Lane 9 News Archive: Bulk of Texas Senior Circuit Times Will Not Count

Bulk of Texas Senior Circuit Times Will Not Count -- May 19, 2008

COLLEGE STATION, Texas, May 19. WITH a short pool causing problems at the Texas Senior Circuit meet held at Texas A&M University in College Station, USA Swimming has responded to a Swimming World request for clarification on the impact of cut times produced at the meet.

The USA Swimming decision, handed down today, read as follows:

Because the recently-installed bulkhead anchors were not in the correct position and created a problem with course length, USA Swimming cannot accept times swum at Texas A&M prior to the Sunday evening (Finals) session.

The story that the pool was short first came into the national limelight when Swimming World reported on a potential world record from Spindrift Beck.

Beck's "world record" in the 50 breast was falsely reported by an inaccurate timing issue with live results and had nothing to do with the short pool problem. Beck's inaccurate time only led to the spotlight being put on the event and the rumors coming out that the pool measured short.

Reaction Time Comments

May 19, 2008 How "recently-installed" is this bulkhead? Does it call into question the times swum there at the Spring Speedo Champions Series meet?
Submitted by: dcswimguy

May 19, 2008 This is ridiculous. What about the kids who made their first trial cuts?! What about those who dropped significant amounts of time? It seems completely unfair to all the kids who took the time to compete in the meet to declare the entire weekend null. Is there no calculation that could be made to add .04 (or whatever the difference the inch would have made) to the original times? What about all the swimmers who rested, in an attempt to get cuts? Spent money to go down there? Punish the A&M management, not the swimmers.
Submitted by: swimmer3360

May 21, 2008 who willbe resposible for the reimbursement of entry fees, travel $ & hotel bills ??
Submitted by: swimming

May 21, 2008 While this is the announced decision, indications are that this issue is still being discussed and may be reversed at some point. I would encourage anyone with a vested interest to contact USA Swimming Olympic Trial Coordinator, Mike Unger, and anyone else at the Executive level at USA Swimming.
Submitted by: CoachV

May 21, 2008 I tried the email address that was posted yesterday but it did not work. As such, I have used the email interface on usaswimming.org to send to specific departments. I have two kids that were affected and they are rather demoralized by the whole thing. For once, I would like to see a swimmer centric decision for USA swimming. Fina can make whatever decision they desire. Given such widely varying pool conditions such as outdoor/indoor, starting blocks, gutters, lane lines etc I feel this 0.03 m easily fits within those variances.

USA Swimming can save some face by accepting the times and also stating they will implement new rules and regulations to ensure pool conformity in the future. This will prevent a reoccurence and get rid of the argument that this sets a bad precedence.
Submitted by: swimhouston

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