Swimmer intentionally swims slowly in championship race, but why?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 มิ.ย. 2024
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NCAA swimming has some strategy to it, but it often gets swept under the rug. Let's talk about probably the most interesting strategic play I've seen at a swim meet in a long time.
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There’s actually an “Honest Effort” rule in the NCAA Swimming & Diving rulebook that states:
“Coaches are to ensure student-athletes put forth an honest effort in all competitions. Failure to show an honest effort could be considered an act of improper conduct (Rule 2-5-6) and result in disqualification and/or disciplinary action by the referee or meet committee.”
This is why Kacper likely went :48 and not 1:08…good luck defining what an “honest effort” is as a ref 🥶
I'm so interested in the definition of "Honest Effort". It's arguable that Stokowski's not putting in an honest effort for the 100 back is for his honest effort for the 100 back + 100 fly double. Does the honest effort rule apply to each race individually or the whole meet overall?
In South African competition we have the following rule:
If the Referee deems a swimmer to have deliberately false started or not performed to the swimmer’s capabilities, the swimmer will be fined R500.00 and will be withdrawn from all further
events that session, including relays if they fall in that session.
When I first started judging I was not aware of this rule. At a championship gala one of the timekeepers joked with me that his son was going to swim slowly because he failed to withdraw from the final in time and wanted to concentrate on the later final. His then came in 5m behind everyone else in a 50m race and laughed with his dad. I was so cross. If I had been aware of that rule I would have approached the referee and got him excluded from the rest of the session.
🇨🇦 Nationals you used to have to make the time standard to score.
Loophole
I've seen this rule applied before at an NCAA Division II championship in Buffalo DQ'ing UINDY's 400 free relay. No one can say that was an honest effort by Stokowski.
completely floating through a 100 fly and still going 48 is nuts lol
factual
Also, it’s like getting to see how KD and MM’s time look like against the men
@@Ineddiblehulk surprisingly that's actually not that far off
True
I thought a trans man was going to win.
Never mind, that's not possible. Lol
I was at the meet and actually DID NOT EVEN NOTICE Kacper dogging the 100 fly final. Granted I was across the pool over lane 1 with the Cal contingent. BTW that is the easiest 48+ fly I've ever seen on video.
Dude was straight vibing. Heart rate was probably 125 after that.
@@Sockwell ASU had a great meet, which BTW I think I somewhat predicted on your comments section after the PAC12's. The ASU parents stayed at our Hotel (aLoft) and were very friendly and cool at the Hotel Bar (ASU after all). There is a big future ahead for Sparky. I hope Frenchy does not go pro. We met Xavier Marchand and family at a Thai restaurant at Lunch in Minneapolis. They seemed apprehensive about all the attention and pressure the swimming world was putting on the kid. Cheers.
@@jryan1024 I grew up in Arizona, love the state, just don’t go there during summer time 😂
@@dah_goofster Or you catch fire
@@jryan1024 road rage hits an all time high during summer too lol. Everybody drives 80 in a 60 also. Yeah if you don’t have AC you burn to death
absolutely shit on my 100 fly PB while sandbagging
Right? Love the channel by the way, watched the FPV drone recovery video a few months ago and it sent me down a rabbit hole
lol
@@Sockwelli think you should try fpv for the shits and giggles
Did they have to drain the pool or does the chlorine take care of the shit?
@@eagle-eye29 fish it out with a net probably
This swim made the gigachad performance by Brendan Burns even better tbh.
Kacper: *chill 100 fly to conserve for 100 back*
Brendan: *maxes both and wins both races in PB or near PB fashion*
Not really. He had to go all out to score the same amount of points as somebody who coasted and took it easy the entire time lol. That's the opposite of gigachad behavior. Burns was really showing soyboy behavior the entire time
@@Luke-uw6dp wrong on both counts bud. Burns scored 29pts between the two, Kacper scored 28pts. Plus Burns got the only gold, so that's for sure the most impressive 🤷♂️
I agree it was the smart thing to do on Kacper's part. That being said, it feels good to know that the kid who gave it everything both races came out on top.
the dodging of having to explain how people quality for NCAAs was elite 🤣
Fr none of us understand this
He really pretty much explained it. There’s not much else to it besides the fact that he left out NCAA has cuts (a specific time you need to hit). So even if you get the cut you won’t necessarily be “invited” to the meet if
This is the first video about swimming in over 18 months that is not about trans athletes destroying the sport in some way. Thank you for this.
Get them out of the sport and all the problems are solved 🤷♂️
@@thelastmanonearth2631 it's not really an issue... certain people just love bringing up the extremely rare instance of that happening
@crackazack510 any time a biological man is competing against a biological woman in any physical competition, it's a problem.
@@crackazack510 gotta have something to distract from societal issues am I right
I've watched many swimming videos which don't raise the issue at all because it's irrelevant to the video's subject.
But trolls are everywhere inserting political propaganda into threads just to get some people riled and make others sick & tired. It isn't about sports, it's about politics and the next election, and using any social media as a vector for transmission.
Similar things happen more often in track all the time. College and high school have a lot of triangles and unless the teams are DI or large schools, there won't be enough competitors to fill all the times/places. I've throw shot to get last place of six or seven before running over to help a relay team win. Some guys did the same with jumps.
Oh, god, yes. I did this often in high school as a distance runner. I don't know how anyone would expect otherwise, with most of us competing in both 1600m and 3200 m races on the same day. It's physically impossible to go 100% on both of those, bodies don't work that way.
I’m so glad I wasn’t the only one who noticed this! I was so confused, thanks for explaining Kyle. I thought he hurt himself before the race or something. Also that was the worst technique 48 low 100 fly I’ve ever seen! Shows that these guys are on a different level to be throwing down times that wouldn’t get last in a D3 final without even getting his feet above the surface of the water in the recovery portion!
Nice job, including the express lane cruise through qualifying times...
From a team/points perspective, it makes perfect sense... and is actually a smart decision.
As far as "honest effort" goes, the vast majority of prelim swims are swum below 100% effort. What constitutes honest in this case???
Really enjoy your vids!!!!!
I remember watching the olympic games some years ago. There was a similar situation at track and field where 2 german sprinters started at 100 m dash, but dropped out of the race immediatly after the start because they knew they wouldn't get far in the individual competition, but they might have a chance in relay and decided to save strength for that. They had to start the race because they already commited to that, but obviously there was no rule in place saying that you can't just drop out of the competition right away.
Brilliant move! Love seeing the strategic side of swimming come out!
100% agree coach!
Thanks for this. I saw the prelim/final times and was baffled. And imagine swimming a leisurely 48 100 fly. In my dreams.
Editing I know might take you more effort but it was so good in this video and really elevates good job you Kyle 🔥
Appreciate it - this one took longer than most to make, but we’re getting better with each video!
This video was like a Jomboy breakdown. A little longer than his, but job well done. Keep up the good work.
@@Sockwell It's all about having FUN! FUN you hear me?!?
As a guy from a high school that wasn’t the fastest but we had depth, we’ve won state for 4 years now simply because of the volume we had in finals
Any time you have results determined over multiple competitions, it is the fault of the rules if someone is incentivized to sandbag at any point in time. It's like the time the olympic badminton several teams got dq'd for trying to manipulate seeding by throwing matches (in some cases both teams in one match) or the time one soccer team had to prevent the other team from scoring on either goal to advance in the tournament, both are in the end the fault of the ruleset for not having winning each match by standard means be the most beneficial thing (although tbf in the badminton one throwing was punishable by dq so they did disincentivize it in a way).
I have a niece that does the butterfly. I can't tell you how many occasions the times are so close where the difference is essentially 0.01 seconds that going into a heat in an A or B final can be very strategic if another race is expected on the same day. She finished 25th and 15th in the last Olympics.
Just happened to see this. Always cool to see someone I used to swim with still involved in the sport!
I think these tactics have been around for a long time…my competition days are long gone, but I can remember all sorts of tactics being used to gather as many points as possible!
I had the exact same thought process as you did as soon as I saw people debating this. The meet is a team project, not an individual one.
stokowski was the one dude from nc state who had a shot of going as fast as he did in the 100 back, so why not have him "sandbag," especially when you have multiple guys in the 100 fly final anyway?
Great explanation. Great swim plan by the team
I was DQ'd in 400IM securing 8th place points, for this very thing, but it was overturned. My coach & I were not aware of this objective rule at the time in '92. Since I was clearly coasting (to save up for my best event later, and not likely to score much more in the IM), the DQ was deserved, and we were lucky to reverse it.
I understand the sentiment, but tbh DQing someone for purposely scuffing a race is pretty dumb. It’s their race, they can do whatever they want.
@@gummy5862 "It’s their race, they can do whatever they want."
I wouldn't buy this argument when it comes to a kingmaker scenario. In this case, whether Stowkowski finished 6th, 7th, or 8th would not have affected the race winner though.
@@gummy5862 They swim for a team. There are rules for team sports.
@@frogmanant And his result was fine for the team, did not effect the team at all, in fact, this move was BETTER for the team.
Well, Dandylion is correct in his original post. He deserved the DQ. NCAA has a rule concerning "honest effort" and he did not give an honest effort by his own account. However after swimming a 48 second backstroke it would be controversial to call that a failure to give an honest effort. I mean an upset stomach can explain those 4 seconds.
I think that was the most effortless 48.2 I have ever seen...
I haven't done the exact same thing before, but something similar, had 100 free and 100 breast almost back to back so I decided to just swim the 100 free not give all my energy into it (I still ended up dropping a second bc it was a month old time) but I ended up qualifying 1st in the constellation final to maximize the points for my team
Thanks for the explanation, all makes sense now.
This is a great breakdown
Having competed in track in high school and college and now as a bicycle racer in my 70s. I will say strategy is extremely important. The best strategy gets the best overall results.
I knew something like this was happening. Smart play my Kacper
My coach use to talk about how training levels up your easy swimming more than your fast swimming and how really great swimmers easy swim is very close to their full speed. Never seen better evidence than this
Your coach is spot on
they said he went 4 seconds slower then his prelim time , should of been disqualified IMO , others swimmers train hard to be there , and he made a mockery of that . BYE BYE IMO
@@adrianrice354 I have to agree, disqualification from that event, forfeit all points for the meet, & further steps.
He cheated. He threw the race.
Who knows why, maybe his family made lots of money betting he would come third, & even more for getting a time of 1:48.
More likely he was conserving his energy.
It was against the rules. It was dis-honest & dis-honourable.
What is an honest effort? Average the season's times. The numbers will tell the story.
His coach must have known about the tactic, & permitted it. The coach should also be bust, & sent for ethical re-education.. It's his job to advise on the legality of tactics.
@@frogmanant Disagree. Maybe an argument could be made for it if you're willing to also dq anyone who doesn't do their best in the heats too (you'd pretty much have to dq most of the top 4 or 5 in any discipline). Dogging it in the heats is standard practice because it makes strategic sense, so by way of an extension if it makes strategic sense to go slow in the finals that the athlete should go for it.
Most people would agree that pacing oneself during a race is acceptable (at some points, you go slower, some faster). My perspective is that one should pace themselves through a season and potentially a career -- sometimes you need to go slow, sometimes you skip races, in order to maximize your potential at the most important events/races. You don't win championships by ignoring the scoring system (look at the Boston Bruins this year, gave it their all during the season, gone in the 1st round).
Something similar happened to me lol. In high school I was at a big invitational that was boys only. I got 8th in the 100 fly by less than a tenth of a second. The hext closest guy was 3 seconds agead of me. I was at 3rd for the 500 narrowly. The only thing inbetween the Fly and 500 were 100 frees. Also, we didn’t have a B final for the 500. I would get 2 minutes of rest. I gained 3 seconds in my 100 fly to make it look like I was somewhat trying. Then I did my 500 where I suprisingly only gained a second.
When strategy is an element of the game, you definitely have to play strategy. Nice analysis and good game play
Great idea. Swimming is a team sport, whether most people view it that way or not, rule 2-5-6 or not.
It's about getting your team to win. One way to do that is to swim your best. A better way is to swim hard when you need to get the most amount of points.
Could you imagine ejecting a wide receiver for not running 100% when they know a run play is coming? Better yet, can you imagine DQing a top tier swimmer for cruising prelims to save energy for finals? You can't and you wouldn't.
Swims easy and still goes 48...lol
they said he went 4 seconds slower then his prelim time , should of been disqualified IMO
Reminds me of China badminton in the Olympics… teams were intentionally performing bad to be seeded differently. This case is a little different as it isn’t 1v1 competition… I feel it is a little against spirit of competition.
UMN was one of my favorite pools to swim in. Great video, meet scoring strategy rarely gets discussion but we always had running score sheets (mental or IRL) tracking how our expected performances had to shake out to maximize our standing.
flip side of this and we actually have seen it at NC High School State championships (South Mecklenburg 2014-2015 season didn't win a single event). Sandbagging finals to optimize more points for later events where you know you have a better chance at more points like you said at the end. Sometimes is better to have all your guys swim lights out in the morning to get into A final and just score points
Fantastic video
Nice point of view from the pro👍
A similar situation happened in the Olympics 1988 where the German B-Finalist swam Olympic record in 400m freestyle.
my roommate is Polish and knows of Kasper. he says that back home he would have scratched instead of doing a double. but because of the level of NCAA he probably was pushed to complete the double and get points.
I know their is a rule at some meets that if you don't hit the qualifying time for the meet, you can't score points.
These are people who know how their sport works… very strategic! Work smarter not harder they say
The strategy makes sense only if swimming a legitimate time in the fly, Kasper would have absolutely ruined his chances of winning the backstroke. It's kind of a "loser" mentality or a "scarcity" mentality otherwise. Clearly Burns wasn't affected by his strong effort in the B group final. At that level, they should be able to recover during the same day. Training is a whole lot harder than swimming two finals in a day. And training would have prepared them for that recovery. I doubt he saved much energy from the time he did vs the time he could have done. The other reason it might back fire is that you introduce a mentality of not going balls to the wall. Not going for it in the fly final could have had the reverse effect in the back stroke. But I guess only the swimmer and his coach knows. I have a son who's a competitive athlete who would never contemplate doing that. One speed, all you got.
Kyle - You asked a good question when you raised it at the start of a race and I would encourage you to ask it again from swimming trainers. In high school and college I was a swimmer and I always went through that ritual of (1) arms overhead stretching (2) arms parallel to ground extended and moving while rotating body. I don't know the answer medically speaking but i would guess that it has to do with warming up muscles tissue and just general stretching before the intense strain that will occur once you leave the starting block. Competition for me was a long time ago and I might just have been told by trainers/coaches and just don't recall and i might have just performed the stretch just before standing onto the blocks because every swimmer I saw did it. As an adult I coached youth soccer and my training told me warming up prior to increasing exertion on muscles and joints reduced likelihood of injury from stress during an active practice or in a game.
So perhaps the same logic I was taught for coaching youth soccer would apply to collegiate swimming. Good question to keep asking.
This is the first time ive watched anything about competitive swimming but this shits fire imm watch a bit more
1+1 = Kyle Sockwell carry the 1 Math always checks out
100% agree, if there’s not a rule it’s the right thing to do. Tanking is bad, but this isn’t tanking. The literal goal is to try and win in the long run.
It’d be like getting mad at a QB for kneeling in the last 2 mins
what website is this?
It was the right strategy and the right thing to do by his team
his 48:27 looks like me going 1:10🤣
😂 🤣
Many, many years ago, when I was running track, I was coming off an injury and made finals in two events. I didn't have much of a shot at winning the first event, as it wasn't my strongest event, but I was expected to do well in the second event.
After getting off the blocks in the first event, I realized that I wasn't feeling it, and kind of coasted the rest of the way, with the thought that I didn't want to reinjure myself in an event I wouldn't win anyway.
Fast forward a couple of hours, and I ended up not finishing the second event because I really did reinjure myself.
It was definitely my most disappointing track meet.
I completely agree. The way the rules are set, this was an extremely smart thing for the team to do. Now do I think that someone should be swimming slowly in the finals of the ncaa championship? No. The rule could change to 1-12 points for the lower final and 8-20 for the upper to help disincentivize this.
This is the same as NBA playoffs, when a game is already a lock by the 4th quarter, teams will sub in their benchwarmers to close out the game to rest/avoid injury to their better players.
Is that "cheating"? "Oh no, it's not fair that your team got extra rest because of the score difference!" But the score difference is exactly what allowed for that extra rest to occur.
So in this case, making it to the A final is what allowed the guy to bank the guaranteed points. He already put in the effort to get to the A final, that's his due reward.
If you don't want this behavior, then alter the rules so only one event per day, or different scoring system. But as it stands, this is what the system encourages, so that's what you get.
You are absolutely right. Stupid rules make stupid meets. The rules should encourage top competition. I don't know how to do that. But there are surely better minds than mine out there.
Absolutely agree that save it for your best race…… don’t forget it’s a 400 IM so think of it as part of the warm up ⬆️
Back in the day (90s) we would do exact same thing
You play the numbers sometimes even if it don't seem right, to win. I say, great coaching.
I did exactly this in college swimming Conference Championship.
Is this video having multiple loading issues for anyone else? All my other videos are working and i've come back to this one like 5 times it seems cursed in about 3 different spots and every other part will play but those.
So how did he do in the backstroke?
It was dumb logic. The energy savings “very little” vs picking up bad habits for the next race. Hence 2nd place when it matters. Lessons learned. Always do your best.
Amazing
In a high school meet, my coach for some reason gave me back to back events. I got up from my 100 free style and immediately heard my name again for a 100 butterfly. Couldn't even get out of the pool at first and had to wait after the next swimmer dived in. After I got up, I heard my name again for a 4x100 relay. I don't think I've been more tired ever.
As a Brazilian, didn't expected the Nazaré meme appearing here lmao
Absolutely a great strategy. He got the points. You see this in all types of races. At the end of the day the championship is about points. No shame in using that to your advantage.
This a and B grouping is what confuses me. Could a B group swimmer end up swimming faster than someone in the A group? If so, why would he (or she?) get fewer points? Does this set the stage for these oddities where a swimmer does not swim hard?
Damn they're under water for 3/4 of the pool, that's wild. they only get 5-6 strokes off before they have to do their flip turn.
happens all the time in track heats/semi-finals, easing up well before the line.
Same thing for swimming in heats / semi finals but out of the ordinary to see it in a scoring final
YeeeeeeHAW! 🤠( Low key I subscribed for that😅)
Yo Kyle you should make a vid about tech suits?
Also I’ve always wanted to know what swimsuit Leon wears
Made one about whether or not they should be worn for NCAA dual meets, what would you want to know in particular? 🤝
Like which tech suits are the best and most used 👍
As soon as you introduce team points, you change the game from a plain time trial to a team points meta game. As a result you introduce an element of strategy. Who swims what races, what days are each race on, how many can each swimmer handle? You balance all of the different factors to optimize for team points. For that reason, I'd equate dogging a race like this to dogging a point in tennis. It's one singular opportunity to score points, it's not the whole competition. It's not some crisis of sportsmanship. Saving energy for a later part of the competition is also very analogous to any other racing sport where pacing and saving energy are core strategic elements. Nobody complains about speed skaters on longer distances starting out as slow as humanly possible to save energy for one big last sprint. But it's the same thing he did here. Strategically drop behind to set yourself up to catchup and overtake the competition later.
Long story short I see no issue with what he did and I think they should take it a step further. Give swimmers the option to sit out a heat and take the last place points. If your strategy involves conserving energy like that there's no need to force you to go through the motions. Nobody is fooled by it. You qualified for the group that means you earned those points already. If you wanna take em and run, go for it.
Does this happen in Track and Field?
No - runners typically compete in 1-2 individual events and not on the same day (you’d never see the 800 and 1500 on the same day similar to never seeing the 500 and the 1650 the same day in swimming)
i thought this was a jomboy segment.... nice one.
Losing on purpose is always okay. If you don't like the result of having certain rules, change the rules to make sure that losing on purpose has no advantages.
plying the gam is part of the game.
the same in track and field where you don't go all out in the semifinals
Hell yea this is allowed! So cool.
I know nothing about swimming. I am Acdc bad. I truly understand. I even understood before you finished. Why has it not been done before?
On way to try to avoid it is to only allow the swimmer to score if they 9:15 swim under the qualifying time! Don’t solve all problems as in some case that still too slow.
Reminds me of badminton teams purposely messing up service multiple times disqualified for not in spirit of sport, and disappointed audience and sponsors.
similar situations happen in track.
Ego. It can be a blessing, or a curse.
Thought you were initially talking about NU’s federico burdisso because I’m aware that he didn’t take SC seriously and don’t try at nationals
There is a rule in place; re that Northwestern women’s swimmer a few years ago…can’t remember if it was b1gs or nc’s, but it seems that it’s up to the official’s discretion
Just looked it up-the “honest effort” rule…seems really subjective lol
Going to post this with some thoughts in a pinned comment, great find!
It is called strategy.
Potential Title :
“Guy sandbags a 48 100 fly”
Keeping this title in my back pocket for next years NCAAs
crazy
It's called strategy, played chess while the others played checkers.
Smart!
You don’t swim “slow”, you swim slowly!
The NCAA rule is ridiculous. The two heats' times should be added together to eliminate slacking off.
It’s all about winning.
May or may not have done this in the IM in highschool… 😏
Yards?
At first I was shocked at those times. Until I realized they are swimming 100 *yards.* Still wicked fast, but understandable.
He forgot to pull in his rudder.
Not the only sport that happens in.
adverb: slowly
'Swimmy'...😁
Meet organizers: Okay, this is how you get points, team with the most points wins.
Swim teams: Behave in extremely predictable way get the most points they can
Organizers: Actually that's illegal.
If they want *times* to always be competitive then tie the points to their relative *times* not their placements. First gets 100 points and say second place came in .25 after they get 75 points third came in .33 later so they get 67 seventh was .89 behind so they get 11 points, and eighth was conserving energy and came in 2.5s behind so they get 0 points.
Should also get rid of the qualify/finals and just swim 2 heats and rank based on overall times, always hate how people winning the consolation final get fewer points than all the people they swam faster than in the final. It makes no sense to evaluate them separately. As is the qualifier system literally incentivizes ALL swimmers to always conserve energy in any race that isn't a final because the actual time doesn't matter.
They have to know this, like how does nearly every single meet times get faster from qualifying to prelims, seems like there's a LOT of people not putting in an "honest effort" every single meet.