Anonymous wrote:I have a June 2nd birthday kid and I still agree with OP. Winter swimming (which all my kids do) you age up the day of your birthday. I had this happen to a friend where they literally aged up the second day of a meet. They swam day 1 of the two day meet as a 10 year old and day 2 as an 11 year old. It should absolutely be the same for summer swim.

That's not how it works for USA Swimming. It's your age on the first day of the meet and no one ages up in the middle of a meet.

Anonymous wrote:My kid is an end of May birthday. It is what it is. The cutoff has to be somewhere.

The cutoff should be Aug 1. The kids will be swimming their correct age.

Anonymous wrote:I have a June 2nd birthday kid and I still agree with OP. Winter swimming (which all my kids do) you age up the day of your birthday. I had this happen to a friend where they literally aged up the second day of a meet. They swam day 1 of the two day meet as a 10 year old and day 2 as an 11 year old. It should absolutely be the same for summer swim.

Why? The people who argue that it should be the same never explain why.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid is an end of May birthday. It is what it is. The cutoff has to be somewhere.

It can be their actual birthday. That’s what USA Swimming uses.

How would that impact tea high point awards? I guess we’d have to eliminate them.

I have a June 2nd birthday kid and I still agree with OP. Winter swimming (which all my kids do) you age up the day of your birthday. I had this happen to a friend where they literally aged up the second day of a meet. They swam day 1 of the two day meet as a 10 year old and day 2 as an 11 year old. It should absolutely be the same for summer swim.

You are exhausting. You probably complain about school ages too. I have one of the kids on the younger side. They don't turn 18 till Freshman year of college. There are advantages and disadvantages. They have to make a rule somewhere.

I imagine the hardest thing about bumping up an age group mid season is going from 25s to 50s or 50s to 100m if you aren’t used to it.

The reason NVSL doesn't is the relays. You could propose a rule change that for Divisionals it's swim your age. I don't think the rule change would go through, but at least that would be a more productive activity than complaining here.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid is an end of May birthday. It is what it is. The cutoff has to be somewhere.

It can be their actual birthday. That’s what USA Swimming uses.

Summer swim is a special thing that is less about competitiveness and more about community and teamwork and encouraging kids to work hard and build skills. The birthday rules for summer swim were designed to ensure that kids wouldn't have to switch divisions in the middle of the short season so that they can stay with friends and not have to switch meets or whatever. It's only 6 weeks. It would really suck for kids with birthdays during those 6 weeks to have to switch levels so the cut-off date was selected (as close as possible to the start of the season) to create a better community experience.

So in a way OP is right -- this rule was adopted "for" summer birthday kids. But not to give them an advantage in races but to allow them to enjoy their summer swim experience without having to worry about suddenly having to go swim in the next age group for the last two weeks of the season.

Because the levels are divided by age bands there will always be an age spread in any division with the oldest kids in that band somewhat advantaged and the youngest kids somewhat disadvantaged. Shifting the cut-off or changing the rule so kids aged up on their birthdays would not eliminate this element of summer swim (and all swimming) but it would undermine the experience for kids whose birthdays fell during the season. Why would you want to do that to a 9 or 11 year old.

Anonymous wrote:On our team, in the younger ages, most of the divisionals swimmers were swimming in the “wrong” age group. 11 year olds swimming as 9/10. 9 year olds swimming as 8&under. In the older kids, many of those dominating came back from college to swim a final year.

This rule was literally cooked up in a back room by the parents of summer birthday kids. It should be done away with. We follow USA Swimming rules for everything else. We should for aging up as well.

This could lead to them getting the wrong bag tags. I know that would upset you

Anonymous wrote:On our team, in the younger ages, most of the divisionals swimmers were swimming in the “wrong” age group. 11 year olds swimming as 9/10. 9 year olds swimming as 8&under. In the older kids, many of those dominating came back from college to swim a final year.

This rule was literally cooked up in a back room by the parents of summer birthday kids. It should be done away with. We follow USA Swimming rules for everything else. We should for aging up as well.

If your kid was that good it wouldn’t matter if someone turned 11 on June 15. My 9 year old still placed 3rd in his events today. Sounds like sour grapes.

OP what's your address. I'll send you atrophy 🏆.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid is an end of May birthday. It is what it is. The cutoff has to be somewhere.

It can be their actual birthday. That’s what USA Swimming uses.

How would that be more fair?

And what other team sport with a single season operates that way? None, because it would be really disruptive.

Anonymous wrote:I have a question in the opposite direction, about HS seniors and college freshmen super seniors. If a kid will turn 19 during the last days of HS senior year, I assume that means their last season of summer swim has to be the season after their junior year of HS, not the year of their HS graduation?

Nope. 19 after June 1 = 18 for summer swim. That’s also why you see some college swimmers come back to NVSL after their freshman year in college. One was a league record breaker this summer.

I have a question in the opposite direction, about HS seniors and college freshmen super seniors. If a kid will turn 19 during the last days of HS senior year, I assume that means their last season of summer swim has to be the season after their junior year of HS, not the year of their HS graduation?