Invitational Meets

             Every year, certain local swimming organizations host what are referred to as “invitational meets.” Even though they are called “invitational meets,” every team within the Northwest Aquatic League (NWAL), which the Sharks are part of, is invited. Some of the meets have qualifying times. These are usually “not to exceed” times, in other words your child must swim the time faster than the qualifying time.  

 

            These meets can be a lot of fun and will also allow your children an extra opportunity to swim to improve their times, earn cool medals and ribbons, and even help the Sharks earn trophies. All of the events in these meets are the events we swim during the season, such as freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and individual medley. All of these meets have modest entry fees per event (for pentathlon it is a flat amount, since everyone swims every event). 

 

If enough people sign up for an invitational meet, we might even be able to enter some relays in the meets. The kids seem to particularly enjoy doing the relays.   

 

            Every year there are mid-season invitationals. These are invitational meets that occur during the regular NWAL season. They include the Pentathlon, Summer Thunder and, this year, a soon to be scheduled “Last Chance” meet (probably the Sunday after divisionals—stay tuned). This meet will offer swimmers that are close to qualifying for a post-season invitational an extra opportunity to make that qualifying time.

 

            There are also three post-season invitational meets. These are held the weekend following the NWAL divisional meet. Two of these meets (Red, White and Blue and All-Stars) have both qualifying times and cut off times, meaning you cannot swim slower than a certain time or faster than a certain time. The Ponderosa Meet has the fastest qualifying times of all the meets. 

 

            A schedule and brief description of the meets follows:

 

            MEET                         DATE                                     LOCATION

 

            Pentathlon:                 Sunday, June 14, 2009 Klein Forest HS

           

Swimmers swim five individual events (free, back, breast, butterly and IM). Swimmers win awards for the individual events, plus their overall combined time. Trophies, medals and ribbons are awarded.            

 

            Summer Thunder:      June 8-9, 2009 (Anticipated date) Klein Oak HS

 

Swimmers can enter 3 individual events per day. All individual events are offered and some regular and special relays (such as co-ed relays and mixed age group relays). Medals and ribbons are awarded.

 

 

            All-Stars:        June 28-29, 2009 (Some events may be June 27). Klein Oak HS 

 

Swimmers can enter 3 individual events per day. Both qualifying and cut-off times apply. This is a year end meet in which many Sharks participate. Qualifying times are needed to enter individual events, but there are no qualifying times for relays. All of the individual events are offered and we frequently ask swimmers to come and swim a relay. There are also some fun relays in this meet. There are no qualifying times for relays. Medals, ribbons and trophies are awarded.

 

            Red, White and Blue: June 27-29, 2009                                           Cy Fair ISD    

                        Cypresswood traditionally has not participated in this meet, which is held at a Cy-Fair area school.

 

            Ponderosa:                 June 28-29, 2009                                 Klein Collins HS

 

Most consider this the premier invitational meet in the Northwest Aquatic League. The qualifying times for this meet are the cut-off time for All-Stars and Ponderosa and are very difficult to achieve. This meet also awards both medals and ribbons. Cypresswood has consistently finished in the top 10 out of 99 teams in this meet and our swimmers hold many of the Ponderosa individual and relay records. Relays (which also have no qualifying time) have been a huge part of the reason. 

             

If you are interested in supporting the Sharks tradition of strong participation in invitational meets, please contact Barbara Buzonas, clerkofcourse@cwsharks.com or Mike Swaim, President@nwal.org for more information.  The links are provided on each event under the "events" tab on our website.