Oldest record at your summer pool?
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Anonymous
Queen!!! I was hoping a record holder would chime in. Do you think your record is threatening? What was the rest of your swim “career” like? |
Anonymous
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I love these stories! We have a couple on the our boards in Arlington from the 1970s. I remember reading an interview with the guy who has the NVSL 8U boys free record that’s from 1965 (?) and wondering if it will ever be broken.
Also - not to derail this into an equipment fight like the one that’s ruining the other swim thread, but I do think not would be fun to see what suits/caps/goggles were like 50–70 years ago. I remember foam lined goggles from the 90s but the caps and suits seemed fairly similar. |
Anonymous
We have some really old photos floating around our pool. In the 70s the suits were all Arena and had a kind of funny low boy-cut for the girls. All I wanted back then was the arena suit with the little logos going up the stripe along the hip and back. I remember “fun suits” in my late 70s childhood being a weird thick knit and/or a thin terrycloth. I can’t remember what team suits felt like but I think they were closer to thick elastic cotton knits than they were to modern Lycra knits. The foam-lined goggles were a thing in the very late 70s but I was too little to remember before that. My relatives who swam in the 60s and early 70s claim there were no goggles? All of this still begs the question of how on earth those kids were so darn fast in spite of bad or no goggles, heavy suits, etc. Maybe it was because they didn’t waste time putting on sunscreen or packing a healthy meal. The kids in the team photos all have bleached out hair, crazy tans, and look strung out like they’ve eaten nothing but Slush Puppies and giant Smarties for a month. |
Anonymous
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Record Holder here.
Don’t think record is “threatening”. Was very surprised when some the records still stood while my kids were swimming. It was a bit surreal. I would jokingly tease my kids that they didn’t beat me or bet them some candy from concessions if they beat my time. I swam club beginning around 8-9 years old. My parents did put me in a variety of activities when I was young. Did figure skating, swimming, basketball, tball, and soccer. Lived on a cul de sac of kids and was always running around outside. I did travel soccer and swimming until about 8th grade when something had to give. During HS joined a club that was intense - doubles practices, etc. Trained with swimmers going to Pan American games and US Olympic Trials. I eventually got burned out. Parents were focused on school, swimming was something for fun if school work was being kept up with. Bad grades and I would be out of swimming. I missed out on a lot of social things too due to swim in HS. I swam D3 and actually played soccer again in college after not playing in HS. Was named MVP in swim program freshmen year, but eventually gave up swimming in junior year when I went abroad. Could have swam at university abroad but I wanted to see the other country and not the inside of another pool. Got job out of college with consulting firm. Rest is history. I don’t swim in a masters program, but wish I did. |
Anonymous
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Record Holder again….
I reminisce with a swim friend about suits back in the day compared to my swimmers current style. Back in the day, we would wear two suits to practices. The suit on top would be your oldest suit with holes and stretched out. We’d wear the top suit for “drag” to make swimming harder/train better. We’d also put the straps down on the bottom suit because the straps dig into your shoulders. Comapre with my swimmer DC who wants a training bikini because she doesn’t want tan lines from practice this summer. I would never have dreamt about swimming practice in a bikini. |
Anonymous
Yes! I asked my daughter if she wanted to keep her old suit as a drag suit and she had no idea what I was talking about 🤣. It probably didn’t make a lick of difference in our training but it was definitely a status thing to have a torn up and bleached out second suit. |
Anonymous
| 80s kid here. When we wore caps — which was really unusual — we wore Lycra caps that were the same fabric as our swimsuits. Nobody wore goggles except maybe the older kids. Club swim was popular (we called it “year round” swim). In Georgia, club teams like Swim Atlanta and Dynamo heavily recruited in our summer league. One of my summer league teammates even held the American Record in long course breaststroke for awhile. She was always fast, even before swimming club, but she did swim for either Dynamo or Swim Atlanta starting early. I swam for both (started with Dynamo, then moved to Swim Atlanta, then quit altogether when doubles at age 10 burned me out). The 80s were…something. |
Anonymous
| 80s kid here. When we wore caps — which was really unusual — we wore Lycra caps that were the same fabric as our swimsuits. Nobody wore goggles except maybe the older kids. Club swim was popular (we called it “year round” swim). In Georgia, club teams like Swim Atlanta and Dynamo heavily recruited in our summer league. One of my summer league teammates even held the American Record in [edit] short course breaststroke for awhile. She was always fast, even before swimming club, but she did swim for either Dynamo or Swim Atlanta starting early. I swam for both (started with Dynamo, then moved to Swim Atlanta, then quit altogether when doubles at age 11 burned me out). The 80s were…something. And I echo the comment about eating jello straight out of the pack. We believed the lime flavor made us the fastest. Add on the way suburban Atlanta summer leagues hold one long meet for all swimmers, many of which were delayed by thunderstorms, and how local pizza places would stay open for a whole huge swim team to arrive at 11 pm (!!!) to eat, and boy was summer league fun! |
Anonymous
| Well the person that holds 90% of our pool’s girls’ records is Phoebe Bacon, so she’s probably safe for a while. |
Anonymous
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I think the oldest record at our pool is 1987 which is only a year or two after the neighborhood was even built.
I was born in the 80s but my swimming career spanned from the early 90s-early 00s. I do remember the old Arena suits on the swim team kids when I was very little. And my first cap was Lycra. I used to wear up to 3 suits to practice for drag, with rips in the suits that I would tie into knots. My first “tech suit” was a paper suit that I borrowed to try to break a league record with my relay. Speaking of records, my old relays still have multiple records… at least they were there last time I was at that pool a few years ago. I still have (had?) one individual record too. Funny enough it’s in an event I wasn’t even that great at, I just had a summer where I was really good at that race for some reason. I never had the record in my best stroke because a teammate was even faster. We both ended up swimming D1 though I was at a better program than my old teammate/rival because they peaked early while I kept getting faster. It was crazy to swim against them and win in college. My 10 year old self never would have believed that was possible! Everyone thought that person would go to the Olympics but they were burned out by college. |
Anonymous
| There might be a couple records around this age, but I know the 8&U boys breast record is 1976 (funny seeing the other comments on breast on this thread). |
Anonymous
| Not my pool but nvsl: 1965 8u 25 free 15.10 |
Anonymous
| The girls 100 medley relay is hanging out since 1973. Otherwise a few from the early 80s. |
Anonymous
Holy crap, what was that kid on?! |
Anonymous
| Our head coach still holds records at our pool. The kids get a kick out of that. |