2024 FAST Information Post

Hey FAST Families,

Our 2024 Summer Season is right around the corner.  I would like to share some information with you all.  I know that it is long but I want to make sure that all of this information gets out there.  Please read through the whole thing.

2024 Meets:

Our meet schedule can be seen HERE and some meet volunteer position descriptions can be seen HERE.  There are a few things that I would like to make note of.

1. Please plan around our JSL championship meet at the end of the summer! It will be on July 26th or July 27th depending your swimmer's age group.  The meet will be held at the Brooks Family YMCA in Charlottesville.  It helps the team tremendously to have as many swimmers there as possible at the JSL Champs meet so that we are able to fill out our relays and individual events in each age group.  It is also a great opportunity for our swimmer's to set new personal best times at the end of the summer season and compare those to where they were in the beginning of the season.
2. Opt in or out for each meet as soon as possible.  This helps us know who will be at each meet when creating meet lineups.  Your swimmer will not be added to the meet if they are not opted in for that particular meet.  You can view directions on how to opt into or out of each meet on our meet schedule page.
3. Volunteering is a major part of being a swim team parent.  We need many volunteers at meets to help the meets run.  Please register sooner rather than later for volunteer positions at our meets.  Reminder that each family is required to volunteer for at least 3 meets this summer.  You can register for volunteer positions for each meet right now.  Directions on how to sign up as a volunteer can be seen on our meet schedule page.  The majority of the positions will be as timers but there are a few other positions that require a quick training that we will need as well.  You can view all of the volunteer position descriptions in the PDF attached above. 
4. Right now our major need is Meet Director! The meet director will be our teams representative at our meets and will help me keep our volunteers organized.  Please email me directly as soon as possible if you are interested in being our meet director for this 2024 Summer Season.  We need at least one but it would be great if we could have a meet director as well as a backup.  Thanks!
5. We also would love to have a couple more stroke and turn officials.  We have a few but having more allows everyone to rotate in and out for different meets.  The stroke and turn officials are the people that are in charge of making sure that each swim is done within the rules set out by USA Swimming.  This also requires a training course, I will email more information to anyone who is interested.

2024 Practice Schedule:

1. Practices will start on May 28th and will end on July 25th.  Our championship meet will be on July 26th and July 27th and we will plan on having our team banquet on July 28th.
2. Dryland: We are starting a dryland program this summer for all 11+ swimmers on M, T, Th, and F afternoons from 5:15-6:15. It will be held at the Fork Union Pool.  The first day of dryland will be on Monday, June 3rd.  Changes to the dryland schedule will be emailed out if needed.  I hope to see lots of swimmers take advantage of this, it will be a great way for them to strengthen the muscles used in swimming while also helping with flexibility and general conditioning.
3. Please bring Water, an extra tee shirt and pair of shorts, tennis shoes, and a Yoga Mat/Towel that can be laid down in the grass every day to dryland.
4. We will be having a general practice schedule of M, T, W, and F mornings as well as M, T, Th, and F afternoons.  Please do your best to stick to the timeslots and days of the week that you are registered for.  If you know you are going to miss a day and let me know ahead of time, we will find a different practice date and/or time where your swimmer will be able to make up their practice.
5. There are some planned variances to our schedule and there will inevitably be some unplanned changes to our practice schedule.  I will remind everyone via email during the weekend before any planned changes like how we will miss the 4th of July.  I will also email everyone if we have to miss practice for any other reason such as weather.  Be sure to check your email before leaving for practice if you think there is a chance practice will be cancelled due to something like weather but always assume practice will go on as scheduled if no email is received.

Social information:

1. We love to have fun and love to teach swimmers how to swim.  We are making our first week of practices a Bring-A-Friend week.  During the first week of the summer season, you can bring a friend with you to try out a summer swim practice with us free of charge to see if they may be interested in joining our summer team.  Please email me beforehand though so that I can make sure that we are prepared.
2. We plan on having lots of team socials this summer.  With the school year ending this week, we are starting off our team socials with an Honor Roll Ice Cream Party.  This will be for every swimmer on the team who achieved an honor roll (A's and B's) report card.  It will be at one of the Papa Jim's locations in Fluvanna and the team will buy ice cream for any swimmer who shows us that they achieved honor roll during their most recent school semester.  More information on this will come out very soon. 
3. We plan on doing other socials this summer as well like the team float down the James River that we do every summer.  A team social list with information and dates will be out soon.

Let me know if you have any questions by emailing me at difaziomike99@gmail.com

I am looking forward to seeing everyone next week!

Coach Mike DiFazio