Willows of Potomac

Time trials are held at the beginning of the season on either the Saturday or Sunday before the first “A” meet. At the Time Trials swimmers are timed for each eligible event. If a swimmer misses time trials they must make arrangements with the Head Coach to time the swimmer in the relevant events the following week at practice.

A Meets:

A-Meet is a dual meet against another divisional opponent. In a typical 6-team division, there are 5 A-Meets. The meet consists of 50 events, breaking up into 10 age/gender groups. The order of events is here. 6 swimmers for freestyle events and 3 swimmers for other events are allowed for each team. 2 relay teams are allowed for each relays. A swimmer is limited to swim 3 out of 4 single strokes (Free, Back, Breast, Fly) and 2 out of 3 relay/IM. A-Meet winner earns 6 points which contribute toward the calculation of the Division Champion. The A meet swimmers' times are official times listed in MCSL Results & All Star website. Very importantly, the times (not the scores) are also used to determine next year's division assignments, using a virtual meet system.

All “A” Meets are scheduled to start Saturday mornings at 9 am. Note that swimmers and volunteers must arrive earlier based on warm up schedules for that meet.  There will be five dual meets per swim season. A dual meet is comprised of forty individual events, four relay events and six individual medley events. The coaches will select the three swimmers in each individual event to represent the Willows Swim Team in the "A" Team Meets. The one exception is that the freestyle events for swimmers in all age groups will be represented by six swimmers in each age group.

Relay Carnival:

Each MCSL Division has one relay carnival per swim season. The relay carnival is comprised of 22 relay events and all teams in the division compete. There are 2 points separating teams in the meet standing. The relay carnival points also contribute to the calculation of the division standing, and determines the participants in the MCSL Relay All-Stars Meet for 18 of the 22 relays. The other 4 are determined by the fastest time in both Relay Carnival and the Divisional. The full list of relay events is at here. This exciting meet requires at least 4 swimmers per age/gender group.

Divisional Championship:

There is one divisional meet per swim season which All teams of the division compete against each other. A divisional meet is comprised of two heats per event following the same order of events used for the A-Meets. Each team provides two swimmers per event and the two swimmers with the fastest official times obtained during the current season in each event will represent the team in the meet. The swimmers follows the A-Meet restriction of swimming 3 out of 4 single strokes and 2 of 3 relay/IM. In individual events, medals are awarded for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd places and ribbons will be awarded for 4th-6th places. In relay events, medals will be awarded for 1st place and ribbons for 2nd and 3rd places.

MCSL Coaches Invitational Long Course Meet:

The fastest eight swimmers (with two alternates) in the league are invited to participate in each event. Times are based on the first three dual meets. Swimmers may not be entered in or compete in more than two events. Events are the same as non-relay events in dual meets with the distances doubled.

All-Star Meets:

There will be one County Relay All-Star Meet and one County Individual All-Star Meet per swim season. Both of these meets are league-wide (Divisions A-O). The winning relays from each division compete in the Relay All-Star Meet. The Individual All-Star Meet is comprised of individual and individual medley events with the fastest sixteen swimmers per event selected from all league divisions. In the Relay All-Star Meet, plaques are awarded for 1st place, medals for 2nd and 3rd places and ribbons for 4th through 8th places. For the Individual All-Star Meet, plaques are awarded to the first three places, medals for 4th, 5th, and 6th and ribbons for 7th through 16th places.

All “B” Meets are scheduled for Wednesday evenings at 6 pm.  "B" Meets are designed to provide competition opportunities for all those swimmers who do not have times that will enable them to compete in the "A" Meets or for those “A” Meet swimmers who want to swim strokes they did not swim at the previous "A" Meet.

GENERAL NOTES REGARDING ELIGIBILITY:

• In B meets as in A meets, a swimmer is expected to be legal in the stroke before being entered in an event.

• B meets results can be used as seed time for A-Meets. But they are NOT MCSL official results and cannot be used as seed time for the Divisional Championship meet.