News and Announcements
Cathy Pennington Named USMS Controller
By Jennifer Gittins
Cathy Pennington, a long-standing member of Fairfax County Masters, has been chosen as Controller for USMS, after a grueling selection process. (OK, maybe it wasn't actually grueling, but she did win out over several other candidates!) It's good to know we have "friends in high places" at USMS!
Cathy lives in Falls Church with her husband and two sons and has been Fairfax Masters' treasurer for five years. She has been a masters swimmer for 11 years.
Coach of the Year Award
USMS presents an annual Coach of the Year Award to a coach who demonstrates excellence in five areas: club and individual accomplishments, publications, contributions to USMS and the LMSC, letters of support and long-term contributions to masters swimming.
Nominations for the 2000 award are due July 1. For more information, visit the USMS web site at http://www.usms.org/coach/ or contact Bonnie Adair at 3646 Barry Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90066 or Scott Rabalais at 3537 Christina Avenue, Baton Rouge, LA 70820.
USMS Service Awards
USMS presents service awards to dozens of people each year who have gone above and beyond the call of duty in serving the organization. Honorees are recognized each year at the USMS convention.
To nominate someone for a service award, please submit your nominations before August 1 to Mary Lee Watson, 109 Cottonwood Drive, Franklin, TN 37069. Mary Lee may also be reached at awards@usms.org.
Include the name, address, phone number and e-mail of the nominee; indicate whether the service was performed at the local, zone or national level; describe the impact of the service; outline the scope of the service and the number of members who may have benefited; and your name and contact information. You also may include a personal letter of support.
DCAC Activities
By Kei Kozumi
DC Aquatics Club is Washington's totally cool, high energy swimming team and social club for gays, lesbians and friends of the gay and lesbian community. Swimmers of all levels - fast, slow, whatever - are welcome. Our members include FINA Masters World Record holders, more than 40 individual and relay All-Americans, over 100 USMS individual and relay Top Ten swimmers, as well as first-time competitors. DCAC is a member of both United States Masters Swimming (USMS) and International Gay and Lesbian Aquatics (IGLA).
DCAC posted spectacular results in recent meets. At the Maryland Master's Meet in February, nearly 30 DCAC swimmers competed, and the team placed second to the host team. Four of our swimmers (Christina West, Rachel Frentsos, Corey Carlisle, and Jerry Frentsos) were the highest-scoring swimmers in their age group.
At the recent Ancient Mariners meet, our coach Jerry Frentsos, swimming in a new age group, set three world records! His world record short-course meters times in the 35+ age group were 2:07.10 in the 200 back, 4:35.23 in the 400 IM, and 59.11 in the 100 IM.
1999 was a spectacular year for DCAC. In the USMS Top Ten Relays for short course meters, DCAC placed numerous relays, including 13 DCAC relays that were the fastest times of 1999. Of those 13 1st place relays, three were all-time USMS records (400 meter free men's relay 100+ 3:39.47; 400 meter free men's relay 160+ 3:46.15; 400 meter medley men's relay 120+ 4:04.80). One of our record-setting swimmers, John O'Keefe, was also named USA Male Triathlete Rookie of the Year for his performances in 1999.
In April, 44 DCAC swimmers will go to the International Gay and Lesbian Aquatics (IGLA) championships in Paris, France. These annual championships bring together gay and lesbian masters swim teams from all over the world. DCAC is the most successful team in the history of the championships, and goes to Paris as the four-time defending champions.
In June, DCAC will march in the DC Gay Pride Parade. DCAC welcomes everyone to our practices, which are held in Virginia, DC, and Maryland.
Registration Notes
By Jeff Roddin
Did you know that in a one-year period USMS receives approximately 2,500 address changes from SWIM Magazine, local registrars and individual swimmers? The majority is from SWIM Magazine which receives over 200 returned magazines per month (six percent of our membership). It in turn sends them on to the USMS National Office. By the time USMS receives this information and updates the database, the swimmers may already have missed the next issue.
LMSC Registrars send their monthly registrations and any address changes they receive to the National Office. The National Office in turn creates the labels for SWIM Magazine. If swimmers do not inform their local registrar of their address changes, the national database is not updated and the magazines are sent to their old addresses.
Therefore swimmers should contact Jeff Roddin (301-603-0528, PVRegistrar@usms.org) with any address changes.
If your household is receiving more than one copy of The Swimmer's Ear and you would prefer not to receive the extra copies, please contact me (301-603-0528, PVRegistrar@usms.org) and let me know which registered PV swimmers wish to be "unsubscribed." Please note this option is not available for SWIM magazine subscriptions at this time.
The Curl-Burke Swim Club (CUBU) is our newest club. At present time CUBU has three practices
per week at American University (Wednesday and Friday mornings and Monday evenings). Contact coach Chris Hadden (301-951-1821 or coachhadden@email.msn.com) for more information.
Replacement USMS cards cost $2.50.
Confused About Relay Age Groups?
Age groups for masters' relays can be confusing. Meets in short course and long course meters pools have different rules than those held in yard pools.
For meters meets, add up the ages of your four relay swimmers. The cumulative ages determine the age group, so if you have three 87-year olds and one 19-year old, the total age would be 280 and the relay would swim in the 280-320 age group. Age groups begin with 76-99, then go to 100-119, 120-159, 160-199, and up in 40-year increments.
Yards meets designate the age group based on the youngest person on the relay. Age groups begin with 19+, 25+, 35+, and on up in 10-year increments. So our relay with the three 87-year old swimmers and the 19-year old would compete in the 19+ age group.