Very Important Sign Ups Require Your Attention

As we move into the second month of the 2014-2015 Short Course season, we can look back at the first month and say "OY!". Last week's two meets were very lightly attended by officials. In fact, we had two sessions that were nearly swum as exhibition because we did not meet the minimum requirements set forth by USA Swimming. We pulled both sessions out of the fire in the waning moments leading up to the beginning of the sessions. I don't recall ever coming that close to an officials disaster. I certainly don't want us to be the cause of having to tell swimmers that their times will not be going into the SWIMS database because we couldn't put enough qualified officials on deck. Could you imagine swimming a 1650 for fun?!?*?

That said, let's look forward and commit to doing a better job in filling the both the wet and dry sides of these meets. Next week, we have the Silver/Gold Meet (11/8-9) at CVSC. Please contact Gina Santilli at cgsantilli@comcast.net or 412-551-5808.

As you'll recall, starting with the BPR Mini/Christmas Qualifier on 11/22-23, we'll be using our centralized spreadsheet for signing up for all future meets. This gives us the chance to monitor where we are with officials at all meets and allows our officials the opportunity to sign up for multiple meets in one convenient location. Please take the time to sign up for all sessions that you can help with. It's important that you sign up as soon as you know your availability. ALL positions should sign up, including Admin Officials so we know what we have or, more importantly, what we don't. The link to the spreadsheet is https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14amxpxN912bDtjtW2AdcE16zWdN7msKUWOvRaGefshM/edit#gid=1718346109.

The 2014 Christmas Meet is once again an Officials Qualifying Meet (OQM) being held 12/11-14 at Pitt. There is a separate Application to Officiate that includes your election to be evaluated for national certification (more on that in a future blog post) should you so desire. The application can be found at  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1jp4dt9CSpSl15VMFCh50ghBpyaNErARPhGXkWq0HsjQ/viewform?usp=send_form. It's very important that you use this Application even if you do not want to be evaluated but would like to work session(s).

Finally, we have been asked to once again observe at the Pitt Invitational being held at Pitt on 11/21-23. We need a minimum of two (we're happy to have more) AMS officials for each session so that these times can be entered into the SWIMS database. Here's the spreadsheet to sign up for this meet...https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tCeqx0dsUHxN2a-FMXW7IQ-Zlm7WuKqnTTCl0aL7U2A/edit#gid=0. We've never not been able to meet these obligations to observe meets.

Thanks for your help. If you have any questions, please contact me at bob.mermelstein@gmail.com. See ya on deck!