11.5 year old boy swimming team advise (falls church VA)

[Anonymous]

Hi there, my son, eleven and a half, has been swimming with Arlington Aquatic Club (AAC) for three years - last year was Age Prep. He likes swimming but does not like meets. We recently moved to falls church (22043) and am looking for a new club for him (he stopped for six months due to skin problem). Options are (1) Fish Spring Hill (15 min drive, try out done, recommended for age group 2, twice a week, $3000/year); (2) NCAP marymount university, (7 min drive, scheduling try out now, but it seems only Bronze 1 will work for him, and not sure he can get in, 3 times a week, $3300/year); (3) Machine (scheduling try out now, Tuckahone location is 7 min drive and tysons location is 15min drive, i guess he will be in either silver or green program also similar price $3000+). Would appreciate it if you can share any advises on teams and locations. Thank you so much!
Btw, AAC was less than $1000 a year, and how come these three are triple price, just curious.

[Anonymous]

Bc AAC’s cost is largely supplemented by Arlington County.

[Anonymous]

Did you look into York? I have one kid that did York from MS through graduation. She loved it.

Another kid did NCAP at Marymount. It's a pain in the a$$ to get to and park. We were in Arlington about 3 miles away and it took a good 25 minutes to get there, park and walk to the pool. At 11.5 you can probably just drop off at the door but if you don't it takes a while to get into the pool. The program was fine but the logistics sucked.

[Anonymous]

I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

NP. I would find a friendly club where he feels more comfortable doing meets. Swimming for a club without doing meets is almost always a dead end because kids will lose interest and motivation without meets.

[Anonymous]

OP here. York is 22 min drive and probably will have traffic too.
NCAP marymont is closest 7 min drive and i will do drop off for sure. $$ sucks! Another option is to stick with AAC money wise. Not sure if worthy $$$ for the pricy clubs at this time. Any one?

Anonymous wrote:Did you look into York? I have one kid that did York from MS through graduation. She loved it.

Another kid did NCAP at Marymount. It's a pain in the a$$ to get to and park. We were in Arlington about 3 miles away and it took a good 25 minutes to get there, park and walk to the pool. At 11.5 you can probably just drop off at the door but if you don't it takes a while to get into the pool. The program was fine but the logistics sucked.

[Anonymous]

Thank you. I see the problem and hope he feels more motivated for meets in the new club.
He does two years of summer team with Arlington forest club and compete in B and A meets. But for winter meets with AAC, he did not like it. Maybe too big and overwhelming....

What are friendly club options? Thanks a lot!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

NP. I would find a friendly club where he feels more comfortable doing meets. Swimming for a club without doing meets is almost always a dead end because kids will lose interest and motivation without meets.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. York is 22 min drive and probably will have traffic too.
NCAP marymont is closest 7 min drive and i will do drop off for sure. $$ sucks! Another option is to stick with AAC money wise. Not sure if worthy $$$ for the pricy clubs at this time. Any one?

Anonymous wrote:Did you look into York? I have one kid that did York from MS through graduation. She loved it.

Another kid did NCAP at Marymount. It's a pain in the a$$ to get to and park. We were in Arlington about 3 miles away and it took a good 25 minutes to get there, park and walk to the pool. At 11.5 you can probably just drop off at the door but if you don't it takes a while to get into the pool. The program was fine but the logistics sucked.

OP, what about meets doesn’t your son like and does he plan to still do them? If he doesn’t plan on doing meets, I don’t know that NCAP is a great choice (even if it’s the closest). It’s a lot of money to spend on a kid who just wants to practice a few days a week.

[Anonymous]

Thank you. I am thinking about giving him one year of these competative club, and if he is still not motivated to meets, then we step down to recreational?

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you. I see the problem and hope he feels more motivated for meets in the new club.
He does two years of summer team with Arlington forest club and compete in B and A meets. But for winter meets with AAC, he did not like it. Maybe too big and overwhelming....

What are friendly club options? Thanks a lot!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

NP. I would find a friendly club where he feels more comfortable doing meets. Swimming for a club without doing meets is almost always a dead end because kids will lose interest and motivation without meets.

I would definitely look into York. The Gears program at Machine also fits for a kid who may not have a lot of interest in doing meets.

[Anonymous]

If he doesn't like meets then don't join a swim club. NCAP and Machine are really competitive. And to put it this way with ANY swim club they want their competitive groups swimming meets. This is how the club gets ranked. When a kid is just going to practice and not all the meets, the coaches have little reason to work with the kid.

Summer meets are fun whereas Club meets are more serious. This does not sound like the sport for your swimmer. Does your summer team have a winter swim program where he could keep in shape?

As for the price differential on Clubs, AAC is cheap because they do not pay for lane time and it is subsidize. They also are not always as motivated to improve swimmers and pull them out and give them individual attention. A club where you are spending a lot want to keep getting your dollars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you. I am thinking about giving him one year of these competative club, and if he is still not motivated to meets, then we step down to recreational?

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

Does your son want to do this, or is this something you are pushing on him? By age 11 and a half I would give your child some ownership over the activities he wants to do, if he is still of the mindset he doesn’t want to do club swim meets, I would not force him to join a pricey competitive club team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. York is 22 min drive and probably will have traffic too.
NCAP marymont is closest 7 min drive and i will do drop off for sure. $$ sucks! Another option is to stick with AAC money wise. Not sure if worthy $$$ for the pricy clubs at this time. Any one?

Anonymous wrote:Did you look into York? I have one kid that did York from MS through graduation. She loved it.

Another kid did NCAP at Marymount. It's a pain in the a$$ to get to and park. We were in Arlington about 3 miles away and it took a good 25 minutes to get there, park and walk to the pool. At 11.5 you can probably just drop off at the door but if you don't it takes a while to get into the pool. The program was fine but the logistics sucked.

York at Renaissance is literally in 22043. Did you look at that location? They have later evening programs for kids who are mostly keeping in shape.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you. I am thinking about giving him one year of these competative club, and if he is still not motivated to meets, then we step down to recreational?

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

Does your son want to do this, or is this something you are pushing on him? By age 11 and a half I would give your child some ownership over the activities he wants to do, if he is still of the mindset he doesn’t want to do club swim meets, I would not force him to join a pricey competitive club team.

I think this is a bit overly aggressive. If he likes practice and works hard, then it's totally fine for him to do club swim. He'll get the best coaching as part of a club.

My daughter is 11 and isn't particularly fast, so going to club meets and getting trounced isn't especially fun. But she works hard at practice and is always improving. She's also very petite and will be late to puberty--pediatrician estimates that she'll start at 13 or 14 yo, so the very later end for a girl--so it will be a long time until she can catch up physically, no matter how hard she works. We are fine with her sticking with swim as long as she likes it. We don't push every club meet as they can be demoralizing. She loves summer meets and does well enough there with our lower division team. So that's enough of a goal. She doesn't need to be an aspiring D1 swimmer to get something out of the activity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you. I am thinking about giving him one year of these competative club, and if he is still not motivated to meets, then we step down to recreational?

Anonymous wrote:I’m going to be blunt, if your kid doesn’t like meets and doesn’t plan on participating in them why are you looking to pay $3k plus per year for competitive clubs?

Does your son want to do this, or is this something you are pushing on him? By age 11 and a half I would give your child some ownership over the activities he wants to do, if he is still of the mindset he doesn’t want to do club swim meets, I would not force him to join a pricey competitive club team.

I think this is a bit overly aggressive. If he likes practice and works hard, then it's totally fine for him to do club swim. He'll get the best coaching as part of a club.

My daughter is 11 and isn't particularly fast, so going to club meets and getting trounced isn't especially fun. But she works hard at practice and is always improving. She's also very petite and will be late to puberty--pediatrician estimates that she'll start at 13 or 14 yo, so the very later end for a girl--so it will be a long time until she can catch up physically, no matter how hard she works. We are fine with her sticking with swim as long as she likes it. We don't push every club meet as they can be demoralizing. She loves summer meets and does well enough there with our lower division team. So that's enough of a goal. She doesn't need to be an aspiring D1 swimmer to get something out of the activity.

OP is also asking about the cost. The price of competitive club swim in this area is not worth it for a kid that actually doesn’t want to compete. If money is no object, absolutely people still get something out of the coaching at a club, but if you’re mindful of the costs of your kid’s activities dropping $3,000+ per year at a competitive club like NCAP or Machine when your kid doesn’t want to compete doesn’t seem like a financially sound decision.