Safety at Christmas Champs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Funny how this started as a thread about safety.

Agreed - it's important to stay focused here. Double-meet attendance wasn't limited to Hydra, and Hydra's own numbers won't have tipped the balance from tolerable to crazy. CC had too many people there. Some of them were swimmers. Some of them were spectators. The meet sanction was definitely violated in some areas (portable chairs, attendance headcount), and the physical circumstances were at best uncomfortable and at worst unsafe. A couple of things probably need to happen next.

1. As posted here earlier, Fairland is looking at their rental agreement for this meet. PVS now needs to examine from a governance standpoint whether SA violated the meet sanction, and decide what, if anything, to do about that.

2. The meet itself probably needs to have some adjustments made. As has been said here, making it NFT would probably help with the number problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Hydra, though a smaller team also has multiple swimmers who did Christmas Champs and will do Riley Eaton this coming weekend. Massive coaching fail. Teams should not allow 2 winter champs, period.

Terrible take. Hard to say this is a massive coaching for a club sending swimmers to meet that wasn’t restricted.

The massive fail lies with SA and PVS, who sanctioned this fiasco.

While SA and PVS sanctioned this, and there are clearly many adults far in the wrong, the Hydra coaches came from a club that only allowed swimmers to enter one winter Champs meet. This year, owners of their own club, they allow kids to swim the same events two weeks in a row at both Christmas Champs and Riley Eaton. Bush league move.

The only Bush league move was SA filling the rafters with swimmers and spectators and their pockets with entry fees. If they wanted to restrict the meet to kids who weren’t going to Riley Eaton, they could have easily done so. But that wouldn’t have been in their financial interest. Hard to see how any club other than the host club is to blame here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The sanction from PVS says only 350 athletes and 250 spectators per session. Is that being followed?

Absolutely not!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good evening everyone,
On behalf of Fairland Sports and Aquatics Complex, we hear you! We were unaware the full scope of potential attendees. As mentioned above, we too were told 350. We tried our best to accommodate the overflow and resulting challenges as best we would, real time, without having to shutdown the meet entirely.

Safety is our paramount focus and mission. Moving forward, we are introducing additional steps to better vet our potential renters and hold them accountable.

Please, do not hesitate to reach out to us directly with any additional concerns. We are here to serve our community with integrity, and welcome all feedback so we can continue to approve.

Thank you,
Matthew Wade, Aquatics Venue Manager
301-362-6092

This is nothing new. How could you not know? Not new info. Have you never been? Cared? It’s wild and has been—even during the end of Covid 19 when people still wore masks.

[Anonymous]

What about the results will the suburban be posting the results?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We were there last year and forgot what a disaster it was, so we ended up going this year as well. Definitely as bad or worse this time around. Very unsafe for swimmers and spectators, and frankly, not fun for anyone (we asked).

It is crowded (jam packed), super loud and there’s too much going on. One year my kid had to wait in a tent set up out back. Nothing about it enjoyable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:RMSC shouldn't send that many swimmers to both Turkey and Xmas Champ. I know their Rockville site asked swimmers to choose either Turkey or Holiday, but all other county sites allowed their swimmers to swim both Xmas Champ and Holiday. They should be banned, especially for a PG pool.

That is ridiculous. Serious. Clubs generally only allow swimmers to swim one Winter champs meet. (I have seen a kid swim both but in those cases they are swimming a one event at the second meet)

Allowing swimmers to double up is not fair. And will force either club number limitations or NST/NFT times for the meet.

1. We're connected with more than one club and I've seen this go both ways.

2. That is exactly what _should_ happen with Christmas Champs. That meet cannot be both things at once: it can't challenge the fast kids at a top level while also providing great opportunities for the slower kids. But many kids are not allowed to skip meets to which they are assigned, and that's a club problem. If the meet changes its policies, problem solved.

Make CC NFT.

Didn’t it use to be nft?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Hydra, though a smaller team also has multiple swimmers who did Christmas Champs and will do Riley Eaton this coming weekend. Massive coaching fail. Teams should not allow 2 winter champs, period.

Terrible take. Hard to say this is a massive coaching for a club sending swimmers to meet that wasn’t restricted.

The massive fail lies with SA and PVS, who sanctioned this fiasco.

While SA and PVS sanctioned this, and there are clearly many adults far in the wrong, the Hydra coaches came from a club that only allowed swimmers to enter one winter Champs meet. This year, owners of their own club, they allow kids to swim the same events two weeks in a row at both Christmas Champs and Riley Eaton. Bush league move.

How do you know the swimmers will be doing he same events at those two meets?

Look at results from CC (point scorers) and the psych sheet from Riley Eaton. There is overlap in the same events.

[Anonymous]

So neither PVS nor SA has anything to say about last weekend? If anyone from SA is on here I'd love to hear their perspective.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So neither PVS nor SA has anything to say about last weekend? If anyone from SA is on here I'd love to hear their perspective.

I agree there could have been some major issues , thank goodness nobody got injured participants or spectators. Knock on wood no illness yet for me, and jeez wonder what NIH thinks of this? I would like to her from SU

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So neither PVS nor SA has anything to say about last weekend? If anyone from SA is on here I'd love to hear their perspective.

Outside of of the 3 or 4 people commenting here, this isn't a big deal and isn't a thing that anyone is dwelling o. Folks have moved on and are living their lives with nary a thought of this meet.

[Anonymous]

The venue and staff can only do so much. It would help if the coaches actually supervised their swimmers. It would help if the meet marshals actually did their jobs instead of focusing on their phones or walking away from their assigned positions to watch and/or record their children compete. It would help if the people visiting the venue acted like the rules still apply to them. Everybody needs to do their part to keep it safe.

[Anonymous]

We could start with the host club actually following the proposals they put forth in the meet sanction. They admitted far more swimmers than they applied for in their documents, thereby pushing the physical venue over capacity. At a minimum I hope Fairland refuses to rent to them again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So neither PVS nor SA has anything to say about last weekend? If anyone from SA is on here I'd love to hear their perspective.

I agree there could have been some major issues , thank goodness nobody got injured participants or spectators. Knock on wood no illness yet for me, and jeez wonder what NIH thinks of this? I would like to her from SU

My kid is now sick gee wonder how child caught a virus probably at this meet!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So neither PVS nor SA has anything to say about last weekend? If anyone from SA is on here I'd love to hear their perspective.

I agree there could have been some major issues , thank goodness nobody got injured participants or spectators. Knock on wood no illness yet for me, and jeez wonder what NIH thinks of this? I would like to her from SU

My kid is now sick gee wonder how child caught a virus probably at this meet!!

My DC was there all three days and was in the finals both Sat and Sun and is not sick so there's another data point.