Dear SBSC families,
Practice Schedule
Riley High School
Group 1 Monday and Wednesday 6:00-7:00
G1 Elite Thursday 5:30-7:00
Group 2 Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:30-7:00
Group 3 PM Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 3:45-5:30
Group 3 AM Friday 5:30-7:15
New Prairie High School
Group 1 Monday and Wednesday 5:00-6:00
Group 2 Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:00-6:30
Group 3 Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:00-6:45
Practice Notes:
Riley families please use door #22. This is the door on the northwest corner of the building and faces Fellows Street. If you are planning to stay to watch practice there is a stairwell that is adjacent to this door, and this will lead you to the seating area.
New Prairie families continue to use door N18. New Prairie swimmers are always welcome to attend their corresponding group's practice at Riley.
We will resume Friday PM Group 2 practices at Riley starting the week of 4/21. The tentative schedule for NP through April is on the website. The tentative schedule for Riley for the remainder of the season can also be found on the website.
Welcome to Our New Families/Swimmers
Thank you for choosing our club. We are well aware there are other options and we appreciate you picking SBSC. Every week you will receive an email very similar to this one. It will include all the information you will need to keep you up to date with everything happening with the club. If possible I would like to meet with you each individually for 5-10 minutes after an upcoming practice. Just send me an email with your availability and we can set up a time to meet.
Goggles
Over the last few seasons there has been an epidemic of our younger swimmers needing to borrow goggles. After a suit a pair of goggles is the most important and individualized piece of equipment a swimmer can own. Not to be overly hyperbolic, but goggles should be just as important and specific to the individual as a baseball or softball player’s bat and glove are to them.
The club purchased around 20 pairs a couple years ago and we have none of those left. Starting on Monday, every time a swimmer needs to borrow a pair of our goggles your account will be charged $1, if they fail to return the goggles you will be billed an additional $9. This is not meant to be punitive. It is meant to show how important a swimmer’s goggles need to be.
There are multiple places where goggles can be purchased. I recommend Swimoutlet or A3 Performance Store for online purchases. If you want to buy local Milinkos Scuba and Swim Shop. All swimmers should have two pairs of goggles. One for daily use and one kept in their swim bag as a backup.
Group 1 Spring and Summer Practices at Riley
During April and May Group 1 at Riley will continue to practice on Monday and Wednesday. During the summer months Wednesday evening has been an off day for our club. We will continue with that this summer. Tentatively, we are going to schedule our Group 1 on Monday and Thursday.
Group 2 and 3 Summer Practices at Riley
As most of you know I am the primary coach for Group 2 and Group 3 this season. Since SBCSC has mandated we keep the doors locked it has become a logistical problem running back and forth from the pool deck to door #22. To help alleviate this Group 2 and Group 3 practices will both start at 5:30 PM beginning June 3. Practices for Group 3 will all be 1.5 hours in length ending at 7:00. Practices for Group 2 will be 2 hours long on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday ending at 7:30. Friday’s are the exception. Practice for both groups on Friday will start at 5:00 and will be 1.5 hours long ending at 6:30.
NP Schedule Adjustments May 6- May 16
Due to the requirement of Coach Ashley to provide swim lessons and with the NP pool being down during the summer months we need to make some adjustments to our schedule. During the two weeks mentioned above NP Group 1 will practice Monday and Wednesday 6:15-7:30 CST, Group 2 Monday-Thursday 6:15-8:00 CST, and Group 3 Monday-Thursday 2:30-4:30 CST. If those times are inconvenient NP athletes are always welcome to attend their corresponding groups practice at Riley.
USA Swimming Membership
Here is a link to the document with instructions on how to register with USA-S. A few of our members have had trouble adding their swimmers once they created their own account. If you have trouble after creating a parent account, try using this link. If your swimmer qualifies for the Outreach Membership (free/reduced lunch at their school) click on this link. Remember, if you use this link you will need to provide documentation to me that your athlete qualifies.
To be eligible to practice/compete with the club once they turn 18 swimmers need to complete the USA Swimming Athlete Protection Training.
Birth Certificates
If your athlete has never competed in a meet for SBSC (or another USA Swimming club) you will need to send me a copy of their birth certificate. The preferred way is to electronically send a pdf. If that is not possible, please email a pic.
Team Apparel
The local swim shop in town is Milinko’s Scuba & Swim. This is a great place to find a good practice suit or pick up a spare pair of goggles.
We are also partnered with A3 Performance. You can purchase a logoed team suit directly from this site. Here is the link to the A3 Team Store. When your swimmer is old enough to purchase a tech suit (13 and over) this company is who I recommend purchasing from.
USA Swimming Guidelines - MAAPP/Safe Sport
USA Swimming issued a directive with regards to electronic communication and social media contact between coaches and athletes. Most of what is being implemented is common sense and falls in line with our club's policies. A requirement we will need to adhere to is how your minor child communicates with all coaches. For several years we have asked swimmers in Group 2 and Group 3 to text/email their coach if they would be missing practice. Moving forward, swimmers will be instructed to include a parent on all communication with me or any of our coaches.
If you are the parent of a Group 2 or Group 3 swimmer, and have never sent me a text before, please text me so I have your contact info in my phone. This way if I need to contact your swimmer about missing practice I can be sure to include you. My cell phone number is 574-276-6057. I encourage all parents and swimmers to read the full policy. We are required to keep this policy on our website, here is the link.
Spring and Summer Meet Schedule/Dates of Meet/Location/Deadline to commit
This is our tentative meet schedule for the spring and summer. We may add meets if we find ones that fit our club’s needs There will be two different dates listed with each meet The first date listed is the day(s) of the meet and the second date is the deadline to commit.
Swimmers wanting to compete will need to commit to those meets. The deadlines will be based on deadlines that were set in previous years. They may change once the meet hosts posts the meet information. When committing to multiple day meets, if the option to select the days you want is not available, leave a message in the notes section stating the specific days you would like to attend.
Some meets will be marked with an * and those will require swimmers to meet minimum time standards. All pool locations can be found on our website under the "Pools" tab.
NASA Off The Blocks Invitational/Northridge HS/May 4/April 21-Group 1 or new swimmers only
CON BW3 Blazin Invite/Merrifield Pool/May 24-26/April 28
GSI Summer Splash/Goshen Aquatic Center/June 1/ May 5-Group 1 or new swimmers only
MSC Summer Splash/Munster HS/June 21-23/May 12
IA Summer Spectacular/Elkhart Aquatic Center/June 28-30/May 19
*IN Swimming Senior State/IUPUI/July 11-14/June 16
*IN Swimming Age Group State/IUPUI/July 19-21/June 23
*USA-S Futures Championships/University of Minnesota/July 24-27/July 7
*IN Swimming Summer Divisionals/Concord HS/Aug. 2-4/July 7
As always, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
--
John VanDriessche
Head Coach
South Bend Swim Club
South Bend Riley High School
(574)276-6057
#SBSCForLife
