Houses/Winter League
Hey folks. Now that Registration is settling down, I wanted to reach out and explain the Houses and what they will be used for with ASL. (You can find your House by logging into your account, clicking on "My Account", then "Account Info", and then click on the "Members" tab, and under the "LOCATION" section you'll see the House Name.)
We have sorted the entire ASL program into four houses, like you read about in the Harry Potter series. There are a few aims to utilizing this system... The main on is to create some team bonding across the age groups and training squads. We will split the team randomly and evenly, so each house has equal representation in all ages/genders. The second is that the Houses will act as "Teams" in the Winter League, so we can put some "competition" into the meets, which is always fun.
The Houses will also compete in the House Cup, a competition that will reward kids for showing great team camaraderie, support for each other and leadership. We will use the houses to create friendly competitions in events like fundraisers and to bring some order to the chaos of team bonding activities such as the pumpkin decorating day in October, and things like roller skating parties, movie days, etc.
Why? Well, it all started about 12 years ago while I was coaching in Exeter, NH. We had one young woman who was one of our house captains. She was 15, a freshman in HS. Throughout the year, at House events like making t-shirts for a meet we were going to, the silly relay carnival, and some movie trips, she formed a great connection with a young man, who at the time was 9. She qualified to swim at Olympic Trials in 2012 in the 100m Fly. He had convinced his mom that they should cancel all their activities and stay home and watch her online. His mom took this great photo, and every year the two of them share and comment on it. They still keep in touch, and he followed in her footsteps, and he's currently studying the same college she attended.
This is one example of many- I had my own experiences as a younger swimmer looking up to some of my older teammates, as has anyone who was on a team like ASL at any point. These moments can last a lifetime- I still remember the older guys ‘allowing’ me to stay in the ‘older guys’ shower area and not kicking me to the colder and further away shower area, and calling me by name… I’m 44, and still think those guys (Rick and Luke) are ‘the coolest’. I even bumped into Rick when I was visiting my family in Boston last month (he's a firefighter at the same station as my cousin), and bought him a cold beer.
So I hope that this presents many opportunities for our older teammates to give many of those moments to our younger teammates, and help them feel connected to this program.
The Houses are called Brave, Fierce, Proud and Strong. These are also our team's Core Values. These logos will be on the team caps given to athletes, with the ASL logo on one side, and their house logo on the other.
The reason we chose these animals a few years back is because they 1) look cool as heck, 2) have generally accepted ‘traits’ or ‘characterizations’ that correspond with those core values that ASL is constantly striving to exemplify.
Brave- ASL athletes are brave in their training, in their racing and in life.
Fierce- ASL athletes are ready to train, race and defend their team with everything they have
Proud- ASL athletes are proud of themselves, their teammates, and their team.
Strong- ASL athletes work hard to be ready to take on all challenges.
One of the things I talk about often with athletes/parents, is that we humans are not meant to be swimming in water. Humans are land animals. We aren’t supposed to be propelling ourselves through water. So when the HS Seniors said they wanted to go with mythological creatures for the mascots, this idea came to my mind… land animals that have no business soaring through the skies, doing things that defy their natural instincts.
We're all very excited to get into this Winter League series- we did an "In-House Race Series" last year, and it was awesome, giving lots of kids race opportunities they wouldn't have gotten if they could only race in travel meets.
We're kicking things off with some TIME TRIALS. Essentially, I just need some DATA on the athletes before we get into the dual meets. So- athletes will swim 25y (8-unders) or 50y (9-overs) of each stroke that we don't have any baseline data for. So if they have already swum all four of those, they're not going to compete in the Time Trials. If they're just missing one, they'll swim that event only. The goal is to get the baseline data, and not be at the pool for 5 hours :-)
So- if your athlete has TIMES from the CSRA Summer League, or from some other team they've been on, PLEASE send it to Coach Noah at coachnoah@swim-asl.com so he can enter the times into our system. Then, if they've got missing data, please make sure you commit to the Time Trials session for your athlete's House, and we'll enter them into their No Time (NT) events.
We need this baseline data because of how we are SCORING our Winter League meets. This is the part I'm most excited about- we won't be scoring these traditionally, as in, first place gets 9 points, 2nd place 7 points, etc etc.
We'll be scoring the meets by TIME DROPPED. So it's based on athletes dropping time for themselves. Doesn't matter what place they get, the goal is PERSONAL IMPROVEMENT. Everyone can potentially score, everyone is important. The more athletes from the House that show up, the more potential time dropped, the more points! So please mark the dates of your House's Winter League meets and try to get your athletes there to help their House score :-)
HOW TO REGISTER FOR THE WINTER LEAGUE MEETS:
- Make sure you are LOGGED IN to the website.
- Click on MEETS/EVENTS.
- You can filter for "DUAL MEETS" in the Custom Filters section, under the Event Category section.
- Find the EVENTS for your House, and click on the pink button "Edit Commitment".
- Click on each of your athletes, and select the "Yes, Please Sign Up ____ For This Event" from the dropdown.
The Winter League Meets will have a specific 2-3 event list, and all the athletes will swim all of the events offered. There is a bit of prep work we need to do before each meet to get it seeded and ready to run, so we will be having HARD DEADLINES of the Wednesday before the meet. This will give us Thursday to enter the athletes, get them exported into the meet management software, and SEED the meet and get Heat Sheets sent out. If you miss the deadlines, there is no guarantee we will be able to get your athlete into the meet. If there are empty lanes, we'll do our best to accomodate, but we won't be creating heats for folks who miss the registration deadline.
OK- That's a lot of information, but as I said, we're super excited about the Winter League, and cannot wait to see all the athletes compete!
#ASLBrave #ASLFierce #ASLProud #ASLStrong
#ASLWinterLeague2324 #WhosNext #LetsGO
#ShowUp #WorkHard #FindFast #BeNext #TheASLWay
Coach Greg Gillette
Program Director / Head Coach
Aiken-Augusta Swim League
coachgreg@swim-asl.com
206-518-1500
