Hi everyone,

Please register as soon as you can; we anticipate an even bigger team than last year, but we need to know how big so we can hire coaches and make other plans. Remember that you must be a member to participate in swim team so if you haven't registered for membership yet, click on this link first and do so. 

Second, the current registration is for Little Lazers and full team Lazers. For those who are unfamiliar with the difference, you can go to this link, about mid-way down the page, and read about the programs. But the summary is that Little Lazers is a development program for younger kids, ages 4 (as of June 1st, no exceptions) to 7 or 8, which ends up being very reasonable and high quality swim lessons. Absolutely no prior swimming ability is expected or required! The kids love it, have fun, make friends, and definitely learn to swim. They are assessed at the first session or the first time they show up and placed in 1 of 5 levels and our great coaches teach and encourage them, and as they improve they move up the levels and can eventually graduate to the big kid swim team. Assessments begin just before FCPS lets out and practice begins the week after school lets out, and continues until the 3rd week of July when we hold my favorite event of the year, the Little Lazers swim meet. If you want your kids to learn how to swim, this is the best way LPRC offers for them to learn an essential life skill that can literally save their lives. And they get to have fun while doing it, what could be better? 

Full Lazers is for kids usually starting around 7 or 8 (again, league rule, whatever age you are as of June 1) and going all the way up until they are 18. This is a full competitive team with practice as much as 5 days a week (but you come as much as you want), competitive meets on Saturdays against other pools, and practice meets on Monday nights. (We take all levels of ability although for older kids who struggle to swim multiple laps it is very challenging and we should talk.) While we take swim season seriously and try to do our very best, we also want it to be fun for the kids while they learn to be superior swimmers and make friends for life. We try to win the competitive meets but we're more concerned that everyone is having a great experience, learning how to swim, and making their personal bests, from our All Stars to those just learning how to swim. It's a great program that is much better for the kids than sitting around all summer watching YouTube, I guarantee. They will get great exercise and a skill they can use for life. Practice begins the Tuesday after Memorial Day. 

We will also have a program we started last year, the "transitional" program. This is for kids who might be in between Little Lazers and big Lazers or kids getting a late start on swim team. It is designed to build up their endurance so that they can comfortably participate in full swim team practice. Not sure where your kid falls? We're here to answer questions, but we will also hold a pre-season assessment on Tuesday, May 24th (rain date Wednesday, May 25th) when the kids can get in the pool and show Coach Catherine what they can do and where they're at. This will be at the same time as our swimsuit fitting at LPRC, 5-7PM. More details on that event and reminders will come later. 

For other kids we also have a couple of additional programs. For these programs sign up will come much closer to the season. First, individual swim lessons will be given by our coaches and we will have a sign up for that around when the pool opens. Second, our "parent and me" Tiny Lazers program for 2 and 3 year olds on weekday mornings will also have sign ups at the beginning of the season. 

Finally, please mark your calendars for our Pizza with the Coaches night on March 30th at 6:30PM this year back in person! We're going to try to do this outside at the pool if the weather is good but we'll have a backup indoor facility just in case. We're also going to try to revitalize our car wash fundraiser perhaps the first weekend in June. This is a major fundraiser for the swim team and the pool, so let your car get dirty between now and then. Thanks! 

Happy to answer questions, but for swim team please: 1. SIGN UP FOR MEMBERSHIP IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY! And 2. SIGN UP FOR SWIM TEAM AS SOON AS YOU CAN!