Its Been a While...

After rushing home early from Nationals for my brother's wedding, getting to spend two weeks on vacation and the amazing push in the beginning of September for team registrations (more on that in a second) I have completely neglected updating the blog in quite some time. I see by the hit counter that quite a few people have visited the site since I last posted in August and I apologize for not keeping up with all of you. Luckily I now have some time to get back into the swing of posting here on a more regular basis.


Since I came back to GCIT in October 2004 our number have increased at a steady pace. We have had to endure some tough times with the pool being shut down during the summer of 2005 and 2006 but with the help of a great coaching staff and a very supportive group of parents we got through it. Last September we started with 130 swimmers on the team and that number increased to 160 by the time we hit the spring season. By April I started to think we could get close to the 200 swimmer mark possibly by September 2008...as there is always a nice surge in registrations following the Olympic Games.


Heading into the month of September our registrations were at 130 and climbing, well ahead of the record pace we set in 2006. However I did not expect to experience the push on September 10th (the first day of practice) that happened. We had over 100 swimmers register for this team (for the full-time program and the high school warm-up group) in less than three hours! When all was said and done we had 200 swimmers on the full-time team and 55 in the high school warm-up group, reaching my personal goal one year early. The high school warm-up group has since grown to 60 swimmers.


There are probably many reasons as to why our team is at this size right now. However one thing keeps coming back to me as a major factor for the surge. I received a number of calls and emails from people who have said something to the effect of, "I have heard the program at GCIT is very good." We can put together a great looking brochure and can put ads listing our team accomplishments in the various summer league meet programs but nothing will ever top the personal endorsement of one of our current families. Knowing there are people on this team who think enough of the program to recommend it to their friends and summer league teammates is both very encouraging and humbling at the same time.

The coaching staff is very excited about the coming season. We hope to help the swimmers on this team become better athletes and better people over the next nine to eleven months. If there is anything we can do to help you or your child with this sport please do not hesitate to speak with one of the coaches.