About Swim Meets
How to Enter a Swim Meet
As soon as a meet is "Open" for entries, you will be informed by an email from Fred. Information about a meet is found in the "Meet Sheet" which may be downloaded from the Pacific Swimming website. Read the information carefully and follow the instructions for entering the meet. Most meets fill up quickly and may close before the "entry deadline" so do not wait until the last minute. Enter the swimmer in events where she/he meets the minimum time standards listed on the meet sheet. If you are not sure what events to enter, please consult your coach.
Registration
Each year every swimmer is given a registration card with their unique registration number. This 14 character, alphanumeric number is composed of the swimmer's specific information.
Guidelines for Swim Meet
It is important that you come to the meet in time for warm-up. You are always informed of what time you should arrive by email before the meet. Please be on time.
1. Check-in (be sure and circle all the events and initial) and write your event numbers on your hand.
2. Report to your coach for warm-up.
3. Check the posted events for your heat and lane assignment.
4. Inform your coach (or coach's assistant) of your heat and lane so she/he is prepared to watch you swim.
5. Check-in with your coach before each race to receive any advice, tip, strategy for your swim.
6. Report to your lane in plenty of time to get focused on your race.
7. See your coach after each race to receive an evaluation and suggestions for improvement.
8. Have fun!
Parents: Volunteers Needed
As you know, a swim meet can't be run without the help of many, many volunteers. For OSC, this means timers and officials.
Timers: At every meet, we usually are assigned a lane to time. Therefore, we will need your help volunteering as timers. Please check-in with the coaches, or their assistant, at the meet to sign-up for a timing slot.
Officials: Almost all of the Zones now require a certain number of officials from each team, based on the number of swimmers from that team entered in a particular meet. If a team does not meet its officials quota, the meet referee is required to make a coach from that team officiate. Obviously this takes away from the coaches ability to coach your swimmers during the meet. The Otters currently have a handful of wonderful parents who are officials but we can always use more!! If you like to learn more or have any questions, Fred or our resident officials will be glad to talk to you about what officials do. If you think you may be interested in being an official, contact Fred.