Poolside Chat: parents of competitive swimmers

[2ducksandI]

Seems I managed to fill the other thread with talk of taking fridges to away galas! And I didnt even mean a fridge I meant an electric cool box So I've started another thread. Hope you all find it.

For the people asking about FINA logos on competition kit, Allens swimwear offer a repair service. One of the repairs is to reapply a FINA logo.
www.allensswimwear.co.uk/allens-race-suit-repair

DD managed to rip her racesuit, but I've not sent it off for them to mend yet.

I can't help with Ukrainian, but it would be a good resource for clubs to have. What a lovely gesture from the sports shop. Plenty of local residents have volunteered to host, but I don't think any have managed to sort out the visas yet.

Has anyone had experience of the Swim England regional open water events? DS wants to enter ours he will be 12 when it it on and is a tiny dot compared to his peers. Its 2k and even though I know they regularly swim more than that but that includes walls and turns and being in a nice warm pool. Any reassurance about the safety aspects and ishe likely to get elbowed in the face!

We dream of open water comps! Maybe this year...

Your local Swim England region ought to have somebody in charge who can advise/discourage. What sort of course are you swimming? What sort of distance? What time of year/water temp? I am slightly surprised that they would let a pre-teen compete a fair distance unseen TBH.

DD started Open Water after the first lockdown, in a swim/dive quarry. They do swim skins occasionally, but normally wear wetsuits. She absolutely loves it BUT there is always somebody spotting onshore and a coach in a canoe. The coach spends quite a while teaching them how to spot and corner around buoys.

Is there a local triathlon club who could help with open water training? We have a close relationship with our triathlon club, we take their kids for pool training and they take our for open water.

DD did open water for a couple of years. Trained once a week in a lake as well as regular swimming sessions. Did regional and qualified for national open water competition. I think she may have been 13 when she did first one. Stopped doing it when the distance went over 3K and got sick of all the duck poo.
On a separate note, how much long course training does your swimmers have. DD has just got back from British champs and the difference between those who swim in 50 metre pools regularly is noticeable. DD only trains in 25 metre pool.

Thanks to everyone who replied re the open water swimming. No local triathlon clubs that train in open water they all seem to train in the pool! I have a couple of private open water coaching sessions booked and will hope for the best. I think I am worrying about it more than DS who seems to think it will be fine and definitely less than by water phobic DH who seems to think he will definitely drown.

@wearegoingtoneedabiggerboat DS is lucky enough to train at a 50m pool all the time but unfortunately to make it financially viable we only get to use the full 50m once a week the rest of the time we use 25m and the leisure centre use the other 25m for swimming lessons.

Hope British Champs went well.

Open water swimmjng isn't something I know
much about because ds will not swim unless it's a pool
However lots of swimmers train once a week in the lake during open water season and sometimes they add a second session.
I think most start around 12 because there's often age limits on open water.
If he's keen I'd just let him give it a go. It takes a certain resilience to swim OW!

Re LC training. We've currently just picked up 1 session every other week because the boom broke just before the first lockdown! It's legally fixed and staff are getting trained up. We are increasing that and so some of the early mornings sessions will also be LC and the hope is eventually it'll be 2-3 sessions a week. I agree you can tell the difference.

Ds has only raced LC since last October but Para juniors in June is SC so that'll be interesting!

Has everyone got regionals coming up over the next month or 2?

We have the Easter festival next week which is LC and regionals over the BH weekend (also LC) at the end of the month. Ds has qualified for 50/100/400 free 100 fly and back and 200IM so hopefully he'll get in for some or all of those 🤞

We’re about 40-50 miles from the nearest long course pools (there are several at about that distance).

We’ve just managed to get a 2 hour session roughly once a month at one of them, for everyone who was at Counties.

We are lucky enough to have a 50m pool locally. (About 5 miles) It's the city and ds swims with the city club rather than the town (he moved as performance level now).

The city club do a satellite programme so those who are younger and coming through the ranks at the surrounding town clubs can swim Lc weekly. (Currently we are still every other week but the weekend satellite session is the LC one for that reason).

We also have swimmers come across from the island for LC training too gives away location!

Any Leeds swim parents got any good ideas for nice, cheap and reasonably healthy places to eat near Premier Inn Elland Road please.

Our club never does long course training, there is only one 50m pool in the region.

No regionals here, eldest came reasonably close in one event but couldn’t quite do it. The odds were against him really as he’s had knee problems and done very little training since Christmas, plus he’s at the younger end of the 14 age group, and it was clear at counties that most of the boys in his age group have hit puberty and are bigger and more developed.

@Hellocatshome are you at John Charles for the NERs? The White Rose shopping centre is a 5 minute drive from Elland Road. It has the usual fast food restaurants like McDonald’s etc but also has Nando’s and Wagamamas if that’s any good?

@Sallycinnamon79 yes we are and its DS's birthday as well so turning into a very expensive weekend away!

@Hellocatshome oh what a weekend! Hope your son enjoys it and has a great birthday. Are you there for both weekends? We are lucky we only live 10 mins from John Charles as we are there every day of the week

@Sallycinnamon79 ah lucky you although I cant complain as we live 5 minute walk from our home pool which is often used for Counties so get to wander into quite a lot of galas last minute with no hotel costs.
Yes we are there all 4 days but unlikely to have to go back in for finals in the afternoons so get a bit of time off. White Rose shopping centre looks like the way to go although coaches quite strict rules about what to eat the night before a gala may have to be bent a little.

When we did age groups at john Charles went to white rose, there was quite a few restaurants there.
Back to ponds forge for regionals and tend to do Wagamamas in the centre. We are not staying city centre though for regionals this time as it was really expensive at the premier inn so doing Barnsley and driving in.

@Wearegoingtoneedabiggerboat

When we did age groups at john Charles went to white rose, there was quite a few restaurants there. Back to ponds forge for regionals and tend to do Wagamamas in the centre. We are not staying city centre though for regionals this time as it was really expensive at the premier inn so doing Barnsley and driving in.

We are hopefully at ponds forge for nationals in summer.

Any hints you've got about places to stay and eat etc greatly received

I've looked at staying at the days inn about 15 minutes drive out to the south. That's because we are coming up from south coast but I'd stay the other side if we are there for a period of time!

We are up in Coventry for junior nationals in June and have managed to get an ibis 1.5 miles away opposite an Asda. I don't think I've ever managed to stay so close 🤣🤣

Still over 2 hours drive away to actually get there mind!

Our regionals is 85 miles away.

However he's all day sat and only afternoons sun and Monday. I've worked out it's cheaper to do the 1.5 hours drive up and and back each day than stay and fund eating in hotels as well! Even with current price of diesel!

Google maps reckon our Regionals are a 2hour 40 minute drive away, train is 2/12-3 hours away.

We are still waiting for the Region to confirm the cut-off for consideration times, which isn't massively helpful.

We are also at John Charles both weekends. Super expensive!

It's not good they leave it so late is it madcats?

Ds has automatic times because para swimming only do auto times. Therefore I'd assume he's got in for all events he's qualified for. I don't think they scratch para swimmers as they don't have a set number they accept either from what I've read. There's only about 10 male para swimmers in our region anyway and they won't all swim the same events and every event. There's an equal number roughly of female para swimmers too so you'd think they'd allow enough in to make for a competition!!!

However our closing date for entries isn't until weds for the meet starting 28th of this month! So it's still cutting it fine because it'll be days before we actually hear anything!

I'm waiting for something to be said about British/ home nations in the summer. They have the AB swimmers rankings etc they publish twice weekly and I'm not even sure how para swimmers qualify and what the qualification times are. 🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Someone looking to move for swimming opportunities. Bet you all have views!

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/extra_curricular_activities/4527492-UK-Swimming?msgid=116575593#116575593

We tend to stay at premier inn Angel street for ponds forge, it’s literally a 2 min walk away, however if it’s nationals it gets booked up quickly and it would be expensive for the whole week. We have stayed in a couple of air b &b. Sheffield city centre is an eye opener though so maybe look at Barnsley and driving in.

Thank you.

Yes I don't want to pay a Corine for a premier inn (above normal rate) just because it's closer.

The only stipulation ds and I have is somewhere to park the car!

We looked at staying in Rotherham but also at the Days Inn in Wyndham about 20 minutes away.

I looked south because we are coming up from south but I'll investigate Barnsley too - thanks for the tip!