IM, did another 25 fly, another 25 back, and then got out of the pool. A shame really; it would have been interesting to see what kind of time he could have posted doing a 400 IM that way. A few seconds later one of his teammates completely botched his backstroke flip turn at the 150 and got DQ'd. Since he was on his back and the official was right in front of him, he saw that he was DQ'd, so he decided to pull on the laneline for the remainder of the backstroke leg. Our team didn't engage in any shenanigans and of course we won the meet easily. Hard to imagine losing to those clowns...

That article reads more like something from The Onion than from Swimming World.

This has to be my favorite part of the story.... "Keith Bell spoke of one other instance that he said he had never heard about in more than 50 years in competitive swimming. "In the 400 IM, two of their swimmers were DQ'd (for unsportsmanlike conduct) for rolling over on their backs on freestyle and waving to everybody," Keith Bell said. "It's as if they were mocking the event. You don't see that kind of thing happening at (USA Swimming) nationals." He compares his "ASA National Championship" to USA Nationals...:laugh2: Because I would go and say that allowing stand up starts for backstroke and breaststroke flip turns allows you to be on the same level as USA Swimming. :censor: I think it would be really nice to see USMS open up a college division championship. I liked that part too. Reality sometimes is funnier than the Onion. I have also never seen an entire swim team disqualified after a swim meet and ever single swim by that team stricken from the record. Tim

I have no idea who Keith Bell is, but ASA seems like an odd organization. If you search this very forum you should be taken to the original announcements of the asa way back in the early naughties. At that time I think world records for every year was a big thing. That is as opposed to the every 5 years usms uses. Looks like they found a niche having national championships for college club teams. The unfortunate part about this mess is that it appears there is a need for such a championship.

This has to be my favorite part of the story.... "Keith Bell spoke of one other instance that he said he had never heard about in more than 50 years in competitive swimming. "In the 400 IM, two of their swimmers were DQ'd (for unsportsmanlike conduct) for rolling over on their backs on freestyle and waving to everybody," Keith Bell said. "It's as if they were mocking the event. You don't see that kind of thing happening at (USA Swimming) nationals." That part was good, but my very favorite part was the part about re-doing the awards: "Reports also indicated that after the meet was rescored, some teams were requested to restage their podium photo shots, but it is unclear if any team complied."