Northampton
Area Swimming
www.naswim.org
April 2, 2010
"Desire fuels Ambition... Ambition creates
Opportunity... Opportunity makes way for success..."
- Gene Vasquez
Welcome
It
is great to be back for the Spring/Summer season. Welcome back returning swimmers and families
and welcome newcomers. Coaches are
looking forward to working with everyone and are excited about a great summer
program.
Reminders for
Practice
Practice Schedules
There will be no Wednesday
practices until 4/21/10, as the pool is being used for another program until
then.
News,
Information, and Communication
Our
team families will each have a folder/mailbox, once registered for the team,
which coaches will take out for swimmers or parents to check for newsletters,
meet announcements, or other correspondence during practice time. Information also gets posted on the team
bulletin board at the pool (far end) and the web site frequently, announcements
are made in the beginning of practice regularly, and email is used often. Families should become familiar with the
website and Team Handbook and policies (posted on the website): www.naswim.org. Feel free to call or email Sherry as needed,
too: 586-1727 at home, 575-8559 (cell),
or email sherbw@comcast.net.
Meet Schedule
The meets we run are our only team fundraisers and participation is required
for all families. Mark your calendars
for Friday, May 14th for our first meet this season, which will be
held at JFK. Families will all be
expected to make a donation for the food table (about $10 equivalent or more if
more than one child on the team), as well as work at the meet (at food table,
timing, or other jobs, as assigned).
Sign-up sheets will be posted for food table and preferred work
assignments, so please sign-up, rather than be assigned closer to the
meet. Our other meets will be held in
June. We will help run the Bay State
Games swimming qualifier at Smith College (a meet for swimmers 10 and older) and
will offer a food table there (a fundraiser for us) on Friday and Saturday 6/11
& 12. All families will be expected
to make a food table donation and work at the meet. Another meet may be added later.
Competitive Swimming Terminology/Jargon, etc.
The spring/summer
swim season is considered the long course (LC) season, where most swim meets
are held in long course pools (LCM), 50 meters, as opposed to the short course
season, when meets are all in short course yards (25 yd. pools). The 25-yard pools are short course
(SCY). There are also some pools which are
SCM (short course meters), which are 25 meters, just a bit longer than 25 yards. There are swimming events in 4 competitive
strokes: Freestyle (front crawl),
Backstroke, Breaststroke, and Butterfly, as well as IMs (Individual Medley
consisting of butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke, and freestyle, in that
order). There are also relays, usually
Freestyle or Medley (medley order is Back, Breast, Fly, Free, which is
different than the IMs). Swimmers will
all practice all of the strokes, IMs, relays, and start and turns for all
strokes and drills for all strokes, too, which will help with learning proper
techniques. Each stroke, turn, and
finish has its own set of rules and regulations, which swimmers must follow in
competitions to avoid DQs or disqualification by swimming officials at meets. At practice and meets, swimmers begin in the
water with a warm-up (a swimming set or prescribed distance to help prepare
swimmers for the practice or meet).
Welcome NAS Swimmers and Families!!