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Tetrathlon - Swimming

Obviously it is essential to have a swimming pool for this phase, either indoors or out. The latter is less suitable the further north you are, particularly if it is not heated.

If your number of competitors is small, say 20 or less, then it may not be necessary to have exclusive use of the whole pool; one or two lanes might be possible. 20 Competitors each swimming for three minutes could comfortably be fitted into an hour using two lanes, allowing a couple of minutes between heats and setting up time. On the other hand if you have all of a five-lane pool, then you could accomplish the whole phase in under half an hour. Less if each competitor swims for two minutes only.

Obviously you have to adjust your swimming phase, if you can have it all, to the length of time you can afford to have the pool, how long the pool is and how you are going to organise it. Say you have a 25 metre pool and your competitors are going to swim for three minutes; you can approximately divide the length of the pool into half and half again. You count the number of lengths each competitor swims to the nearest quarter length. Allow 150 points for each length plus 38 points for a quarter length, 75 points for half a length and 113 points for three-quarters of a length. On this scale, just under seven lengths would give 1,000 points. If the pool were 100 feet long, 175 points a length would be about right. For a 20 metre pool about 110 points a length. However, it does not really matter what you decide as long as it is the same for everyone and over-emphasis is not given to any phase other than the riding.

A useful contact for more information is the Amateur Swimming Association (ASA).

Maximum Swimming Times

Senior/Open Boys 4 minutes
Senior/Open Girls and Juniors 3 minutes
Minimus 2 minutes

Judging

A lane judge is required for each lane, to count the lengths swum by each competitor in that lane. If you are using the whole pool and have five or six lanes it is a good idea to have a marker for each lane thus; each judge carried a plastic squash type bottle partly filled with water to weight it and with the lane number painted on it. When the whistle blows to stop swimming each lane judge puts their bottle down opposite the point where their swimmer stops, and notes the direction the swimmer was travelling. This allows a double check for the extra fractions of length swum.

Number of Officals

Starter 1
Time keeper 1
Lane Judge 1 per lane
Score keeper 1
Total 3 + number of lanes

It is also a good idea to have a blackboard and put the number of lengths swum by each competitor after each heat. This is not necessary if you are using only one or two lanes.