Monkey Girl kicked all kinds of butt at the TAAF Games of Texas state swim finals! She swam Thursday in the 100 IM, and shaved an amazing 9 seconds off her qualifying time from regionals! That kind of improvement over such a short span is unheard of. She finished first in her heat, beating her closest competitor by two seconds, but we don't know how she fared in the final standings. The top 3 is too much to hope for, but considering this isn't even her best event, I'm very, very proud of her showing.
I can't say the same for the city of Waco, which is where the meet was held. We've been going to swim meets for three years now, and I've never seen such a wretched event. The finals were held at Waco Water Park, and I can't fathom a venue more ill-suited. Most of the place is taken up by water slides, wading pools and lazy rivers, acres of concrete and no shade whatsoever. Temperatures were pushing 100 degrees and there was no breeze, but they had a full contingent of life guards on duty--to keep people away from the water. Also to make sure nobody brought drinks in, to force folks to buy the park's overpriced concessions. AND pay higher admission prices than they would have to simply go swimming there, if they would actually let people in the water. They had water coolers placed here and there, but these were emptied quickly and by about 3:30 they just stopped trying to keep them filled and took them all away. At about 3 p.m. the first ambulance arrived to treat someone for heat exhaustion. Did I mention how overbearing, rude and condescending the workers were? Let's just say the woman in charge isn't someone the Waco Chamber of Commerce should put on their community's welcoming committee. Their ineptitude was astounding. There was only one competitive pool, so they had to block out time for the swimmers to warm up, then clear them all out before competition could start. Most venues have two pools, so swimmers can warm up shortly before their races. Not Waco. Which meant Monkey Girl warmed up at 2 p.m., then sat in the blistering heat until her race at 5 p.m. The P.A. announced events and heats only intermittently, and the big board was about two events behind the entire day. Confusion reined. The kicker is that at noon the Waco organizers distributed heat sheets to the competing teams, and it took an out of town coach to notice that the Waco folks, in their infinite wisdom, had scheduled eight swimmers per heat, but their pool only had six lanes. Pure bush league.
If you're reading this and have swimmers competing Friday or Saturday, it's not too late to pull out and save yourself several hours of pure misery. I've been to dozens of swim meets both as a parent and a sports reporter, and have never, ever experienced such a train wreck. Waco should be permanently banned from even bidding on a TAAF swim meet ever again. Seriously, folks, it was that bad.
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