Rudgear Rats: Week of June 2nd
Upcoming Dates
June 3 - Summer Practice Schedule Begins / First Day of Summer Practice Breakfast!
June 5 - REST @ WHO | Warm-ups: 4:30pm; Meet Begins: 5:00pm
June 8 - REST vs IVST | Warm-ups: 8:00am; Meet Begins: 9:00am
June 10 - Picture Day & Buddy Day (No Practice)
June 11 - Rugrats Begins
June 12 - REST @ YWST Declare by 6/5
June 15 - REST vs. Larkey Declare by 6/8
June 17 – 6U and 7/8 Social
June 19 – Green vs White Declare by 6/5
TL;DR:
-GREEN OUT for WHO
-come to First Day Breakfast tomorrow
-declare for Green vs. White, IVST, & Larkey
-opt in for picture day (text "2024RATS to 90738)
-picture & buddy day is 6/10
-lessons are available
Coach’s Message
Aloha Rudgear Rats fam. After a long wait, the 2024 summer season is finally upon us! Spring practice was epic, but we are grateful to be moving back into our morning routine with all six lanes for workouts. A couple reminders – if your swimmer wants to swim a specific stroke at a meet please make that request via the website or OnDeck app using the note feature before the declaration deadline. No promises, however this is the best method of requesting strokes. (You must do this ahead of the declaration deadline.) Relays are at the coaches’ discretion. Relays will change. Please remember with the Paris Olympics coming up quickly… It’s going to be a golden summer! With golden vibes! Gold vibes only. Go Rats!!
-Coach Nick
Summer Practice Begins
Tomorrow we shift to our summer practice schedule. With this shift, you’ll see a few changes:
-Some practices will be a bit longer and 11/12s & 13/14s will shift to practicing together.
-No one is allowed in the pool except team swimmers during their practice time (this is for real for real and extremely important to adhere to – please make sure your swimmers follow this rule).
-Different coaches will be coaching different age groups. Check out who will be coaching your swimmer’s age group here.
Reminder: All children ten years of age and younger must be supervised by an adult when not practicing. The team does not provide supervision for swimmers when they aren’t practicing.
First Day of Summer Practice Breakfast
This fun traditional is going down tomorrow! Come before and/or stay after practice for a delicious breakfast and lots of fun! And it’s not too late to sign up for a shift to help out our first day breakfast coordinators!
Wednesday Night GREEN OUT!!
It’s our first away meet of the season and we are going up against our neighborhood rivals Walnut Heights!! Let’s GREEN OUT the WHO’s pool deck – rock all the green you can. Our Rat Packers will be coming around to offer face paint and hair spray, too!
Picture Day
Monday, June 10 – arrive between 8am and 10:30am. Please come at whatever time is best for you – but not everyone can come on the later side, so if you can come earlier please do so. (Even if you don’t want to order pictures, please bring your swimmer by to take their photo so it can be compiled into the team photo.) Please see the note below from our photographers:
Picture Day OPT-IN Details -
It's a new kind of picture day! For those that have photographed with us before, this change might be a little different. There is NO PREPAY (yay!), you just need to Opt-In/Subscribe via text message, before picture day. Once pictures are ready for ordering, all those that have opted-in via text will receive the private link and access code to place their orders. All orders are mailed directly to parents' homes. It's that easy! :) *Parents/Caretakers MUST opt-in via text to receive the ordering link and SPECIAL PROMOTIONS
Text "2024RATS" to 90738 to opt-in for picture day
Buddy Day
Monday, June 10 | 11:00am-12:30pm
Our Buddy Reveal will happen right after picture day! If your swimmer signed up to be a buddy, they will find out who their buddy is! We will play team building games and have lots of fun! (If your swimmer can’t make this event and signed up to be a buddy, that is totally fine. We will post the buddy list and put your buddy’s sheet in your family folder.)
Lessons
Lessons are available! We post all the coach’s sign-up links on our website (click here); however, it is the coaches’ responsibility to update their sign-ups, set prices, receive payment, etc.
We have 200 swimmers on our team, so please be considerate when booking lessons. We don't want one swimmer having three lessons per week and another left with none.
Please note: Swimmers may only sign up for one lesson per week with Coach Nick. If you sign up for multiple lessons for one swimmer, the earlier lesson will stay on his schedule and the remainder for the week will be deleted.
Green vs. White - Declare Now
Please declare if your swimmer is coming to the Green vs. White meet by June 5th. The coaches need time to split the teams, so it’s important we know who is coming now.
"I Got County!"
Now that meets have begun, you may hear swimmers say that they “got county!” A County Time is established by the County Committee and achieving this time allows swimmers to enter the County Meet. These swimmers will receive a county cap and their name will go on the County banner. Read more about County here.
A note about county relays: throughout the season, relays may swim a County time – which is awesome! Being one of the swimmers in that relay, however, does not guarantee that swimmer a spot in the County relay. Swimmers who are placed on the County relay will receive County caps the first day of County practice. Just like any other meet, relay teams are chosen by the coaches. Coaches look at records times, attitude and participation, starts/finishes, and team needs in order to determine who swims in relays. No swimmer is owed or guaranteed a relay spot.
Please note: The majority of swimmers do not make County and that is more than okay! Our goal is for our swimmers to work hard to best their own times and to have a ton of fun along the way.
Let's Connect
Instagram: @rudgear_rats
Facebook: Click here to join our Facebook group
Let's make it a great first week of summer and GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO RATS!!
