The anti-sandbag law:
"if a swimmer enters an event with a time significantly slower or faster than that swimmer's recorded time in the past two years, the meet director may, after a discussion with the swimmer, change the seeded time to a realistic time" (104.5.5.A(10)).
Concerning my Auburn nationals entry, I confess, when faced with a 7 hour 2 stop flight and 3:45 nonstop at an earlier time, I did what any warm-blooded middle-aged American swimmer with low self-esteem would do--sandbag my entry so I could catch the earlier flight, thus diminishing the possible time spent sitting next to a 400 pound Alabama slammer with sleep apnea wearing nothing but overalls and body odor. Of course, I was caught in my bold fabrication and my time was "fixed."
USMS seems to have an identity problem. Are we hard core with rigid qualifying times? It would seem not as 2 of my not-so-speedy family members were allowed to swim four events last year in Puerto Rico. If we are not hard core, why does anybody care that I sandbag? More to the point, why can one person enter a crappy time and another cannot? Just wondering.:)
so what does one do if entering a meet for the first time in say 17 years? A NT is not realistic but a "guess" is going to upset someone. I will either be a sandbagger or a glory days swimmer.
Matt, when faced with this problem I have used the best time I have achieved in practice in the past few months - basically Kirk's TT idea. It's honest, I really have swum that time recently, and it gets me into a heat where I don't look ridiculous. You might expect that since meet times are almost always faster than practice times, this would place you in a heat that is too slow and you will easily win the heat, but in my experience it does not work that way because there are always a few people who have a good swim and beat their seed time.
so what does one do if entering a meet for the first time in say 17 years? A NT is not realistic but a "guess" is going to upset someone. I will either be a sandbagger or a glory days swimmer.
Matt, when faced with this problem I have used the best time I have achieved in practice in the past few months - basically Kirk's TT idea. It's honest, I really have swum that time recently, and it gets me into a heat where I don't look ridiculous. You might expect that since meet times are almost always faster than practice times, this would place you in a heat that is too slow and you will easily win the heat, but in my experience it does not work that way because there are always a few people who have a good swim and beat their seed time.
