Seniors and Group 4- Looking for a good Holiday Gift?

Finis has a freestyle snorkel that we will begin to use during free and pull sets at practice. This is not mandatory for the groups but is a great tool to help with body alignment when swimming free.

Here is the link.

The Youth Norkel is up to 9 years.

The Junior seems to be up to 13-14.

The Free snorkel looks to be 14 and older.

Pool Temp.

Parents - As all of you know we are beginning to have some "winter" weather for Houston. The Rec Center has been working with what the baseline "air" temp can be with out affecting the regulated pool temp. They have been using the manufactures recommendation on the heater temp up to this point and will now begin apply real world adjustments to the heater temp. This week has been chilly and rainy already with more to come later in the week. With the rain last night the current pool temp is going to be a little chilly today. Please keep this in mind for tonights practice. I wanted to list a few things RICE Aquatics is initiating with the Rec Center to help regulate the temp. through out the day. These steps will start tonight and continue through the upcoming months. We will begin keeping the far end of the pool covered through out the day. This will mean less lap swim lanes but should not have an effect on our swim space and time. Once Masters Swimming is finished at 6:30-6:45 we will begin covering 6-8 lanes. After Senior 2 practice at 7:15 we will cover all but 4-6 lanes of the pool. When Group 4 finishes at 7:30 we will cover all lanes except 2-4 lanes of the pool. These lanes will be covered once the Rec Center closes each night. The covers will be pulled from our side as needed begining with Masters, Senior and College practice in the morning. We will need swimmer help to pull the covers in a timely manner so please be aware they may stay in the water 5 mins over what their usual practice time is if they fall within the timeframe of pulling tarps. I wanted to assure everyone that RICE Aquatics will not have practice if the pool temp is not acceptable for our groups. If you have a smaller swimmer and are looking for some holiday gift ideas here are a few: Thermal Suits. TYR, Speedo, and Finis make some variation of a thermal suit or thermal shirt. I have not used them but know teams that have. See you guys at the pool, Coach Jason

Parka Orders

I will be picking up the Parka orders early Thursday morning and should have them at practice Thursday night. The parkas will be placed in the swimmers lounge area for pick up on Thursday nights practice. I will have a few parent volunteers to help pass them out on Thursday night.

Thank you for your patience.

RICE First List

With the opening of the new outdoor pool we have had many first's this year. First 50 m practice in pool, first sub 50 practice, first practice while raining. If anyone has checked the weather for Friday we might have another first. Our first snow practice!!!