Welcome to the 2014
Jingle Bell Classic
hosted by
Clearwater Aquatic Team
Coaches,
This is the largest Jingle Bell ever! 1076 swimmers! You will find helpful information in this email to assist you, your swimmers and your parents.
This is going to be some serious fun. Good luck to your swimmers this weekend!
Please pass this information along to coaches and parents.
WARM-UP CHANGE/PROCEDURE
Dear Coaches,
I hope this email finds your preparations for this weekend’s meet going well. All of us here at CAT want to offer you and your swimmers the best environment possible. If there is anything we can do to better your experience, please let us know. If we can, we will.
As you may know, the meet will be well attended with 1076 swimmers. This means your swimmers will have plenty of opportunities to race stiff compitition. This also means that warm up space will be at a premium. We decided to assign lanes this year and see if this is better. Unfortunately a couple teams will have to share, but most of those shared lanes are coming from teams that already have multiple lanes, hence more flexibly and control over their warm-up so they can better work with their fellow coaches.
I am thinking that maybe we can talk about tweaking the warm ups for Sat and Sun during the coaches meeting Friday at 7:30 am. Here are some possible tweaks.
○add a general warm up session from 6:30 - 7:00am each day
○brake the next hour into two (2) half hour sessions; 1 - 7:00 - 7:30, 2 - 7:30 - 8:00
○8:00 - 8:20 will be controlled warm up (with general, start & pace lanes)
I tried very hard to make adjustments to this year’s Jingle Bell that would accommodate the amount of swimmers we anticipated. We eliminated events like relays and some distant events for the younger kids that were non recognized for that age group. I tried hard to avoid another 6 hour session like last year, unfortunately this format was still not adequate for the amount of swimmers and we are over. Look for our thank you e-mail after this meet which will have a small questioner about running the 10U in a timed final situation I think this would be the time to thank you once again for your continued support of this meet.
Parking
We have parking attendants as usual to help direct traffic. Swimmers may be dropped off at the entrance.
Friday – On the grounds of the Long Center with overflow next door at the Salvation Army.
Saturday - On the grounds of the Long Center with overflow next door at the Salvation Army and directly across the street either next to or behind the commercial building. We have hired two off duty officers and cruisers to assist crossing the street.
Sunday - On the grounds of the Long Center with overflow directly across the street either next to or behind the commercial building. We have hired an off duty officer and cruiser to assist crossing the street. No parking Sunday at the Salvation Army!
Shepherds
Remember, no parents are allowed on deck unless they are given a volunteer badge. If you are in need of a parent shepherd, please accompany them to the volunteer check in area located under the stairs on the sundeck. One of our awesome Job coordinators will help you with these shepherd passes, either Tammy Irwin, or Carman Pinaro-Crespo, you will find these lady to be awesome help!
Timeline
Saturday & Sunday’s distance events push us past four hour rule. Instead of limiting the number of swimmers in these events, we are going to offer every swimmer the opportunity to swim. We will move as fast as possible and do everything within the rules to shave time. If after reviewing the estimated timeline (attached) you would like to scratch a swimmer, there will be no penalty. Thanks in advance for supporting this mindset.
Gym
We have all three courts. So have your parents and swimmers bring their chairs and blankets. The TV’s will be set up showing the scoreboards to follow along with the meet.
Vendors will be located on sundeck and in the gym and include
Total Team Wares
Contemporary Photo
Simple Expressions gifts
Sno-Cones
Also in the gym…
50/50 Raffle
Bake Sale
Heat Sheet
T-shirts
Florida Swim Network
They will be live streaming all three days of finals. Tell the grandparents across the country!!! Please remember to tell your parents to donate to this great service!
Coaches Meeting
Friday at 7:30am in the Hospitality Room located next to the concession stand or the Coaches Lounge in the gym.
Financials
If you have not already mailed a check, please bring into the CAT office on the first morning of the meet. Thank you.
Results and Live Timing
Results can be found at
Live results are available on Meet Mobile