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You have to plan a meet. You want it to offer a good range of competition,
be productive for your club, and have it comply with the four-hour-rule.
You also want it to run smoothly, and have all the swimmers, parents, officials,
and other people affiliated with United States Swimming be happy.
While all of the dreams in the above paragraph may not be attainable,
and in fact some of them may be impossible, you need to use them as your
basis for planning. The following is a list of items that should be considered
by you when you are planning your age group swim meet. These items are
interdependent, and should all be looked at and considered as you are designing
your meet sheet and planning for the meet. A few examples of this interdependency
are: if you have a 10 lane pool you can accommodate more swimmers than
if you have a 6 lane pool; if your zone requires certain events to be offered,
you may be limited in the other events available, depending on the distances
required; the time of year your meet is offered may affect the types of
events that are appropriate for certain age groups
Most important advice: keep your head referee in the
information loop. S/he can be a great help to you, but only
if s/he is informed. As with so many things, even if s/he doesn't know
the answer, he or she probably knows who to ask, and will be glad to help
you.
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Key Considerations
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1.
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Pool size (number of lanes; long course/short
course). Long course meets always take longer to run than
short course ones. The more lanes you have available the more swimmers
and swimming distance you can accommodate.
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2.
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Number of swimmers permitted.
There are some guidelines, but they are fairly general:
6 lanes =~250 swimmers; 8 lanes = ~325 swimmers; 10 lanes = ~375 swimmers;
12 lanes = ~475 swimmers. This number of swimmers is approximately that
which can be accommodated per 4 hour session in a split meet that offers
events of mid-range distances, permitting no more than 4 swims per swimmer,
and not offering relays.
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3.
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Number of events offered.
Meets are not required to offer all possible events for all possible age
groups. Our rule of thumb for full day meets is no fewer than 3 regular
events/age group. If certain events are required by your zone, make sure
these events are included before you fill in the rest of the meet.
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4.
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Number of events permitted to be swum
per swimmer. Even if all events are offered for all
age groups, the number of events the swimmer may compete in may be limited.
Once again, the rule of thumb is no fewer than 3 regular events. Be aware
that swimmers are always permitted to enter as many events as are offered,
but are required to scratch down to the maximum permitted for competition.
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5.
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Splitting the meet into sessions.
The four hour rule (of USS) only affects 12/under swimmers.
However, two Pacific Swimming zones have "length of meet" rules
that affect all age group swimming. These rules also need to be taken into
consideration. In order to effectively split the meet, and have the 12/under
swimmers finish in 4 hours (or less), the 11/12 age group is usually split
by gender, with the 11/12 boys swimming in one session and the 11/12 girls
in the other. Remember that the 11/12 girls is the single largest group
of swimmers. The most common configuration is to group them with the 13/over
swimmers.
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6.
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The distance of the events offered
is important to consider. If you are going to offer 200/400
yard events and up, you may need to look at adding a 1/2 day to the meet.
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7.
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Restricting the
level of the meet can help. Offer
"B" or "Novice" meets, offer "A+/-" meets,
offer invitational meets for only 1 or 2 age groups. There is a lot of
leeway for creativity. Put your thinking cap on.
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8.
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The time
of year (high school water polo
or swimming season, cabana club time, holidays) -- these seasonal influences
on your meets need to be considered in advance.
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9.
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Meets can be 1/2, 1, 1-1/2, 2, 2-1/2,
3 days long, depending on what you want the meet to accomplish and provide.
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10.
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Expect cooperation from your referees/starters
in moving the meet efficiently (call the next heat up
while the previous one is in the water; limit the search for late swimmers).
This can be applied to all meets, please!!
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11.
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Nothing works all the time.
Be prepared! If you have to run two courses, figure out
how to do it. If you have to require a scratch down, figure out how to
handle it and have your people aware and the money for refunds there. Refer
to this always!!
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Questions/comments? Direct them to Pacific Age Group Chairman Darwin Takaki.
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