We hope that our swimmers will enjoy participating in numerous galas and meets - both locally and further afield as they progress through their swimming journey.
We will email our members with upcoming competition details and entry forms, but for those that are new to the world of competing - below you'll find our beginner's guide to competitive swimming.
Should you have any questions about participating or about specific events, please contact Lisa - our Competitions Secretary at: [email protected]
A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO COMPETITIVE SWIMMING
Exmouth Swimming Club is a competitive swimming club offering children of all ages and abilities the chance to develop and enhance their skills as swimmers in a competitive environment.
The swimming environment is one that aims to establish friendships, endorse sportsmanship and promote a healthy and competitive lifestyle. Success in competitive swimming comes through hard work and dedication, but most importantly through fun and enjoyment.
It can be a confusing experience when trying to understand how the competition structure works. So here we aim to explain the different levels of galas (sometimes referred to as “meets”) available to swimmers and some of the terms that you’ll see used in their entry packs.
LICENSED OPEN MEETS
Licensed Open Meets allow swimmers to compete as individuals in whichever events they’d prefer. Our Head Coach will be happy to recommend events to you should you wish.
To enter a Licensed meet, a swimmer needs to hold a Club Compete membership with Swim England and only swim times from licenced events are recognised by them - if you want to upgrade your membership at any time, please email: [email protected]
The cost for these events is charged by the hosting club and is typically £5 to £10 per race / event.
There are four levels of licensed open meets:
LEVEL 4 - Is for club swimmers and those beginning to enter individual open competition.
To enter these competitions no upper or lower limit qualifying times are needed.
LEVEL 3 - Is for club swimmers who are seeking County and Regional qualifying times.
These meets have qualifying times and upper limit times (so “no faster than”).
LEVEL 2 - Is aimed at Regional and National qualifiers and swimmers close to regional qualification.
These meets take place in 25m pools and have a set qualification time criteria.
LEVEL 1 - Is aimed at national qualifiers and swimmers close to national qualification looking for opportunities to achieve national qualifying times.
These meets take place in 50m pools.
Swim England holds a database of all official times recorded for each swimmer at licensed galas www.swimmingresults.org/
Any swimmer who holds a valid qualifying time can enter an open competition (providing that they submit their entry form before the published closing date).
QUALIFYING TIMES / UPPER LIMIT TIMES / CUT OFF TIMES:
A qualifying time is the time that the swimmer must have already achieved in order to enter an event at the competition.
Upper limit/cut off times are times set by a competition organiser that a swimmer must be slower than to be able to swim at the competition – this is so that swimmers can attend knowing that they’ll be competing with swimmers of a similar ability.
Qualifying times or cut off times will be included in the competition meet pack so please look out for these and check before submitting an entry for your swimmer(s).
SHORT COURSE and LONG COURSE
Some competitions require qualifying times. Some will have ‘SC’ (short course) and some will have ‘LC’ (long course).
This means that a short course time is the time you achieved in an event in a 25m pool. A long course time is the time you achieved in an event in a 50m pool.
For example, a time for 100m freestyle in a short course (25m) pool is usually faster than the time for the same event in a long course (50m) pool because the turns are an advantage. That means SC and LC times can’t be compared directly. Swim England uses a time conversion factor to convert between the two.
WHICH TIMES SHOULD BE USED?
The meet pack for a given competition usually states whether times need to have been achieved at a licensed meet (and therefore appearing on the official rankings) and how recently those times need to have been achieved. If this is ever unclear, please ask your coach.
As a general rule, most L3 and L4, and friendly competitions will accept club recorded times - regardless of whether they appear on the rankings database, whereas an L1 or L2, County, Regional, or National event will always require times to have been achieved at licensed competitions and to appear on the rankings database.
We will email our members with upcoming competition details and entry forms, but for those that are new to the world of competing - below you'll find our beginner's guide to competitive swimming.
Should you have any questions about participating or about specific events, please contact Lisa - our Competitions Secretary at: [email protected]
A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO COMPETITIVE SWIMMING
Exmouth Swimming Club is a competitive swimming club offering children of all ages and abilities the chance to develop and enhance their skills as swimmers in a competitive environment.
The swimming environment is one that aims to establish friendships, endorse sportsmanship and promote a healthy and competitive lifestyle. Success in competitive swimming comes through hard work and dedication, but most importantly through fun and enjoyment.
It can be a confusing experience when trying to understand how the competition structure works. So here we aim to explain the different levels of galas (sometimes referred to as “meets”) available to swimmers and some of the terms that you’ll see used in their entry packs.
LICENSED OPEN MEETS
Licensed Open Meets allow swimmers to compete as individuals in whichever events they’d prefer. Our Head Coach will be happy to recommend events to you should you wish.
To enter a Licensed meet, a swimmer needs to hold a Club Compete membership with Swim England and only swim times from licenced events are recognised by them - if you want to upgrade your membership at any time, please email: [email protected]
The cost for these events is charged by the hosting club and is typically £5 to £10 per race / event.
There are four levels of licensed open meets:
LEVEL 4 - Is for club swimmers and those beginning to enter individual open competition.
To enter these competitions no upper or lower limit qualifying times are needed.
LEVEL 3 - Is for club swimmers who are seeking County and Regional qualifying times.
These meets have qualifying times and upper limit times (so “no faster than”).
LEVEL 2 - Is aimed at Regional and National qualifiers and swimmers close to regional qualification.
These meets take place in 25m pools and have a set qualification time criteria.
LEVEL 1 - Is aimed at national qualifiers and swimmers close to national qualification looking for opportunities to achieve national qualifying times.
These meets take place in 50m pools.
Swim England holds a database of all official times recorded for each swimmer at licensed galas www.swimmingresults.org/
Any swimmer who holds a valid qualifying time can enter an open competition (providing that they submit their entry form before the published closing date).
QUALIFYING TIMES / UPPER LIMIT TIMES / CUT OFF TIMES:
A qualifying time is the time that the swimmer must have already achieved in order to enter an event at the competition.
Upper limit/cut off times are times set by a competition organiser that a swimmer must be slower than to be able to swim at the competition – this is so that swimmers can attend knowing that they’ll be competing with swimmers of a similar ability.
Qualifying times or cut off times will be included in the competition meet pack so please look out for these and check before submitting an entry for your swimmer(s).
SHORT COURSE and LONG COURSE
Some competitions require qualifying times. Some will have ‘SC’ (short course) and some will have ‘LC’ (long course).
This means that a short course time is the time you achieved in an event in a 25m pool. A long course time is the time you achieved in an event in a 50m pool.
For example, a time for 100m freestyle in a short course (25m) pool is usually faster than the time for the same event in a long course (50m) pool because the turns are an advantage. That means SC and LC times can’t be compared directly. Swim England uses a time conversion factor to convert between the two.
WHICH TIMES SHOULD BE USED?
The meet pack for a given competition usually states whether times need to have been achieved at a licensed meet (and therefore appearing on the official rankings) and how recently those times need to have been achieved. If this is ever unclear, please ask your coach.
As a general rule, most L3 and L4, and friendly competitions will accept club recorded times - regardless of whether they appear on the rankings database, whereas an L1 or L2, County, Regional, or National event will always require times to have been achieved at licensed competitions and to appear on the rankings database.
