[Breeze]

YSSC Thanksgiving Invite - @ Y‐Spartaquatics Swim Club & the Middle Tyger YMCA - 11/15 - 11/16

This is our travel meet for the season, heading back to Spartanburg, SC. Brett will be riding the bus with the older kids, while the twins will ride with us. Actually, only 13 and overs were supposed to swim this meet, but we got an exception for the twins because we told the team that it was too expensive for us to go to the 12 and under and the 13 and over away meets. The only problem is that the twins have to swim every event open so they will be in the afternoon session with the older kids.

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Haven't been able to watch them at pratice in a while, so my comments below are either observations based on the heat they are likely to be in, or based on comments they have made to me about practice.

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Bailey

Bailey is swimming open in this event, so again she'll swim against kids much older than her.

#21 (d2/s2): W Open 100 Breast (1:27.32Y) - This is the event that Bailey hates swimming with older kids, because she'll be one of the slowest. Says her breaststroke looks better and feels faster in practice.

#25 (d2/s2): W Open 200 Fly (2:23.72Y) - In this one Bailey is already faster than several of the older Gold girls. Interestingly, she's also only 4 seconds behind (and 5 seeded slots) one of the top Gold swimmers, who is already receiving interest from a number of D1 universities. Her strength is Free, but for Bailey to be in sight of this girl is very exciting.

#29 (d2/s2): W Open 200 Back (2:31.63Y) - Her time here is within 4 seconds of 7 girls on the Senior team with Brett. I think she'll be motivated to beat as many as she can, so I expect a good time here (assuming she isn't exhausted from racing the 200 Fly only 4 event before).

#33 (d2/s2): W Open 100 Free (1:02.28Y) - Still comments way to often for my taste, that she just isn't very good at Free. There is no reason for her not to be...she could go sub 60 if she can figure out the small things she does wrong on her pull. All in all, I expect 61+ seconds.

#75 (d3/s4): W Open 200 Free (2:25.43Y) - Not her PB, her seed time should be a 2:11.27. Which means she'll be seeded with kids that come in about 15 seconds slower than her PB, so I expect she won't have anyone pushing her, and she'll finish somewhere just over the 2:11 time.

#79 (d3/s4): W Open 100 Back (1:08.58Y) - Last time she swam this event, I commented about the older girl who barely beat her and ask Bailey if she was 15...we'll they'll be racing again it looks like. I think Bailey will get her this time.

#91 (d3/s4): W Open 100 Fly (1:06.57Y) - Personal Best is actually 1:05.52, which would put her just ahead of a Senior swimmer from one of the big swim families at the Cumming Pool. It also puts her ahead of Nicole Sulivan who just got signed to swim with Birmingham Southern. She could be in the heat with both of those girls, but I expect they will beat her because this is the older kids 1 taper event before Senior State in December, whereas Bailey isn't tapering at all because she basically has more cuts that she can swim anyway.

#93 (d3/s4): W Open 1000 Free (11:58.00Y) - This seed time is made up. The only time she swam this she posted a 13:16 in December of last year. I think she can swim the 11:58. In fact, I think she can do better than that...but only if she's willing to work hard.

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Bear

Like Bailey, he is swimming Open, so competing against older kids.

#26 (d2/s2): M Open 200 Fly (2:34.44Y) - Bear is the last seed (by 4 seconds) in this event, and it is unfortunate. Hopefully, he doesn't get self concious about it, because he's been swimming this event well so far this season.

#30 (d2/s2): M Open 200 Back (2:25.59Y) - I expect a very similar time to his seed here. He posted the PB just a few weeks back.

#34 (d2/s2): M Open 100 Free (1:01.11Y) - Like Brett, wants to go sub 60 - I think he'll go sub 61 but just over 60...

#38 (d2/s2): M Open 400 Medley (5:16.19Y) - Hasn't done this one since State in Feburary. I expect a pretty big drop here.

#76 (d3/s4): M Open 200 Free (2:09.62Y) - not his PB, PB is a 2:05.16...I expect a similar swim here.

#80 (d3/s4): M Open 100 Back (1:11.06Y) - not his PB, PB is a 1:10.56 - again a slight improvement is about all I expect.

#88 (d3/s4): M Open 50 Free (28.10Y) - 28:07 is actually his PB. Given he's dropped time all season so far, I don't think he'll drop this time around.

#123A (d3/s4): B 11-14 1000 Free (11:30.72Y) - After Bear's improvements across the board in his Free races, I'm sure he's looking to duplicate those in this race as well. He swam around 1:05 splits for the 500 recently when he posted his 5:27.xx time. So I'm guessing he's going to want to swim under 1:08s. Which means we might be looking at around an 11:20.

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Brett

Interestingly, his coach told him to shave for this event. As you probably noticed if you looked at the picture from the high school website, he doesn't save his face yet...but he'll shave his whole body prior to this event.

#20 (d2/s2): M 13-14 100 Breast (1:15.87Y) - Brett and Tommy will be racing in this one again. They will probably be on opposite ends of the pool, but it could be a motivting factor for Brett. Brett swam a 1:14 to open the 200 breast recently, so I'm hoping he might go 1:13.+

#28 (d2/s2): M 13-14 200 Back (2:28.59Y) - I think Brett will go faster here, but not a bunch faster.

#32 (d2/s2): M 13-14 100 Free (1:02.00Y) - He despirately wants to go sub 60...but I don't think he can yet. I do think he might get something under 61.

#38 (d2/s2): M Open 400 Medley (5:12.60Y) - The seed time here isn't his PB. That would be a 5:06.83 from mid October. I'm conflicted on the prediction on this one. Last time he swam it he did extremely well as you can see by dropping 6 seconds, so with that in mind, I'm not sure he'll be able to improve on it again. However, last time he swam it, his fly was fantastic for 35 of the 100 yards in that leg. If he can increase his correct fly stroke for 50 to 70 of the 100 yards, he'll probably drop another couple of seconds with just that improvement alone. Ultimately, I'm guessing for a similar time to the 5:06.

#74 (d3/s4): M 13-14 200 Free (2:13.29Y) - Again, this isn't a personal best seed time. His PB is 2:08.68. If he improves in his 100, I'd expect a similar improvement in the 200 (not double but similar...)

#78 (d3/s4): M 13-14 100 Back (1:12.87Y) - Another time not a PB, but this time it is only fractionally off. His PB is 1:12.79. I'd love to see him go sub 1:10...but I don't think he has the sprint mindset for backstroke down yet. He's more of the long flowing stroke, and he needs to keep that form but increase the rotation. He could also improve my cleaning up his kick (which he's been doing some) so we'll see.

#82 (d3/s4): M 13-14 200 Breast (2:42.45Y) - Not his personal best - 2:37.34 is. Not happy he wasn't given him PB here, as it impacted his seeding by 4 slots, and my have pushed him to the second heat, where he will be the fastest time coming in. Brett does better when he's pushed. All that said, I'm not sure he'll improve on this, he dropped so much time, last time around.

#94 (d3/s4): M Open 1000 Free (12:05.69Y) - Brett says he holds 1:10 splits in practice during interval training, and he thinks he can do that for the 1000. I'm not convinced, but I hope he's right. That would translate to an 11:40. I think if he can pull that off he would have done fantastic.

Relay (Entered by Admin):
#70 (d1/s1): M 13-14 200 Medley Relay (Team A) - This was an interesting suprise. We knew they were having relays, but apparently from the psych sheet Gold is only fielding one 13-14 boys team, so we didn't expect Brett to be on it. However, it is possible that Brett will be swimming with Tommy, Riley, and Seth in this relay, which would be VERY COOL for Brett.