MM Weekly Announcements for Week of 09/15-09/21

John VanDriessche

Dear Marlin families,

As we start week three we will be sending the weekly emails through our new website. If you want to add email addresses that receive those emails you will need to add those to your account and go through the verification process. Individual account holders/members are the only ones that can verify additional emails.

Understandably, we have been receiving several questions about everything to do with our club. With all swim clubs there are two operational fronts. We have the wet side which is everything directly related to what we do at practice and meets. The dry side is all of the administrative type tasks. If you have questions regarding the dry side you should contact Kelly Laneman, our team/business manager. If you have questions regarding anything to do with the wet side of our team, please refer those questions to me.

Practice Schedule for Week of 9/8

Penn High School

Splash 1 & 2: Monday and Wednesday 6:00-7:00

Splash 3: Monday and Wednesday 6:00-7:00, & Tuesday and Thursday 5:30-7:00

Fins Flex: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:30-7:00

Fins Compete: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, 5:30-7:00

Elite AM: Friday 5:30-7:30

Elite PM: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 3:45-5:45, and Friday 3:45-5:15

New Prairie High School

Splash: Monday and Wednesday 5:00-6:00 CST

Fins: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:00-6:30 CST

Elite: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday 5:00-7:00 CST

Knollwood CC

Splash 1 and 2:

Monday and Wednesday 4:30-5:30 or 5:30-6:30

Tuesday and Thursday 3:30-4:30 or 4:30-5:30

Practice Notes:

New Prairie families continue to use door N18 to enter the building. Penn families use door D. If you arrive at Penn and the gallery door is locked, please feel free to get my attention on deck to let me know.

Due to the home football game at Penn on Friday we have been asked to leave the building by 5:30. Unfortunately that means we will not be able to offer practice for Splash 3 or Fins. Splash 3 will add Tuesday this week.

Practices

You can now access the weekly practices right from our website. Click on the Practice Plan tab to get a drop down menu of this week’s practices. Please share these with your swimmers. The more prepared they are for practice the more productive it will be.

DUNE Sweater Weather Swim Spectacular/Hobart High School/Oct. 5&6

The deadline to commit to this meet is this Friday, September 20. If you have already committed your swimmer, their events have been chosen. There are few swimmers that I do not know yet and will be conferring with their coaches if their event selection is correct.

I have heard second hand there has been concern about my policy of coaches selecting events. I know this is a departure of what you may have experienced. I fully intend to discuss this at our parent meetings. But, if you feel you need to have a discussion prior to those meetings, just let me know. Please also keep in my mind if you need an answer with anything regarding the wet side of our program I would be the appropriate person to ask.

Swim–A-Thon/Penn High School/Oct. 12

Congratulations! As of 9:00 AM Sunday morning we have already raised over $2000. This is with only 10 of our members raising funds. Just imagine where we could be when all of our members are participating.

Due to space limitations we are going to divide the Swim-A-Thon into two sessions.

All athletes 12 years old and up will have their Swim-A-Thon from 8:00-10:00.

All athletes 11 and younger will have their Swim-A-Thon from 10:00-12:00.

We will need parents to help count laps. We will use the main pool and the diving well if necessary. We could need up to 14 lap counters to cover the entire facility. This is an event for our entire team.

Each athlete will be required to raise a minimum of $100. Athletes raising $200 or more will win a logo’d team suit. There will also be other prizes for the overall top fundraiser and for the top fundraiser at each location.

Here is a preliminary breakdown of funds disbursement.

5% to the USA Swimming Foundation
10% goes to Michiana Marlins Foundation for scholarships for our athletes
TBD % for needs for each location based on what each site raises.
TBD % towards coaching wages/salaries
TBD % coach education/clinics/professional memberships/required certifications
TBD % future projects/travel/trips/clinics/guest speakers/emergency funds

I understand this is vague. I want to be as transparent as possible and will communicate exactly where the funds will go once it has been decided.

Fitter and Faster Tour Northridge High School

NASA is hosting a clinic for 9 and over swimmers focusing on the essentials of faster racing. The clinic will be on Saturday 9/28 and Sunday 9/29. You can register by clicking here. The clinic organizers agreed to give our club a small amount of the registration fees for every Marlins swimmer that attends. A great way to learn some skills and help out the club!

TeamUnify

We have switched almost all of our club operations over to the new website. I have fielded a couple of questions with some problems our members are having. My experience is these problems typically come down to two issues. The most common is the web browser you use on your laptop. TeamUnify works best with Firefox. The second issue is when members use the web browser on their phones. If you prefer to use your phone it is best to use one of two apps. The two apps that connect directly to our website are OnDeck and Sports Engine Motion. The login information is the same you would use for the website.

Suggestion Box

As we are transitioning to the TeamUnify platform we have the ability to add all types of information to our website. If there is anything that you would like to see on our site shoot me an email with your ideas.

Addition to Meet Schedule

We will be adding a meet the weekend of 12/6-8. I am still weighing our options. A decision will be made this week and the selected meet will be added to the schedule below and to our website.

Middle School Weight Program

If your athlete is a middle school student at PHM there is an opportunity for them to start a lifting program at Penn High School. This program, named Futures, is designed and led by Matt Cates, the 2024 National Strength Coach of The Year. This program is free of charge. It will be Monday and Wednesdays from 7:30-8:15. Bus transportation will be provided for Grissom and Discovery students. Schmucker students will walk to school. I have attached a flyer with more information.

I want to be clear on this point. I can not recommend this enough. Every one of our eligible athletes, male and female, should be part of this program. Stronger athletes are better athletes. My goal is for swimmers to be the largest group of athletes participating. Let’s be the example!

Contact Info

We have added a tab to our new website. If you need a coaches’ email you can click here.

USA Memberships

We will need all of our athletes that have not done so already, to renew their USA Swimming memberships. Here is the link. From my experience with my own athletes just purchasing the membership will initiate the transfer process.

If you qualify for the Outreach Program email me and I will send you the link you will need to use for registrations.

If you have any questions about any registration issues you can reach out to me or our team/business manager Kelly Laneman ([email protected])

Spirit Wear

Hopefully you saw our social media posts with the link to our team store. If you missed it, no worries, here is the link.

Parent Meetings

Here are the tentative dates for our parent meetings at each location.

The KCC parent meeting will be Monday September 23 at 5:45 EST.

The NP parent meeting will be Tuesday September 24 at 5:30 CST.

The Penn parent meeting will be Wednesday September 25 at 6:00 EST.

Specific meeting locations will be communicated in a later email. These dates are all subject to change based on coach availability for practice coverage. My presentation typically takes around 30 minutes followed by a question and answer session.

Social Media Sites

Make sure to like, follow, or subscribe to our social media platforms. You can click here to our Facebook page, X, and Instagram. We will use these sites to enhance our communication. These sites will be filled with pictures from meets and practices. We will also be posting any last minute announcements here as well. These will include practice cancellations, weather or otherwise, time changes to meet warmups, and anything else that needs to get out quickly.

Fall and Winter Meet Schedule/Dates of Meet/Location/Deadline to commit

This is our tentative meet schedule for the fall and winter. We may add meets if we find ones that fit our club’s needs. There will be two different dates listed with each meet The first date listed is the day(s) of the meet and the second date is the deadline to commit.

Swimmers wanting to compete will need to commit to those meets. The deadlines will be based on deadlines that were set in previous years. They may change once the meet hosts posts the meet information. When committing to multiple day meets, if the option to select the days you want is not available, leave a message in the notes section stating the specific days you would like to attend.

Some meets will be marked with an * and those will require swimmers to meet minimum time standards. You can view all pool locations on our website under the "Pools" tab.

DUNE Sweater Weather Swim Spectacular/Hobart High School/Oct. 5&6/Sept. 20

CON Skypoint Transit Invite/Elkhart Aquatic Center/Nov. 1-3/Oct. 6

GSI Goshen Rays Veterans Day Meet/Goshen Aquatic Center/Nov. 9/Oct. 13

IA Tim Welsh Invite/Elkhart Aquatic Center/Jan. 3-5/Nov. 3

CON IMXtreme Invite/Concord High School/Jan. 24-26/Dec.15

IA Jr. Superstar Invitational/Rolfs Aquatic Center/Feb. 15&16/Jan.12

CON Leisure Pools Last Chance Showdown/Concord HS/Feb. 28-Mar. 2/Jan.19

*IN Swimming Divisional Championships/TBD/Mar. 7-9/Feb.23

*IN Swimming Senior State/TBD/Mar. 13-16/Feb.23

*IN Swimming Age Group State/TBD/Mar. 21-23/Feb. 23

*USA Swimming Speedo Sectionals/IU Natatorium Indy/Mar. 27-30/Feb.23

As always, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.