The New Approach to Meets

The voice of reason. I never claimed to be reasonable about swimming competition. I expect USMS will not make an allowance for the fact that the vast majority of swimmers will likely not be able to complete. I just think this year at least deserves an asterisk.

The voice of reason. I'm struggling to find your logic. Is it "it's equally unfair so it's fair"? Perhaps USMS can let me know before I purchase memberships for me and my adult children for next year's nationals whether we will be responsible for finding our own competitions with another organization or some quid pro quo "back massage" for time trial with a USMS coach within 100 miles.

I'm struggling to find your logic. Is it "it's equally unfair so it's fair"? Perhaps USMS can let me know before I purchase memberships for me and my adult children for next year's nationals whether we will be responsible for finding our own competitions with another organization or some quid pro quo "back massage" for time trial with a USMS coach within 100 miles. I just think that the spirit of equality seems to be lacking. There will the “haves” and “have nots” in the current scenario of granting sanctions for club time trials. I really think that everything needs to be paused until we can find a way to allow all members to compete on a level playing field. Perhaps USMS can create “virtual” Top Tens that donâ€t really count for anything until we are able to return to “normal.” Iâ€m very uncomfortable with the current train of thought of favoring certain LMSCâ€s, clubs, and states†restrictions/non-restrictions. As an independent swimmer, I have no reason to re-join for next year, because I donâ€t have a club, an LMSC, or an organization that can offer me anything right now. Nor do I have any hope of competing anytime in the near future. I hope our organization can find a way to think outside of the box right now.

I never claimed to be reasonable about swimming competition. I expect USMS will not make an allowance for the fact that the vast majority of swimmers will likely not be able to complete. I just think this year at least deserves an asterisk. i'll be adding a "covasterik" to this and maybe next year ... and have no problem waiting till next year to compete ... i just don't want to be dead or have secondary lung issues r/t this virus ... competition and top tens seem to be kinda small issues to me, when compared to what is being inflicted on this country. though i'm a retired RN and i do currently have access to a well controlled swimming environment for training. :wine:

Aside: I don't have a horse in this race (or lack of a race) at all. I'm just reading this thread for interest sake. I didn't even know who Kurt Dickson is. (I know, right?) But I just looked at some of his results. Wow. Just wow. Ok. Thanks. Please carry on.

I just think that the spirit of equality seems to be lacking. There will the “haves” and “have nots” in the current scenario of granting sanctions for club time trials. I really think that everything needs to be paused until we can find a way to allow all members to compete on a level playing field.There have always be haveâ€s and have notâ€s in swimming. COVID-19 has definitely exacerbated the situation and in many cases moved the haves to the other side of the ledger. Some members have great coaches many do not; some have access to great facilities many do not; some have an abundance of pool time many do not; some have access to 50M pools many do not; some swam in high school, college and the Olympics many have not. The reality is that there have and will always be inequities in life. Sometimes the best we can do is to try to slowly return to the new normal. Note – Iâ€m part of the US Masters Swimming COVID-19 task force and we are listening to the suggestions of our member as well as the experts in the field and the other sports governing bodies. We are looking for actionable and constructive recommendations for our return to the normal initiative. So please continue the conversation.

I'm a USA-S, FHSAA and NCAA official. We started out tentatively in late summer with some intrasquad meets, progressing to virtual meets and have been running high school duals and some club meets over the last month or so under strict Covid-19 protocols: no spectators, social distancing on deck, masks except when actually competing, etc. One of the issues is that the Covid-19 protocols of the facility override any thing that the swimming organizations put together. Since most pools are municipally owned, the protocols can vary greatly from facility to facility, depending on the local government. I know some national team members and trials qualifiers who are still having to scramble to find water. The overriding advice for everyone is to be patient. It's going to take awhile for things to get back to normal, whatever that "normal" is going to look like in the future. Even the US Open is going to be a glorified virtual meet this year, contested a nine different sites around the country at the same time. Life's not always fair and there are things outside of our control. The most important thing at this point is getting through this pandemic safely.

I'm struggling to understand the clinical logic behind the 100 mile limit. It really doesn't make sense to me- what risk are we mitigating? Risk to members who might stay in a hotel? I'm not aware of hotels being a risk factor for this respiratory virus. Is it to avoid cohort mixing? That is really not effective unless the people who are in the meet haven't travelled outside of 100 miles prior to attendance, train together and live together.. I appreciate the return to racing and I am the biggest proponent of safe return to sport... but as someone who takes care of covid patients daily, I want to make sure we are sticking to logic. This particular rule feels a bit like wearing gloves to the grocery store.

Life's not always fair and there are things outside of our control. The most important thing at this point is getting through this pandemic safely.Great post, Mark. I think one thing all of us Masters swimmers should remind ourselves is that our swimming careers last a lifetime. Yeah, I know many of us have goals and ambitions to do things at certain ages, but we're just going to have to be patient. I've set my expectations that, other than potentially some physically distanced open water races in the summer of 2021, I won't be doing any pool racing until 2022. If the vaccines come and accelerate that timeline, that's awesome. While this is an external factor affecting my ability to compete, over the last ~30 years as a Masters swimmer, I have certainly had a number of occasions where events and issues kept me from competing ... Having my first two kids close together - I barely trained, much less competed from '96 to '00 Joining a startup technology firm - after 4 years of always attending at least one nationals, '01 to '04, I completely missed '05 to '07 Blowing my shoulder out when I got too ambitious in 2012 (when I aged up to 45) caused me to miss all of 2013 Moving to another country in 2019 meant that I was really hoping 2020 was the year I'd be back at a USMS Nationals The point is, we're all going to have "life" throw us a curveball and slow down or prevent us from competing ... but we all have our whole lives ahead of us to come back and compete again. I'm 53 now and really hope I have at least another 42 years in the sport (because then maybe, just maybe, I could set a national record in the 95-100 age group :D) COVID-19 is a big, global curveball. But, we will compete again

Thanks, PWB, for a well-stated post! You are realistic and have a great attitude! Thanks as well to Mark Usher for this: "Life's not always fair and there are things outside of our control. The most important thing at this point is getting through this pandemic safely."