Swim Meet #1

Collin started swim team practice a month ago.  Practice is every day after school for 30 minutes except Friday.  The weather had been so bad that some of those practices were canceled or moved to Friday.  Collin is still struggling with freestyle.  He is improving with his breathing but still uses too much energy with each stroke and his kicking.  He can still make it across in the pool fairly quickly.  His backstroke is about the same as last year except he does swim more crooked than before so he does have to make corrections as he is swimming to the other side.  However, he likes going to swim practice and is motivated to practice to get better.

Last night was our first Swim Meet against the biggest team we will swim against.  We had to be there by 5pm for the Meet that started at 6pm.  Getting the early allows for the volunteers to make sure all of the swimmers arrive, get something to eat, and mark up the swimmers for the Heats they will swim in (see below for a more detailed description about this).  Dad stayed with the boys while I volunteered as the Meet score keeper.  Great spot because I can see the finish of every race.  However, I am not sitting with Collin and his group in between races so I don't get to visit with him....what am I saying?  He is not visiting with his parents anyway.  Between heats (each race during a Meet), he is playing with the other boys in is age group or on the iPad....just as the other boys are doing.  I would be staring at his back most of the time. Here is an example of that:

 

Before the Heats start, the volunteer in charge of the group marks the swimmer's back with their name and possibly draws a picture of a barracuda (the name of our team) or something the boy is interested in. Also, the swimmer's arm is marked with each of the heats they will be swimming in and information about which lane they are to swim in.  Here is Collin's arm for last night:

What this means is Collin swam four times last night:  Heats 7, 17, 21 and 43.  The "1" for each Heat means he swam in the fastest group and the only group that gets scored for the team.  So, swimming in the first Heat means the swimmer is really good.  The next number really tells how good the swimmer is.  The number indicates the lane the swimmer will be swimming in.  There are six lanes for this Meet.  If the number is a 3 or 4, that means the Coach expects the swimmer to win a 1st Place ribbon.  Lanes 2 and 4 or the next best swimmer.  Lane 6 is expected to get 6th, or last place.  So, looking at Collin's arm, the Coach put him in the first Heat for Mixed Relay (7), Freestyle Relay (17), and Backstroke (43).  Notice that he expected the Freestyle Relay team to be the best because they were swimming in Lane 4.  The results for Collin last night were:

Heat 7 - Mixed Relay - he swam backstroke for the relay - 2nd Place
Heat 17 - Freestyle Relay - 3rd Place
Heat 21 - Freestyle - 3rd Place - He swam in Lane 6 and got 3rd which means he swam better than expected.  He might move up for the next Meet. 
Heat 43 - Backstroke - it was really close - 2nd Place

After Collin swam and got his ribbon, he would come over to my table, give me the ribbon and make a few comments about the swim.  Then he ran off to his group to way for his next Heat.  By the time he finished backstroke, it was 8:40pm.  He gave me his ribbon as he did before all night and then sat next to me to watch me score the Meet.  He wanted to help me so he watched the next four Heats and helped me score (not really but I was not about to tell him that).  By then, it was 9pm.  The Meet was expected to last another 30 minutes.  I nice volunteer told me to go home because she could take over the scoring for me.

On the way home, Collin wanted to know about the ribbons and the colors.  As last year, he did not know what the colors indicated.  He had no idea how well he swam.  I told him I had the ribbons from last year's first Meet and I know he improved.  He wanted to see these when we got home and talk about them.  I pulled the ribbons down and showed that he got 6th, 5th, 3rd and 2nd and then compared the same races to the ones he did that night.  I could tell he was getting tired.  I left the room to put on my PJs and then come back.  This is how I found my little swimmer:

It was 9:20pm so I was glad to see that he was asleep....but knew it would not last long.  The Turkey was faking it!  He was too excited to sleep.  We sat up and talked for another 20 minutes before I explained that I had not had dinner and that it was time for him to go to bed.  He has zoo camp in the morning...which started more conversation about bee hives at the zoo and if we could go this weekend to look at them.  :)