Quote:
Originally Posted by RPI-Fan
You should add tennis to the dynasty! Also, can you provide more background on how all these meets work? -- I get confused about the various state meets, how you qualify, who is qualified for which meet, and why being in the top 8 is important, etc.
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RPI...thanks for checking in.
I had thought about adding in Bailey's tennins, and in fact, I believe I mention it a few times in as much as it impacts her practice schedule for swimming. I'll start adding in that info, when she gets back on the court. Her coach suffered a stroke at the beginning of the Summer, and with that being our busy swim season, and with us not terribly fond of our other options for coaching, we allowed her a break. She's been idle for over 2 months...so she'll be real rusty when she returns. Currently she is ranked 34th in the state...and she'd be higher if we had a doubles partner for her to play with (doubles gives kids extra ranking points...and Bailey doesn't have a set partner, because she doesn't play out of a tennis center).
Now let's see if I can adequately explain the different state meets, etc...
Basically the swimming I describe here is divided into two separate organizations or leagues.
1. USA Swimming
2. GRPA Swimming
USA Swimming (yes the same group that runs the USA Olympic Swim Team), is the bigger of two organizations by far and it is for the year round swimmers, thus all of SwimAtlanta, Chattahoochee Gold, Dynamo and more. There are a number of meets during each of the seasons (Long Course & Short Course) that are hosted around the country, and results from the meets are maintained in the USA Swimming Database. Each state has their own time standards, and if a person swims faster than the standard they are eligible to swim at the State Meet. In fact, the time standards are in place for Sectional, Regional, and National meets, and the Olympic Trials Cut is also part of this same process. So a kid that swims an exceptional race and gets an Olympic Cut time (even in the same events my kids are in), they are then "invited" to compete at the Olympic Trials.
Bringing it back to my kids level, the Long Course State Championships that were held last weekend, were the results of the kids efforts during the season. The events they swam were the ones that they qualfied for during the season (except we weren't able to do the 50 back because we couldn't get them to the meet). Also the cut times to swim at state change as the child ages up. The first level is 10U, then the cut changes every year. That is why it was such a big deal that Brett got his 12 year old cut in the 200 Breast during the state meet. Next year the twins for short course will be still under 10, so they will have a majority of their cuts before the season even starts, and we'll be pushing for Sectional Cuts, while keeping an eye on 11 year old cuts for Long Course (they age up prior to the start of the long course season).
The second organization is GRPA (Georgia Recreation and Parks Association). This is the state meet taking place over the weekend (7/27 - 7/28). Here the kids swim on a neighborhood team each week leading up the county championships (which were held about a month ago). If a swimmer places in the top 3 finishers in their event, they represent the county at the state meet. Which is why Bailey and Bear are going. Bear finished 3rd in fly, Bailey finished 2nd. They also get put on relays for Medley and Free (free relays are the top 12 finishers)...The interesting thing here is - even though this is just a summer league, the county team is better than the year round teams at any singular year round facility. This is because there are so many year round swimmers at so many different facilities and when they race off you get the best of the best. In the county I live in alone, there are 7 year round organizations that can feed swimmers to the county team, so it is a big deal to make the team.
So basically if you think about this in the context of other sports it's a bit like having a child that plays on a travelling team but also plays in the rec league during the week. Then ends up on the rec. league all-star team that goes to the state tournament.
Hope that makes since...let me know if it doesn't and feel free to ask questions, I'm more than happy to answer them...