October 6, 2004

Dear Gael Aquatic Club Families:

This Friday, October 8th, we will be having our Season Starter Meet at Iona for all team levels, including Future team swimmers. We will have a warm-up from 4:30-5:00 PM and swim events from 5:00 to somewhere between 6:30 and 7:00 PM depending on the age of the swimmer. Younger swimmers will be finished earlier. The 8 and under swimmers will swim all four 25's, the 9-12 year old swimmers will swim all four 50's and the 13 and over swimmers will swim all four 100's. If a swimmer is not comfortable swimming a certain event, he or she can let us know upon arrival and we will take the swimmer out.

All swimmers will be entered unless you let us know that you will not be able to attend. Some families have already sent emails to Bryan Dorsey at bdorsey@gaelac.com to scratch swimmers from the event. Sorry to the NYAC swimmers, we did not know it was the night of your team dinner (Have Fun!). If you are unable to attend, please do the same by Thursday evening.

Also, on Thursday and Friday Metro Swim Shop will be on deck from 4:00-6:00 PM to take all team suit and equipment orders. A form was handed out along with the first Gael Gram and we will have them available at the fitting. If you cannot make either evening, you can order from metro via mail and the address is on the order forms. You must do so by Friday, however, so our team order gets printed together and you get the bulk team prices.

Lastly, our USS Meet sign-ups have been a bit crunched in the beginning of the year, but things are leveling off. The October 30th sign-up for the Condors Meet has been at poolside and several swimmers have signed up already. If you would still like to be entered in this event, you must sign up by the end of the meet at Iona on Friday night.

Being 8 and unders are not joining us at Asphalt Green, we have found a separate meet for them that Sunday morning, October 17th. The meet will be at Wagner College in Staten Island and it will include only 5-8 year olds from our team and theirs. It is a great way for younger swimmers to begin their competitive swimming this year. The meet will have a 10:00 AM warm-up and 10:30 AM start. All events should conclude no later that 12 noon.

If you would like to join us, you can sign up at Iona or on line at bdorsey@gaelac.com. The events being offered are the 25 Free, 25 Back, 25 Breast, 25 Fly and 100 Free. We recommend swimmers only sign up for three or a maximum of four events from the five being offered. It will be a very short meet and swimming five events would be a bit too much for such young swimmers. We will have directions printed for all who join us.

Our biggest USS Meets for the first half, The Viking Classic November 12-14 and the West Point Christmas Invitational December 17-19 are also now posted at poolside. We have a little bit of time before sending these meet entries out, but we ask that you sign up as soon as you check your calendars. There are very few meets that we try to attend as a full team, but both of these fit that bill.

If any family would like to see the USS meet calendar and print out meet information packets, you can go to www.metroswimming.org. Once at the Metro website, click on calendar and toggle down to the meet you wish to view. On the right hand side of the page across from the meets is gray adobe box that can be printed and that contains all of the information we have posted at poolside. We will also try to add this information to the Gael website for convenience. This will help you make plans at home instead of having to come into Iona and check the walls. 

Thanks and we look forward to a great season,

The Gael Aquatic Club Staff