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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Flashback. Every year as a mediocre swimmer I would get so irrationally hyped before the banquet would just hope and hope that I would win a real award. The coaches would push coming to the last practices even if you didn’t qualify, and I was always there like an eager fool hoping to put in the last bits of work before the banquet.

Maybe it would be the year a coach finally noticed my hard work even if my times sucked? Maybe there would be new award categories?!

Our pool awarded trophies to everyone with a base size that reflected how well you did. I always got the flat plain base participation trophy with the swimmer statue glued directly on it. Some years they did away with that and just did participation certificates. I hated my brother and the girls who got the super tall colored trophies for high points and stuff. The worst were the years when one kid would get both high points and most improved. I know trophies are a dime a dozen now and kids get them for breathing, but back then kids actually displayed and compared them and they were rare. My team wasn’t the best but somehow my age group had girls who went on to D1 and top D3s.

I quit the year after I was a 13-14 and they gave me a made-up trophy because there were only 3 girls in my age group and I didn’t get high points or most improved. For many years after 9-10s my brother was the only boy in his age group and also did dive and would be given a box for his awards at the end of the night. My parents would make me wait while they took a million photos of him on the pool steps with his hardware.

I remember crying in my bed after those stupid banquets! [/quote]

As a mediocre swimmer, I remember feeling the same way as you (maybe not the tears though, definitely the disappointment), except I kept going through graduating as a 15-18 for my MCSL team.  Why?  I don't really know.  Probably because I was at the pool anyway.

Then I was inexplicably hired as an assistant coach the year after I graduated because the head coach knew how hard I worked despite being a mediocre swimmer.

Then after two summers as an assistant coach (and time as a PVS coach), I was hired as a head coach of another team.

I vividly remember, after my experiences as a swimmer, that nothing brought me greater joy than giving out the discretionary coach's awards for the most spirited boy and girl and hardest working boy and girl.  I intentionally avoided giving them to the kids who were getting the massive high point trophies and long course plaques.  I anguished over those awards.  And a few years I convinced the reps to let me give out more than I was allotted.  That's what keeps the buy-in from the kids who are not club swimmers and never will be.

And I also limited paper plate awards to 15 minutes.  Because yeah, those can get a little out of hand.

Summer swim is supposed to be fun.  I wish more coaches came from the same place you and I were.  [/quote]

It’s not just the B swimmers who feel dejected at these awards banquets. We’ve had to prep our A meet swimmer, who went to all the practices and all the meets, that he’s unlikely to get a trophy bc he’s the second highest points scorer, not the first - and because it’s not his rookie year, he’s unlikely to get a prize for being the most improved or for team spirit, which I think they do generally reserve for the non-A meet swimmers. He loves the sport, so not that it’s all about the prizes, but I can appreciate how it can feel really crummy not to be recognized when you’ve worked so hard, particular for the 10U kids. [/quote]

That's because he will feel foolish because he allowed himself to be used by his coaches to help the team win. If I were his coach, I'd reach out to him personally and let him know that I saw how hard he worked for the team, etc... then tell him I planned to give him a special shout out at the banquet.

[b]Coaches that don't recognize effort of their solid swimmers will eventually lose those swimmers to other sports (which often happens when kids hit high school).[/b] The kids that are left in the 15-18 range are the club swimmers and a few non-club swimmers who don't put up All Star times.  This is why that age bracket is double the size of the lower brackets. [/quote]

That's an oversimplification....older kids leave summer swim (or other rec sports) for all sorts of different reasons. Could be friends, other interests, etc. etc. There's been countless threads on this.

At the end of the day, don't take rec sports awards too seriously. From what I see at our pool, except for a few parents who seem to excel at resentment (at all things...), their kids move quickly on as do other parents whose kids were not recognized.

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