Hello Awesome Maplewood families!

We are about to open registration for the 2021 swim season!   Please mark your calendar for Monday, March 15.

I am sure that many of you have questions about how the season with play out.   I will let you know everything we know at this point.   Please know, things are constantly changing.   We are monitoring the rules and mandates from the HOA, city, county, state, and CDC.   We are working in conjunction with our Rec Committee from the HOA to make sure that this is a safe, fun summer.  

First bit of good news!  We have hired our coaching staff!   

Natasha Fung will be joining us as Head Coach.  She is a graduate of the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio where she was a D1 swimmer.  She was a USA Swimming Scholastic All American and competed at 5 national level meets during high school.  She was a peer mentor for incoming freshman to her university team.  She has years of experience swimming and instructing and we are very excited to welcome her to the team 

Alex Alvarez will be returning to the team as Assistant Coach  Alex joined the team in 2008 as a six and under swimmer.   He has advanced to the all star meet many times and has been a leader on the team.   Alex graduated from Strake Jesuit High School and is attending Texas A&M University (whoop!) currently.     

Camille Directo will also be returning to the team as an Assistant Coach.,  Camille joined the team in 2007 as a six and under swimmer.   She also swam for Duchesne Academy through high school, where she advanced to the state meet many times.   She graduated from Duchesne last fall and is attending the University of Dallas currently. 

We are excited about our coaching staff and hope you all will show them a big Marlin's welcome!

On to the season logistics.

The league is continuing with the policy of not having dual meets this summer.  We will hold our meets at the pool, swimming with just Maplewood swimmers.   However, this season, we will  be coming together in two groups instead of swimming by age group.   10 and under swimmers will swim together in the first meet.  We will have a short break to regroup and disinfect and then the 11 and up swimmers will swim a meet together.   These meets will be short because you only have our team and only half of the swimmers.  i would expect them to be over in 1.5 to 2 hours.   

Here are some of the rules that we will be following this season, as agreed to with the HOA.

We will not have temperature checks.   Swimmers and parents are asked to self monitor.   Please do not come to the pool if you have any of the symptoms of COVID.   When at the pool, all people will be required to wear a mask when entering and exiting the pool or when walking around the deck.   When seated on deck, masks can be taken off.   Social distancing will be observed.   I believe that the chairs will be back out this season, but be prepared to bring your own if needed.  Siblings are allowed to be at practices, but must follow the guidelines mentioned above.  

Our goal is to have as normal a season as possible.   Our plan is for the meets to have as many of the bells and whistles of a pre Covid meet as we can safely accomplish.   We plan to have concessions, but with only prepackaged food.   We have all learned a lot over the past year and we know how this works.   I was so grateful for everyone who helped us last year to pull off our Covid swim season.  There will be many more emails coming regarding the season.   Don't get email fatigue!!   Read them!   

Now to registration.   We are going to be limiting each age group to 25 competitive swimmer for the time being.   Don't panic!   We will be working to get as many kids on the competitive team as possible.   Currently, the HOA is limiting us to 225 people at the pool.  We are hopeful that that limit will increase as we get closer to the summer.  Rest assured, whenever we can add more swimmers, we will.   But even if you are not on the competitive team, you can still be on the practice team.

When registering, if you receive a message that you have been placed on the waitlist, don't panic and back out of everything an sign up for the practice only team.  Waitlisted swimmers are automatically on the practice team.   If you are on the waitlisted team, we know that you want to be moved to the competitive team.   If you back out and sign up for the practice team, we don't know that you want to swim competitively.  We will go down the list of wait listed swimmers in order by age group.   If you aren't on that list, you will be at the end of the line.   So, if you get wait listed, stay there.   We will do our best to get everyone swimming competitively who wants to.

This year, we are signing up for volunteer slots during registration, since we know our schedule.   Please make sure that you sign up for the correct meet.   Instead of first half and second half, we have 10 & under meet and 11 & up meet.   Make sure you sign up for a meet that your swimmer will be swimming in!

We also ask that you only sign up for the competitive team if you will be able to attend 3 of the 4 regular season meets.   This year we have 4 meets, the meet of champions, and allstars.   Since we are having to limit our numbers, if you can only come to 2 or fewer of the meets, we ask that you sign up for the practice team.   

There is a lot more information to come.   Be on the look out for emails.   Once returning family registration concludes, I will no longer be emailing last years families, so make sure you get your registration done as soon as possible.  

We are excited to have another season of Marlins swimming!   If you or someone you know might be interested in sponsoring the Marlins swim team, please contact Stephanie Lester at 713.530.0307 or [email protected]  As you can imagine, last year was an expensive one for the team.   Low registration numbers coupled with added PPE expenses put a dent in our reserves!   Additionally, don't forget about the family sponsorship for $100 that gives you a reserved parking space at the meets and other goodies.