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.:)
I just spent 4 days racing in a USAS meet where all the kids were entered in their best times for prelims and then we were all, obviously, entered in our prelims times for finals. Here's my "AHA" that I think all swimmers need to understand: heat sheets are works of fiction. 99+% of the time, all swimmers' performances will vary from their entered time. In particular, what I saw this weekend was that the delta in performances between prelims swims and finals (both faster and slower) was often more dramatic than the differences between initial heat sheets and prelims performance.
People need to get over the illusion of the heat sheet as predictive of that day's performance and just race.
My last USA-S meet was the same way. The kids (and myself) were all entered with their best times, (which happened to be from a whole year ago). Most of these kids are growing stronger and developing a lot between ages 14-18 and tend to blow their times out of the water. Even though I was seeded right next to a "similar time", I was getting beat by a significant margin most of the time, and I was equaling or slightly bettering my own times.
I think for the kids it is easier to beat their best times season to season. Masters...yeah, just get out there and race!! :banana:
I just spent 4 days racing in a USAS meet where all the kids were entered in their best times for prelims and then we were all, obviously, entered in our prelims times for finals. Here's my "AHA" that I think all swimmers need to understand: heat sheets are works of fiction. 99+% of the time, all swimmers' performances will vary from their entered time. In particular, what I saw this weekend was that the delta in performances between prelims swims and finals (both faster and slower) was often more dramatic than the differences between initial heat sheets and prelims performance.
People need to get over the illusion of the heat sheet as predictive of that day's performance and just race.
My last USA-S meet was the same way. The kids (and myself) were all entered with their best times, (which happened to be from a whole year ago). Most of these kids are growing stronger and developing a lot between ages 14-18 and tend to blow their times out of the water. Even though I was seeded right next to a "similar time", I was getting beat by a significant margin most of the time, and I was equaling or slightly bettering my own times.
I think for the kids it is easier to beat their best times season to season. Masters...yeah, just get out there and race!! :banana:
