Men's and womens

Competing: tu, Arizona, Auburn, UC Davis, Wisconsin, North Texas, UIW

A few other teams are diving only.

Live Results

Some good times in today's prelims. Lots of B cuts so far. Arizona looks like they came to swim fast. Men's 200 IM looks fast.

Women's 500 fastest time is 4:44 so far.

I don't see tu's Jonathan Jackson in any events. Is there a story?

Hmmm....Jonathan Jackson isn't even on tu's roster. What happened?

He should have gone to A&M?

No doubt that's true!

Now taking theories why Auburn and Texas were HORRIBLE on day one of the Texas Invite...?

I mean Texas is not good AT ALL outside of their top 3 (Hersey, Gingrich, Bispo) but Auburn is worse...and I mean REAL bad (1 freaking A finalist all day???)...WTF?

LOB - I noticed the same thing. Arizona looks good. Texas' top few are fast. But Auburn indeed looks slow.

Today should be an interesting day - first breaststroke races.

I understand that Auburn is likely not rested at all (at least I hope not for their kids' sake) but, as was pointed out to me earlier, even unrested how can someone like Ava Ohlgren be going 2:02.7 in a 200 IM? She has the goods to go AT LEAST 2:00 at any point in the season, rested or not.

It's interesting to see Piersol in this meet, finishing 12th in 100 Fly yesterday.

Yeah, the times at this meet really are a shocker, especially when compared to what our girls did a few weeks ago. Maybe our girls are going to place a lot higher than we thought. It seems that college swimming in general will be in a down year. Agree/disagree?

Coaching > suits ??? Just throwing that out there...

No suits is a factor. But the times overall seem somewhat slow. This meet has produced fast times in the past. It is the chance to earn NCAA cuts before their holiday break/training trip.

I wonder how our girls would have performed against Arizona and Auburn instead of UH (etc.).

i think you'll find that most teams are going to be hesitant to rest their teams midseason this year, with the exception of those that are truly comfortable with their system (i.e. Bultman).

coaches generally rest (significantly) midseason for one of two reasons; 1 - to get swimmers to NCAAs (situationally smart gamble) or 2 - to give their swimmers 'confidence' (HUGE gamble imo).

1 - even without rocket suits, the NCAA cuts didn't change a whole lot from last year. that will cause some coaches to doubt if they'll do some damage to their squad by NOT getting in to the meet early.

2 - best way to get confidence is to go best times. this season will be the litmus test for the effect the shiny suits had on performance. is it going to take a 2% better performance to drop 1% of your time from spring 2009? if so, you'll see some disappointed faces looking up at the scoreboard instead of fist pumping. nothing would hurt team morale more than resting for nothing in the fall.

I can see both sides of the argument. I think with our team, and given that it's a system our girls are used to, it works out great. The good ones are capable of getting cuts at this point in the season with a rest week, and then they don't have to taper for Big 12's, which to me is a huge advantage. We see it a little bit with American swimmers at the Olympics. Because they have to taper so much for trials, it hurts them at the actual Olympic Games. Most of our top swimmers are now in to NCAA's.

He may do this, but the only argument I might make (it would take more work for him, and some juggling, but it might be worth it) is to split the team into 2 groups, and the ones who can get their cuts now, let them have a rest week, and the ones who can't, just keep building them up and let them try and get their cuts at Big 12's. That group would mostly apply to girls who have a shot at qualifying for NCAA's, but little chance at scoring points.

Of course, that ignores the confidence boost a good time gives you going into the toughest training. But, as was pointed out in that mega-thread about the boys not taking a training trip last season, some might argue that the swimmers need to be mentally tougher than that. Although, from what I've seen, our girls team can, how do I put this delicately... be very fragile emotionally. Like most girls.

All-in-all, for our team, I like the midseason taper. Not for all teams, but for our team.

Geary of Auburn 1:52.1 200 free
Ohlgren 1:52.2
Both of these are 1:45ers. Once again, WTF.

Texas looks a LITTLE better but not blowing anyone away by any stretch. Zona is simply rolling the field.

Hersey is MIA today. DFS on both the 400 IM and 100 back. I wonder what happened.

[This message has been edited by Look Out Below (edited 12/4/2009 3:03p).]

Geary's seed time was 1:43...maybe she doesn't care what heat she swims in tonight and plans to swim faster.

It shouldn't be illness - anything that makes her so ill that she swims +9 secs would keep her home.

Kinda strange all around for Auburn.

Hersey has been a warrior for tu all year - she swims lots of events with little rest. Maybe she's tired today and wants to be fresh for relays?

The way Auburn and tu are swimming I'd say they are planning to get their cuts at Big12s. I think this season there is more time between Big12s and the NCAAs. So maybe the coaches think they can pull off the double taper.

Cragin went 48.06 100 Back which is not too bad a prelim time for him at this stage it seems. 1.31 off his national hs record set in March. I doubt he goes much below 48 though tonight.

Even though they are sips, it's good to see a couple of Friendswood freshmen in an A final for tonight (McElhany being the other).

[This message has been edited by jbeaman88 (edited 12/4/2009 5:05p).]

tu's medley relays were fast tonight. Girls swam 1:38.44.

Cole Cragin split 21.77 in the 'B' medley. He may earn the spot on the 'A' since Hill Taylor went 22.33.

Cragin ends up with a 47.58 and 2nd place. That's a pretty decent drop from prelims and I would think puts him on track for 46 low by NCAAs.