I was looking at the photo gallery from 2008 Trials and the competition pool was a ten-lane pool with only eight lanes used, even in preliminaries. The two end lanes did not even have blocks. For USMS Nationals, we should use all ten lanes, like at Atlanta nationals last week. I'm putting this out there early, so that we don't end up with those two extra blocks not being installed in the temporary venue :)
Edit: four extra blocks. It's a long course pool, there are blocks at each end....
Listened to the interview and it sounds like we have a great leader in Rob Butcher.
+1.
I'm really looking forward to the growth of the sport under Rob's direction. He's done a great job so far, and I think as USMS consolidates its base, continues to innovate (2012 LCM Nationals), and extends outreach, we will become the envy of sports federations.
I have a proposal that will end the techsuit debate once and for all, and also improve the spectator interest in swimming. It'd probably get our sport on national news, and improve revenues for professional swimmers.
Here's my contribution to USMS innovation: I propose that for 2012 LCM Nationals, we take advantage of those four extra blocks and have the first real combat swimming. Take the 200 IM for example - ten lanes per heat, two heats per starting gun. Both ends of the pool start at once, and meet somewhere near the middle on the fly. (Sort of like water polo).
Then, once you've muscled your way past your opponent (who's now wearing a football pad type REAL techsuit), you finish the lap, then come back to battle on the backstroke segment. This part even gets better, because you don't know exactly WHEN you'll butt heads (literally).
I can't wait for this groundbreaking (and possibly bone-breaking) rule modification to take place. Thanks in advance to Rob Butcher for taking this idea and implementing it. If we're lucky, we can even do this in a short course meet - talk about intense...
I was looking at the photo gallery from 2008 Trials and the competition pool was a ten-lane pool with only eight lanes used, even in preliminaries. The two end lanes did not even have blocks. For USMS Nationals, we should use all ten lanes, like at Atlanta nationals last week. I'm putting this out there early, so that we don't end up with those two extra blocks not being installed in the temporary venue :)
Edit: four extra blocks. It's a long course pool, there are blocks at each end....
Listened to the interview and it sounds like we have a great leader in Rob Butcher.
+1.
I'm really looking forward to the growth of the sport under Rob's direction. He's done a great job so far, and I think as USMS consolidates its base, continues to innovate (2012 LCM Nationals), and extends outreach, we will become the envy of sports federations.
I have a proposal that will end the techsuit debate once and for all, and also improve the spectator interest in swimming. It'd probably get our sport on national news, and improve revenues for professional swimmers.
Here's my contribution to USMS innovation: I propose that for 2012 LCM Nationals, we take advantage of those four extra blocks and have the first real combat swimming. Take the 200 IM for example - ten lanes per heat, two heats per starting gun. Both ends of the pool start at once, and meet somewhere near the middle on the fly. (Sort of like water polo).
Then, once you've muscled your way past your opponent (who's now wearing a football pad type REAL techsuit), you finish the lap, then come back to battle on the backstroke segment. This part even gets better, because you don't know exactly WHEN you'll butt heads (literally).
I can't wait for this groundbreaking (and possibly bone-breaking) rule modification to take place. Thanks in advance to Rob Butcher for taking this idea and implementing it. If we're lucky, we can even do this in a short course meet - talk about intense...
