Bensmom Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 Ds joined our local swim team a couple of months ago and loves it. There are a couple of meets coming up and the coach is encouraging everyone to participate. (She knows many of our young swimmers are not particularly fast, but wants them to begin participating anyway). I went to the website with info about past and future meets and it references divisions like AA, A, B, BB... I have no idea what these labels mean. Is this a team label or a participant label? Also, some meets seem to have qualifying times to participate. Do these apply to the 10 and under crowd? None are listed for them, but they have events listed for 10 and under. What other things do I need to know in considering whether or not to allow him to participate? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stayseeliz Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 Those letters are USA Swimming times. They are used to qualify swimmers for certain events. AAAA is the fastest with B being the slowest. Each meet can choose which time standards they want to use. To qualify for regionals my kids would have to have BB times in our league. I am not sure how things are done for the 10 and under crowd. They may need to meet the 10 and under USA times or your league may have their own times. Welcome to the world of swimming. It's a wonderful sport! I have three swimmers and they love it so much! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Swimtaxi234 Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 USA Swimming 2013-16 Motivational Times USA Swimming is the governing body for club swimming across the country. Every swimmer is judged at a swim meet by officials that all follow the same rules. Once a time is determined to be official, that time can be compared to swimmers across the country with the same age group, gender, event, and race length. In the USA, most club teams have two seasons: fall to spring is usually short course yards SCY and summer is usually long course meters LCM (but there are a few areas that swim short course meters in the fall) On the above link, there is a form with motivational times that is used across the country. Your child is probably swimming SCY right now, so you would scroll to the second page. Find your child's age group and gender, then use their current times to determine where they currently fit. My son looks at the motivational times before every meet. If he has an A time in say the 100 free, he uses the AA time as a motivation to set a goal. Another thing about the motivational times is that swimmers tend to understand the language of trying to achieve a new time like, "I'm going for an AA". They tend to cheer harder for their friends who are trying to achieve something difficult and/or if a parent says, "That was an AAA time - WOW!", the swimmer understands and appreciates their achievement and so do their friends. I hope that helps! :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lolly Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 Ds joined our local swim team a couple of months ago and loves it. There are a couple of meets coming up and the coach is encouraging everyone to participate. (She knows many of our young swimmers are not particularly fast, but wants them to begin participating anyway). I went to the website with info about past and future meets and it references divisions like AA, A, B, BB... I have no idea what these labels mean. Is this a team label or a participant label? Also, some meets seem to have qualifying times to participate. Do these apply to the 10 and under crowd? None are listed for them, but they have events listed for 10 and under. What other things do I need to know in considering whether or not to allow him to participate? As someone else explained, times are divided out into B, BB, A, AA, AAA, and AAAA. Some meets limit times to above or (more rarely) below certain times. When we first started out swimming, one of our first meets as an A cut meet. For that meet, if you had an A time in an event, you were not allowed to swim it during that meet. If you made above that time, you were not allowed to place. (However, you did receive an even more special, fancier ribbon.) Other meets require at least A times to participate in the meet. Other meets pick their own times to use as cut offs. The cutoffs are by age group. Whether 10 and unders (usually 8 and under/9-10 yo) are included in needing specific times will depend on the meet. It is up to the team hosting for their home meets. If no cuts are listed, they are probably not required. In order to decide if the meet is appropriate for your dc, just consult with his coach. They will know which meets will be best for him to attend. You can also see which meets his friends will be attending. The fun of the meets is hanging out between events! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarinesWife Posted November 15, 2013 Share Posted November 15, 2013 Since he has not done any meets he would do a C meet or a BC. Then once he has qualifying times you will know where he fits in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.