Welcome to the Fall Winter 2023 2024 Season
News for 9/14/2023
Hello Sea Snakes!
We have had almost two full weeks of competitive swim practices - how has it been? Some have said it has been too easy, and some have come home crying - where are you on the spectrum? We do want you to work hard, but also want you to get out of the pool feeling accomplished and successful. Talk to your coaches - they are here to listen and help you succeed wherever you are and whatever your goals are. We are available before, after, and during practice for the swimmers, and always reachable via email. Also, please start bringing your swim journals! A composition notebook and a pen in a gallon Ziploc bag is required gear and is a pivotal tool in communicating with your coaching staff. See how 7x Olympic Gold Medalist 21x World Champion Katie Ledecky utilized this tool in her swimming career in this article.
Keep feeding your swimmers healthy meals and extra snacks. Help them get to sleep at a decent time. Hand them cups of water whenever you see them and remind them to hydrate. Gatorade is good, but make water the main liquid intake. If you are sick and need a break, get some rest and come back to practice when you are ready.
There is a lot of new information this year as we move from what has been a conditioning only team into a fully competitive USA Swimming travel team. Please take a minute to carefully read through the information below, click on all the links, and reach out if you have any questions.
- - Lost and Found
- - Coaches Amazon Wish-List
- - Parent and Swimmer Expectations
- - TeamUnify Registration
- - USA Swimming Information and Registration
- - Equipment Requirements and Team Suit Information
- - Booster Club Participation and Team T-Shirts (Spirit Wear!)
- - Swim Meets and other Calendar Items
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Please email me with any questions! The coaches will be available after practices to help you with any questions or to assist in registrations.
Lost and Found:
We have a pair of red and black goggles and also a summer Sea Snakes Tshirt size adult small. Both are on my desk in the meet office - ask a lifeguard or coach to grab them for you.
Coaches Wish-List:
We didn't want to feel left-out in the back-to-school frenzy! Below is a link to our Sea Snakes Team Amazon wish list - life is always better with a few good office supplies (and some candy to hand out to swimmers on hard days . . .)! If anyone is able, we would appreciate the donations to help us get organized as well as reward swimmers when we can.
Practice Schedule and Swimmer Expectations:
During the first few weeks of practice, swimmers will be working on season goals with the coaching staff. All competitive team swimmers will need to bring a notebook/paper and pen/pencil to write their goals down for their coach. Please take the time to fill out a parent questionnaire. You may print, fill out and bring to practice, or we have copies at the pool. We also have a Goals Worksheet that we would like all Gold/Silver Advanced swimmers to fill out (anyone else is welcome to, as well!!). You can find those forms under the Documents section of our team website.
In addition, please read the following swimmer expectations and Wellness Center policy reminders and share them with your athlete.
- Be on time to practice – Mark your attendance at the front desk.
- Stretching begins 15 minutes before practice starts. Swimmers will enter the water promptly at the start of their practice time.
- No equipment is to be left in the locker rooms, unless properly stored in a locker. Swimmers may put their towels and bags on the chairs to the side of the pool and then will meet the coaches behind the blocks for stretches and to enter the water for practice.
- Have the right gear (See equipment list here on the team website)
- If your faulty gear is getting in the way of your workout, make sure you correct it before the next practice.
- Caps and goggles are available for purchase at the front desk. If you need other recommendations, please check with your coaches.
- Bring a water bottle to keep next to your lane.
- Water, Gatorade, Powerade, etc. are acceptable drinks for practice. No soda or energy drinks.
- Listen when coaches are talking.
- No horseplay before/after practice or in-between sets - head above the water, feet below you, and no splashing others. (You may be asked to leave practice).
- Go to the bathroom before or after practice. Permission to use the restroom will only be granted in emergencies.
- DO YOUR BEST.
Swimmers and parents are also expected to follow all Wellness Center policies and procedures while in the building. Any pool usage outside of the scheduled practice times requires a Wellness Center membership or a guest pass from both participants and their parents/guardians. More information on Wellness Center policies and procedures can be found in our Membership Handbook.
Please note that the Wellness Center closes for major holidays and the pool may close for inclement weather. Please download our mobile app (you do not need to log in) so that you may receive our push notifications for building closures.
Parent Expectations:
Parents are not permitted on the pool deck during practice. Please sit on the Observation Deck if you would like to watch practice. If needed, you may speak with coaches 15 minutes before or after practice. Parents are also responsible for ensuring both themselves and their swimmers are registered through the TeamUnify page as well as USA Swimming (further in email) and monitor communications from the coaching/administrative staff.
Canceled/Missed Practices:
Any swimmer who misses practice forfeits instruction for that day. We will not prorate practices that will be missed and will not offer make-up practices. Please let your coaches know if you will be missing more than one practice. In the event of a canceled practice, a push notification will be sent through the app (see above) and an email will be sent to the email address we have on file. Credits for canceled practices will only be given in the event of 3 or more consecutive canceled practices. This credit will remain on the participants' account and may be used for a future purchase. The Wellness Center has a no refund policy for memberships or programs. This policy can be found in our Membership Handbook, on program receipts, and in the prompt that appears when registering for Sea Snakes.
TeamUnify and USA SWIMMING Registration:
REGISTRATION FOR SEA SNAKES IS A THREE PART PROCESS:
1. FIRST register and pay your practice fee with the Shepherd University Wellness Center. This is what actually registers your swimmer and ensures them participation in the Sea Snakes competitive swim program. Wellness Center Member Portal (myshepherdwellness.com).
The Fall/Winter 2023/2024 SEASON runs September 5, 2023 – end of March 2024. This encompasses a total of 3 SESSIONS that you will register and pay for. Current swimmers will have priority to re-register (roll-over) their same swim practice groups/days that they were in for Session 1, then if there is any room they may add or switch practice groups/days for the next session. After that, if there is still room, we will allow new participants to join. As a note, all our practice groups are currently at full capacity.
2. Register your swimmer on the Sea Snakes Electronic Registration platform on our Sea Snakes swim team (TeamUnify) website. This is how you will get access to your own private account that will enable you easily declare attendance for meets/events, sign-up for jobs, see your children's progress, maintain your own contact information, and more. Meet participation and all team communication goes through this platform. PLEASE COMPLETE THIS REGISTRATION BY FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 15th! This only needs to be done once a SEASON (once in the beginning of September for Fall/Winter Season, then once again in May if you will be participating in Summer Swim Season).
3. Register your swimmer for USA Swimming. The Shepherd University Wellness Center Sea Snakes Swim Team is now officially a USA Swimming certified competitive team! Read more about what that means here. Swimmers must individually register for a USA Swimming membership to be on the Sea Snakes swim team (ALL Gold, Silver, and Bronze Swimmers in both LITE and Advanced groups). Pre-Competitive group swimmers (M/W/F 5-6 pm) are not included in this membership. Swimmers have two options for their USA Swimming membership:
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Premium Membership $87 – Covering September 1, 2023 - December 31, 2024. Allows your swimmer to participate in team practices and any and all meets this year, including State and Regional Championships for those who qualify.
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Outreach Membership $35 – Covering September 1, 2023 - December 31, 2024. Allows swimmers to participate in tram practices and 2 meets in a year, not to include any championships. If at any point a swimmer wishes to upgrade this membership, they are welcome to do so.
We will send these links out with instructions starting next week. If you are a current USA Swimming member transferring from another team, we will give you instructions for that transfer.
If you are not sure you will continue with the Sea Snakes for the next session, you may hold off paying your USA Swimming individual membership fee until the start of the next session. However, in order to participate in any team swim meet before that, you will have to have this paid.
Equipment and Team Suit/Cap:
We are requiring each swimmer to have their own gear and gear bag at each practice. See the information here on the team website under Equipment. You may purchase your gear from anywhere, but we have partnered with swimoutlet.com to give you some of the best prices and a portion of every sale gets kicked back to our team! Use this link or go to the top tabs and search for your team and choose Sea Snakes! Suggested gear and suits are listed under our page. But anything you buy from the whole website still earns money for our team.
A team suit is required for meet participation. The Booster Officers have a try-on kit if you would like to see what size suit fits your swimmer best (super snug is good!).
A plain navy suit may be substituted if sizes/costs make the main team suit less desirable for your family! Check them with the coaches if you have any questions.
Do not wear your team suit as your practice suits – it wears out the form fitting and water-wicking properties of the fabric.
The Booster Officers are the distributers of our team caps and will have them for sale during practice. They will have them for sale at practice and take cash, check, or Venmo. If you need a back up team cap, or a cap that is especially designed for a nice head of hair, aim to purchase a plain white one for meets.
Booster Club Participation and Team T-Shirts (Spirit Wear!)
The dream is that EVERY family participates in supporting the Sea Snakes in some capacity. Come be a part of the Sea Snakes Booster Club meetings, open to any and all parent/guardians. They are held EVERY SECOND MONDAY of each month, starting at 7pm. Our next meeting is scheduled for Monday, October 9th from 7pm to 8pm. Can’t make it but want to be kept in the loop? Look for emails from the Booster Club Officers, follow the team Facebook page, read the meeting minutes here, and/or email them at [email protected]
Team T-Shirts and sweatshirts orders are open! Here is the order form – due next Friday the 22nd. Get one for the whole family! (Venmo payment online, or cash or check to a Booster Officer at practice.)
Swim Meets/Calendaring:
We know many of you are anxious to start adding meets to calendars and planning your fall and winter life out! We are working on these schedules as quickly as we can. We are reaching out to host teams in our area to see who has room for our team to participate at their meets. We already have some who have sent us their meet files, so it's pretty exciting! As soon as those dates are ready, we will release them and start adding them to the Swim Meets & Events Tab on our TeamUnify Website.
Swim Meets start the first weekend of October. The final Season State Championship meet will be at the end of March. We will have Wednesday - Sunday off for the week of Thanksgiving, and Dec 23-Jan 1 off for the holiday break (those dates may be updated give or take a day).
Our goal is to have 1 non-USA invitational meet each session for all swimmers to participate in - this will be an expected meet for every member of the team. It is a lower-key meet and it will be fun. There will also be one primary USA Swimming meet a month (encouraged for all swimmers), and one secondary USA Swim meet a month (optional for any swimmer). These are also fun, but a little more intense! Most of the meets we are entering do not have minimum time requirements - so everyone on our competitive teams is invited, just be ready to pay attention to when it's your turn to race. We will work with the swimmers to choose events they are ready for. Again, as soon as we have these dates and locations nailed down, we will send them out and upload them on the Event/Meet tab. Swimmers will “opt-in” to notify coaches if they are planning on attending or not. There are additional meet fees of $50-$70 per swimmer per meet to pay team and individual entry fees as well as coach/staff prep and attendance time.
Here are a few events we currently have on the calendar:
Sat September 30/Sunday October 1 FITTER & FASTER National Swim Clinic, hosted by the Shepherd University Wellness Center
4x NCAA All-American Robyn Clevenger will be in the water with us all weekend sharing her knowledge that made her one of the best swimmers at Auburn University. You will not want to miss the opportunity to learn from her! Everyone is really progressing with their streamlines and flipturns at practice, and are ready to get some of this next level training.
There will be two sessions each day, both designed for swimmers ages 10 & over. You can choose one session or up to all four: 1. The Fifth Stroke – Underwaters, 2. Explosive Starts 3. Faster Flip Turns, Open Turns & Finishes, and 4. Essentials of Sprinting***
CLICK HERE for details and registration
If you have any questions about the clinic, email Michael Plantamura at [email protected] and he will help you out.
October 7th from 4-7pm RELAY FOR LIFE - Splash Away Cancer
This is an event for our high school swim teams and the Sea Snakes club to raise awareness about the fight against cancer, fund-raise for the American Cancer Society and our Berkeley / Jefferson County Relay For Life events, and swim in honor of local cancer survivors! We will send out more information and links for registration next week.
Scheduled Swim Meets:
All are subject to change, and more information will be provided as soon as we have it! You do not have to attend every meet (or any, technically, but what is the fun in that?!)– choose the ones that make the most sense in your families’ schedules and help you achieve your personal swim goals. Aim to choose the encouraged team meets and primary swim meets first, if you can.
Oct 8-9 Mercersburg Academy Invitational, Mercersburg Academy, 1 hr away, 100 Academy Dr, Mercersburg, PA 17236 *Primary USA October Meet, encouraged for Sea Snakes
Oct 14, 2023, HAGY Gators Invitational, Hagerstown YMCA YMCA, 45 min away, 1100 Eastern Blvd N, Hagerstown, MD 21742 *All Sea Snakes expected to attend
Oct 21-22, 2023, Fox Swim Club Invitational #1, Fox Swim Club, 1 hr 15 min away, Claude Moore Recreation Center, 46105 Loudoun Park Lane, Sterling, VA 20164, USA *Secondary USA October Meet, optional for Sea Snakes
Nov 4 – 5, 2023, Mountain State Storm Invitational, Mountain State Storm, 3 hrs away, The Bridge Sports Complex Bridgeport, WV (this is a team in our own WV LSC). *Primary USA November Meet, encouraged for Sea Snakes
Nov 18, 2023 TBD ~1-1.5 hrs away *Secondary USA November Meet, optional for Sea Snakes
Dec 3 TBD ~1-1.5 hrs away *Primary USA December Meet, encouraged for Sea Snakes
Dec 10, 2023, HAGY Holiday Invitational, Hagerstown YMCA, 45 min away, 1100 Eastern Blvd N, Hagerstown, MD 21742 *All Sea Snakes expected to attend
That’s all we have for now, but we will keep the information rolling as we receive it. You are all doing awesome. Give your swimmer a high-five today. It's going to be a fun year!
Coach Erica and the rest of the Sea Snakes Coaching Staff
