LMSC News: Florida Gold Coast | Florida | North Carolina
Meet News: Auburn Masters Meet | St. Pat's Recap | Maverick One Hour Postal
World Championships: Gold Coast | X FINA Championships | Swimming at World Championships
Feature Article: Facts Regarding Caffeine Intake
Florida Gold Coast
On January 5, we held our annual Awards Banquet. Over 100 people attended the dinner and awards at the Downtowner restaurant. Individuals making the 2001 All American list were presented with inscribed mugs. All swimmers making a Top Ten time including relays were also presented with an inscribed mug.
Debra Riker was honored for breaking her first World Record on a winning relay at Long Course Nationals. Top female swimmer of the year went to June Krauser while top male swimmer of the year went to Alan Rapperport. Top female long distance swimmer of the year went to Cheryl Vega while top male long distance swimmer of the year went to David Boudreau. Florida Gold Coast Hall of Fame Award went to Chris Derks, a long distance swimmer, who made the Channel swim in 2001.
On February 22-23-24, the ninth annual Florida Gold Coast Short Course Masters Challenge was held at the Hall of Fame pool in Ft. Lauderdale. Approximately 120 swimmers braved some cold weather and a little rain. The results were on the internet by Sunday night with all splits. Both the FGC and DIXIE web sites. Modern technologies are wonderful!
Right after the banquet in January, Deb and Cav Cavanaugh went sailing in the Caribbean. Some of who wished to swim in the Y Nationals in April at the Hall of Fame pool joined the South Broward Y before the end of the year. Deb made up special entries for our team, due to the fact that each Y can have only one team entry. June Krauser volunteered to receive and process (entries had to be in Hy-Tek program so that a disk could be sent with the paper entries) all South Broward Y entries. Cav and Deb flew back the weekend of March 1, made up all the relays, got all the paper work signed and sent our 64 entries to the Y on March 4, as they flew back to their boat for another month of sailing.
Florida
The 2002 annual CAT Masters Valentine Meet was held on February 9-10 in Clearwater. This is always a great meet for February as it is in an indoor pool! This meet was our Dixie Zone SCY Championships and 235 swimmers attended. It was a well-run meet with plenty of hospitality all day long -- coffee, orange juice, doughnuts, bagels, lunch, fruit, drinks, etc.
On Saturday evening after the meet, the Florida LMSC had its first annual Awards Banquet. They called it a Recognition Dinner. The dinner was held in the Long Center between the two buildings. Chairman Tom Bliss wrote, "The goal for every LMSC should be to strive toward excellence, which is doing what you do the very best that you can. While recognition for a great LMSC usually comes to its leaders, it is the individual members who achieved the accomplishments, and it is the individuals who we want to recognize and honor tonight.
"We are not a small elite group of top swimmers, but instead, we are a diverse group of dedicate d individuals who excel because of the high levels of interest and high levels of competition in our LMSC: 56 different swimmers set new individual LMSC pool records in 2001, and 51 different swimmers finished in the top ten in 2001 USMS national postal or open water championships.
"As I have mentioned many times, an organization is only as strong as the support its members provide. Because of the undying sacrifices that so many of you have made, from outstanding swims to outstanding volunteer services, we are successful. We are one of the best LMSC's in the nation ... because of you!
"Many new and exciting ideas have been provided to me over the course of the past year through conversations, emails, and meetings, and many more ideas have been generated as a result of the surveys submitted by your team representatives. The task of the FL LMSC board is and will be to take all of the ideas and suggestions and to implement as many as possible to improve YOUR organization. Tonight's Recognition Awards banquet, which we hope will become an annual event, is a great example of one of your ideas that has been implemented. We will continually look to do things in new ways and to learn from our past as we strive for excellence.
"This Recognition Awards banquet is a first. I personally want to recognize Joan Campbell, Dick Brewer, Margie Hutinger, Gertie Perry and Meegan Wilson for all the preparation that has gone into making tonight's event so special. Your FL LMSC Board of Directors and representatives sincerely hope that each of you is blessed and honored as a result of tonight's program. Welcome to the first Annual Recognition Awards Banquet!"
Among the winners were Male Distance -- Bob Beach, Female Distance -- Peggy Hughes, Male Pool -- Paul Hutinger, and Female Pool -- Florence Carr.
North Carolina
Chairman Fritz Lehman has some "what a small world it is" story to tell. "After a meet in Charlotte, I presented the awards for Outstanding Swimmer, Volunteer of the Year, and Inspirational Swimmers. Most of the people receiving the awards I knew, some better than others. One of the people I thought I knew the least was Milton Gee. Milton, however, knew me much better than I knew him. Later in the day when Milton was in the warm down lanes, he called to me and wanted to talk. It turns out that Milton served in the military with my father, and we were stationed together in Germany back in the early '60's. Many years later after my parents were no longer married, he even went out with my mother! It really is a small world."
Auburn Masters
by Conner Bailey
We had approximately 210 swimmers at the fifth annual Auburn Masters SCY Invitational this past weekend, February 16-17. The water was fast, and so were the swimmers. At least three national records were established. Lionel Moreau established a new national record in the 400 IM with a 3:56.69, breaking a record (3:59.73) established in 1988. Lionel missed the 200 IM record by .32 and was close also in the 200 and 500 freestyles. Robert Poiletman (55-59) established a new national record in the 200 fly at 2:09.66, smashing his old record of 2:12.35 established February 2000. And Roger VonJouanne closed the meet out with a 1:56.29 in the 200 IM to establish a new record for the men's 40-44 age group. The old record was 1:59.07.
Team trophies were awarded as follows: Large Team -- 1. Dynamo 1213 points, 2. Pirate Swim. 1148 points, and 3. Georgia 915 points. Medium Team -- 1. Chattanooga 636 points, 2. Atlanta Rainbow Trout 565 points, 3. Montgomery Y 372 points. Small Team -- 1. Madison Tit. 260 points, Birmingham Swim 201 points, and 3. Anniston Y 165 points.
St. Pat's Recap
About 215 swimmers entered the annual St. Patrick's Day SCY Invitational held March 16-17 at the Dynamo Swim Center and sponsored by the Dynamo Masters. As usual, a lot of great swims at this meet. High point team awards for Georgia went to Atlanta Rainbow Trout, Killer Whales, and Swim Atlanta for 1, 2, and 3 respectively. The top out-of-state team was North Carolina Masters.
There were a number of Georgia swimmers who earned individual high point award for their respective age groups: Jelena Crawford (W19-24), Liz Myers (W25-29), Cathy Jones (W30-34), Diana Stephens (W40-44), Teresa Mcdowell (W50-54), Mary Mead (W60-64), Robert Brown M45-49), Bill McClung (M60-64), George Gfroerer M65-69), Irwin Stolz (M70-74), Jack Mitchell (M75-79), and John Taylor (M80-84). A big thanks to meet director Ralph McIntyre and Dynamo Masters head coach Marty Hamburger for putting on this meet.
Maverick's One Hour Swim
by Margie Hutinger, 2002 USMS One-Hour Postal Meet Director
The Journey: As we frequently heard in the Winter Olympics, "It's not about the destination, it's about the journey." For most of the swimmers, the place was not the important result, even 173rd. One man told us he waited until he aged up to do his swim. His daughter gave him a stopwatch for his birthday so she could time him. He couldn't wait for the results, and called to find out how he did ... excited that he was in the middle of the pack. It's about team spirit and relays, camaraderie and common goals, training and being the only entry from your pool.
Maverick's Review: Bid accepted. Creation of program for iMac. 200 entries every day for three days straight. Carry out meals. Filing 2006 entries. Deciphering handwriting. Late hours. Verifying registrations. Peter Crumbine's (long distance chairman) question at the entry deadline -- "Are you enjoying this?" I couldn't have accomplished this monumental task without the continual and unwavering support from the Mavericks, friends, and Greg Bruce, last year's host. I appreciated every contribution, no matter how trivial it may have seemed. Paul Hutinger, husband, assistant, entry organizer, yardage checker ("He couldn't have gone 50 yards in 7 sec!") and most important, patient and understanding of our massive commitment to this project.
Gold Coast at Worlds
There were four swimmers attending the IX FINA World Masters Championships in Christchurch NZ March 24-30. We got together one evening for dinner at a great restaurant but minus Luis. All four placed in the top three:
X FINA World Masters Championships
The FINA Bureau voted on the site of the next Championships. They are to be held in Riccione in Italy. You might ask, "Where?" I looked it up on a map and it is a small town on the East Coast just southeast of Bologna -- just south of Rimini. It is on the Adriatic Sea.
Swimming at World Championships
These FINA World Masters Championships in New Zealand will go down in history as much more QUALITY than QUANTITY! With only 2386 swimmers, 104 World Records were broken -- the most ever. FINA Masters recorder Walt Reid was kept very busy filling out forms and collecting the data necessary to record these records.
The quantity of volunteers was tremendous -- never have i seen so many red shirts -- all the officials and timers wore red shirts. The security personnel wore yellow shirts, the volunteers wore teal colored shirts, FINA Masters Committee members wore light blue shirts, the Organizing Committee wore gray shirts, and the lifeguards wore red and yellow shirts. Very color coordinated! There were three timers on each lane and a stroke and turn judge on all 10 lanes at both ends of the pool. There was not much deck space and the stands did not accommodate many swimmers and coaches. However, up on the Mezzanine floor, the Super Center was huge and had plenty of chairs and tables with a huge TV screen allowing many people to watch the meet, eat, socialize, etc. The meet started at 9 AM and was finished by 5 or 6 PM. The warm-up pool was small and crowded. Lifeguards were always present but more marshals are needed for safety at our World Championships, The ceilings in the 10-lane pool and diving well were very high with no chlorine smell.
Facts Regarding Caffeine Intake
by Coach Emeritus George E. Bole in the St. Pete Masters newsletter
Whenever I think of early morning practice at North Shore Pool, I picture the arrival of Pam Geiger, leaving the car park festooned with her change of clothes and in her hand a vessel full of coffee. I don't know how much she drank or still drinks, but when I read an article about the most widely ingested drug in the world, I though a follow-up might prove interesting and instructive.
Firstly, is it healthy? Reserach in Israel has shown that long-term coffee drinkers (more than four cups per day) have unusually-shaped cells in the hippo campus area of the brain, which controls the memory.
Sports scientists have discovered that immediately a cup of coffee or cola is digested, it stimulates the release of fats into the blood and then becomes the body's primary energy source before it reverts to using its limited stores of carbohydrates for fuel.
A Greek study last month revealed that drinking coffee when you first get up could damage your arteries. Dr. C. Viachopoulus of Henry Dimmant Hospital in Athens states, "Just one cup of coffee could stiffen your arteries." The result could last between three and four hours.
A Bristol (Great Britain) University study of six hundred people found that those who had a cup of ordinary coffee performed better and were more upbeat than those wh drank decaffeinated coffee (Bob Atwood) or nothing.
Dr. David Kerr of the Royal Bournemouth Hospital says that within half an hour of drinking coffee, the flow of blood to the brain is reduced by between 10% and 20%, either in diabetics or those who have not eaten for a while -- and -- you can soon start to feel shaky, have palpitations, feel anxious, or suffer blurred vision.
Sports scientists at the University of Otago in New Zealand recently tested the effects of caffeine on the performances of a group of rowers. Results showed an average improvement of 13% in the time it took them to row 2000 meters (Peter Betzer should how his daughter this interesting effect).
"In strength and power activities, caffeine mobilizes calcium, which, in turn, improves the activity of muscles," says Richard Godfrey, pyhsiologist at the British Olympic Centre.
Several studies have shows that, though caffeine may mobilize calcium intake, it could interfere with its absorption, raising the risk of the brittle bone disease, osteoporosis.
Researches at Bristol University showed that drinking four cups of coffee each morning helped people work more efficiently that those who abstained. It is believed it stimulates the release of fats into the blood, which are then burned rapidly for energy.
Now, researchers from the University of Oslo and Ulleval University Hospital Oslo reported in the Americna Journal of Clinical Nutrition this year (2001) that four or more cups of filter coffee per day can increase the risk of coronary heart disease by 15%.
A study of 183 men and women found that those who drank no coffee for six weeks had lower levels of cholesterol and homocysteine in ther blood than those who drank four or more cups per day. Raised levels of these compounds are known to increase the risk of coronary heart disease.
And finally, for those on very high levels of caffeine, nine cups per day, have been linked with a range of cancers, including those of the pancreas, kidneys, and urinary tract, though in many of the studies of linking heavy intake of caffeine, the cancer sufferers had also been smokers.
And there I leave it to you all to decide: coffee or ? I'll watch what Pam's drinking when I return!