Summer swim absurd age rules

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do you really think if they called the age group: 11 and 2 months/12 and 2 months, then the complainers would stop complaining?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Besides club swim is there any other sport that has kids age up partway through the year?

Soccer. Jan 1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Besides club swim is there any other sport that has kids age up partway through the year?

Soccer. Jan 1.

Soccer has an age cutoff of Jan 1. They don’t age up during the season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

Organizing sports by grade is precisely what leads to sports-motivated redshirting, specifically in boys. Some people are blatant about and will just tell you they redshirted so their kid would have a better shot at playing at a high level. If you really want your kid to play varsity sports in high school, redshirting is actually pretty easy way to accomplish that, assuming they have any proclivity for the sport at all. A 19 yr old senior is going to make the team most of the time, especially in boys sports.

I'm for whatever rules prevent psychotic sports parents from trying to game the system to get their kid an advantage, because those people need to be controlled. For this reason, I support the age cut offs for summer swim, even though they don't benefit my kids, because if the rules make the obsessive, hyper-competitive parents mad, that means they are probably a good idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

I didn’t say it would be fairer. It’s already fair. It’s a 24 month eligibility period. Like I said, changing it would just cause people to complain in a different way. Case in point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How in the world do you know all of these kids' ages? Please tell me your not google searching them.

There are swimming sites where the club swimmers’ age and month are listed (ie 12 years 11 months). You also can see for example kids competing at 13 and over champs this weekend that are listed as being 12 on their summer team because that was their age on June 1. Parents like to complain about this but the reality is the kids don’t care. And no I’m not a summer birthday parent, my kid has a May birthday.

The top kids who are the correct age do care.

Week to week meets, I don' think my kids care at all. My record-holding kid minds a tiny bit when setting a record at say 12.5 that gets broken the next year by a classmate who has been 13 for almost two months by the time it gets broken at all stars. In our house, we do say "records are meant to be broken" and kids shrug it off for the most part, but we know a 12yo didn't get that record.

Yeah, like how the "8&U" relays at All Stars this year were all mostly made up of 9 year olds. I think there are a few age groups where the June 1st cut-off leans more towards unfair - namely, 8&U and 13-14.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How in the world do you know all of these kids' ages? Please tell me your not google searching them.

There are swimming sites where the club swimmers’ age and month are listed (ie 12 years 11 months). You also can see for example kids competing at 13 and over champs this weekend that are listed as being 12 on their summer team because that was their age on June 1. Parents like to complain about this but the reality is the kids don’t care. And no I’m not a summer birthday parent, my kid has a May birthday.

The top kids who are the correct age do care.

Week to week meets, I don' think my kids care at all. My record-holding kid minds a tiny bit when setting a record at say 12.5 that gets broken the next year by a classmate who has been 13 for almost two months by the time it gets broken at all stars. In our house, we do say "records are meant to be broken" and kids shrug it off for the most part, but we know a 12yo didn't get that record.

Yeah, like how the "8&U" relays at All Stars this year were all mostly made up of 9 year olds. I think there are a few age groups where the June 1st cut-off leans more towards unfair - namely, 8&U and 13-14.

Divisional relays were on June 28th this year. Are you seriously suggesting that those 28 days made a difference? 28 days made those kids bigger, faster, and stronger?

It's still a 24 month window. How is this so hard to understand?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How in the world do you know all of these kids' ages? Please tell me your not google searching them.

There are swimming sites where the club swimmers’ age and month are listed (ie 12 years 11 months). You also can see for example kids competing at 13 and over champs this weekend that are listed as being 12 on their summer team because that was their age on June 1. Parents like to complain about this but the reality is the kids don’t care. And no I’m not a summer birthday parent, my kid has a May birthday.

The top kids who are the correct age do care.

Week to week meets, I don' think my kids care at all. My record-holding kid minds a tiny bit when setting a record at say 12.5 that gets broken the next year by a classmate who has been 13 for almost two months by the time it gets broken at all stars. In our house, we do say "records are meant to be broken" and kids shrug it off for the most part, but we know a 12yo didn't get that record.

Yeah, like how the "8&U" relays at All Stars this year were all mostly made up of 9 year olds. I think there are a few age groups where the June 1st cut-off leans more towards unfair - namely, 8&U and 13-14.

Divisional relays were on June 28th this year. Are you seriously suggesting that those 28 days made a difference? 28 days made those kids bigger, faster, and stronger?

It's still a 24 month window. How is this so hard to understand?

I mean, two of our four were 11 then. And swapping them for still ten year olds would have meant the relays not going to all stars. So, yes?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

Organizing sports by grade is precisely what leads to sports-motivated redshirting, specifically in boys. Some people are blatant about and will just tell you they redshirted so their kid would have a better shot at playing at a high level. If you really want your kid to play varsity sports in high school, redshirting is actually pretty easy way to accomplish that, assuming they have any proclivity for the sport at all. A 19 yr old senior is going to make the team most of the time, especially in boys sports.

I'm for whatever rules prevent psychotic sports parents from trying to game the system to get their kid an advantage, because those people need to be controlled. For this reason, I support the age cut offs for summer swim, even though they don't benefit my kids, because if the rules make the obsessive, hyper-competitive parents mad, that means they are probably a good idea.

In schools, they have to do it by grade and skill but I fully support private groups doing it by age as it makes far more sense so kids cannot game the system. For swim though, its a bit weird as some of our summer/fall birthday kids are eligible to swim after graduating HS for that year as they are still 17.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

It's only fair to the families who hold back their kids claiming immaturity or social delays to game the system. Reality is those kids aren't brighter, stronger or faster, they are just older.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How in the world do you know all of these kids' ages? Please tell me your not google searching them.

There are swimming sites where the club swimmers’ age and month are listed (ie 12 years 11 months). You also can see for example kids competing at 13 and over champs this weekend that are listed as being 12 on their summer team because that was their age on June 1. Parents like to complain about this but the reality is the kids don’t care. And no I’m not a summer birthday parent, my kid has a May birthday.

The top kids who are the correct age do care.

Week to week meets, I don' think my kids care at all. My record-holding kid minds a tiny bit when setting a record at say 12.5 that gets broken the next year by a classmate who has been 13 for almost two months by the time it gets broken at all stars. In our house, we do say "records are meant to be broken" and kids shrug it off for the most part, but we know a 12yo didn't get that record.

Yeah, like how the "8&U" relays at All Stars this year were all mostly made up of 9 year olds. I think there are a few age groups where the June 1st cut-off leans more towards unfair - namely, 8&U and 13-14.

Divisional relays were on June 28th this year. Are you seriously suggesting that those 28 days made a difference? 28 days made those kids bigger, faster, and stronger?

It's still a 24 month window. How is this so hard to understand?

I mean, two of our four were 11 then. And swapping them for still ten year olds would have meant the relays not going to all stars. So, yes?

Do you think they suddenly got faster when they turned 11. Can you explain how that works?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can someone explain to me what exactly the issue is? Like what are people upset about? I’ve read all the discussion and I don’t get it.

The age group spans 24 months right? The youngest and the oldest in the group will always be the same distance apart. The older one turning 11 in July doesn’t suddenly widen the gap.

Am I missing something? Do the people upset about it want narrower age groups so kids two years apart can’t compete together?

I’ll preface this by saying I don’t have a dog in the fight. I have club swimmers with fall and spring bdays who don’t want to do summer swim.

People get incensed about “unfairness” in kids’ sports, except of course, if said “unfairness” favors your own kid. The idea that a kid who has orbited the earth eleven times can win a trophy or ribbon or whatever kids get that is emblazoned with the title “9/10 year old champion” is impossible for some people to get over. You can show them a calendar, explain the 24 month duration, explain that someone will always be the oldest or the youngest, but none of that will enable them to reconcile “11 years old” and “9/10 year old”.

Club swim solves this by taking every kid’s age the first day of the meet, but even there, people focus on “oh that kid is turning 13 tomorrow, while my kid just turned 11”. I admit, I do it sometimes. But at least every kid is actually the age on the ribbon or medal, so it shuts people up. It is totally impractical to have this policy for a short summer swim season. So either they should do it by grade (3rd/4th, 5th/6th etc) or call the groups something not age related (minnows, piranhas etc), or just draw the line somewhere and let people kvetch. If they didn’t have a bellyache about the age cutoff, they would grumble about something else.

Do it by grade? Someone is always going to be the oldest and others the youngest. For my late August birthday kid, there are kids who are 18 months older than him in his grade due to red shirting. For a two grade level spread, that could mean a 30 month gap. How is that fairer?

Organizing sports by grade is precisely what leads to sports-motivated redshirting, specifically in boys. Some people are blatant about and will just tell you they redshirted so their kid would have a better shot at playing at a high level. If you really want your kid to play varsity sports in high school, redshirting is actually pretty easy way to accomplish that, assuming they have any proclivity for the sport at all. A 19 yr old senior is going to make the team most of the time, especially in boys sports.

I'm for whatever rules prevent psychotic sports parents from trying to game the system to get their kid an advantage, because those people need to be controlled. For this reason, I support the age cut offs for summer swim, even though they don't benefit my kids, because if the rules make the obsessive, hyper-competitive parents mad, that means they are probably a good idea.

Goodness, yes. Organizing by grade would be absurd - you now have March boys being redshirted to avoid being “too young.” You’ll have kids hitting puberty in the third grade by the time the idiot parents in the DMV stop redshirting to gain advantage. Travel and club sports are 1000 better because they use birth years, so your 7th grade 15 year old isn’t competing against kids who actually belong in the 7th grade. Grade based swim would be the dumbest idea ever for actual competition.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How in the world do you know all of these kids' ages? Please tell me your not google searching them.

There are swimming sites where the club swimmers’ age and month are listed (ie 12 years 11 months). You also can see for example kids competing at 13 and over champs this weekend that are listed as being 12 on their summer team because that was their age on June 1. Parents like to complain about this but the reality is the kids don’t care. And no I’m not a summer birthday parent, my kid has a May birthday.

The top kids who are the correct age do care.

Week to week meets, I don' think my kids care at all. My record-holding kid minds a tiny bit when setting a record at say 12.5 that gets broken the next year by a classmate who has been 13 for almost two months by the time it gets broken at all stars. In our house, we do say "records are meant to be broken" and kids shrug it off for the most part, but we know a 12yo didn't get that record.

Yeah, like how the "8&U" relays at All Stars this year were all mostly made up of 9 year olds. I think there are a few age groups where the June 1st cut-off leans more towards unfair - namely, 8&U and 13-14.

Oh come on. multiple top relay teams in the 13-14s were made up of 13 year olds. I guess they are just the most amazing 13 year olds ever to beat - gasp - a 14 year old swimmer.