Hope Relay starts:

I think that the reputation/myth has more to do with the fact that the last swimmer on Hope’s relays usually touches the wall before the other teams do.

For sure a surprise, but also, using the splits we are discussing, Hope hasn’t gotten their 200 FR in for the past 3 years… because i assume you didn’t have access to time trials. Either way, I would say Hope consistently gets their guys to hit their best times at the same times, whereas even when K had more talent than Hope, and won MIAAs, by a lot, they could rarely get all their guys hitting their stride at the same time to put together a great relay.

I know there was some arguing about whether or not one of Hope’s guys jumped during that time trial this past year. I am however surprised that the splits look the way that they do. Must have taken some work for Cheadle to find all this info. Keep it up

anybody out there have the results from the hope 200free relay time trial-with splits?

I would like to suggest something about the above math. While it is obvious that K has the better drops, the .68 seconds from 23.00 to 22.32 is far less impressive than the .58 seconds from 21.25 to 20.67.

Does this make sense?

What I am saying is that in the situations in the example from Cheadle, all of Kalamazoo’s times are great drops but it is a tougher but it is relative to the swimmer’s times. Hope sprinter’s are a tough group to try and trump much like Kzoo’s IM task force in the late 90’s to 2001-2002.

Am I way off on this?

@Insight wrote:

I would like to suggest something about the above math. While it is obvious that K has the better drops, the .68 seconds from 23.00 to 22.32 is far less impressive than the .58 seconds from 21.25 to 20.67.

Does this make sense?

What I am saying is that in the situations in the example from Cheadle, all of Kalamazoo’s times are great drops but it is a tougher but it is relative to the swimmer’s times. Hope sprinter’s are a tough group to try and trump much like Kzoo’s IM task force in the late 90’s to 2001-2002.

Am I way off on this?

So you’re suggesting a percentage difference?

I can see why, but am unsure if that would be neccessary in this instance. The goal here is to find the difference in time that the relay start gets. This difference would be the same because one relay start is the same as the other. I could be wrong though.

I’d be interested to see what other teams have for time drops from other conferences. I have actually been doing work at work lately so my time to research has been lessened, but i could see what i can do tomorrow. It would onyl be one year of data for the other teams, but it would be interesting. Just from my personal knowledge based on conference drops, Gustavus will be one heck of a tough team to beat based on last year.

In my opinion, you cannot guage a relay start based on the time difference from an individual swim and a relay swim. To truly figure it out, we need splits from the touch of the previous swimmer to, say, the 7m mark. Anything else has too many variables with too few constants.

@Derek wrote:

In my opinion, you cannot guage a relay start based on the time difference from an individual swim and a relay swim. To truly figure it out, we need splits from the touch of the previous swimmer to, say, the 7m mark. Anything else has too many variables with too few constants.

I agree. Race time and relay start time are not proportional.

I also don’t understand the thoery that taller swimmers have an inate relay start advantage. Of course they have to travel less distance but that is true in a flat start race also.

@Captain Insano wrote:

I also don’t understand the thoery that taller swimmers have an inate relay start advantage. Of course they have to travel less distance but that is true in a flat start race also.

I agree it’s true of a flat start as well, so the difference made would be the same, it would just be an advantage over shorter swimmers, just like in most races. I guess that evens itself out though, good point.

I did the Gustavus times, someone else can do teams like Wash U or Kenyon, etc…

Hagemeyer: 20.88 dropped to 19.76 difference of 1.12
Amundson: 20.93 dropped to 19.89 difference of 1.04
Wakefield: 21.6 dropped to 20.57 difference of 1.03
Clem: 21.84 dropped to 21.51 difference of .33

Average of .88

Clem hurts them but wow, 3 guys with over a 1 second drop, including 2 20. freestylers? that’s impressive.

were those from this year or were they best times? Because if we are splitting hairs I believe Hagemeyer’s best flat 50 is 20.4. If that was the case it would be 0.63, instead of 1.09. Either way still some awesome exchanges out of that guy.

Triebe 20.61- 20.00
Slavik 20.40- 19.9 I believe not sure on the other 2

Last year’s times were used for my Gustavus post.

I think great relay swimmers know how to utilize the momentum gained by a strong jump. So the drops in time are not only due to the distance from the jump but also because one fatigues less on the first 25. I love the sensation during a relay swim: without forcing much energy you are already at the other wall.

So even if you could measure the first 7 meters, it would not be an accurate indication of how much time difference a relay start could make because you have more energy at the end of the 50.

Bad relay swims often happen because the momentum was dissipated, or the swimmer stayed under too long.

Some swimmers are better at harnessing that energy, and it shows later in the race.Stevo (Heydlauff) was always fun to watch. His 1st 25 always looked phenomonal, like he was being pulled by those demonic chords coach uses to torture us in the mornings.

@swim5599 wrote:

were those from this year or were they best times? Because if we are splitting hairs I believe Hagemeyer’s best flat 50 is 20.4. If that was the case it would be 0.63, instead of 1.09. Either way still some awesome exchanges out of that guy.

Triebe 20.61- 20.00
Slavik 20.40- 19.9 I believe not sure on the other 2

20.60 thank you very much. the reason some of those guys relay starts are much faster than their flat starts are because they’re so huge. hagemeyer is absolutely huge and his flat start cant be that fast. courage is over 6’6″ and has trouble getting all the momentum going. amundson is also very large and suffers from the same problem. they all just lack good flat starts. to get a good relay start, you just need good timing.

My bad I robbed you out of hundredth.