Swim Meets (6): Lane assignments

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In most of the Timed Final Meets or during the Preliminaries where there are multiple heats for an event, the usual order is fastest to slowest heats (i.e. swimmers in Heat 1 are faster than those in Heat 5).  Each swimmer is seeded according to their previous best time.  If it's an event that the swimmer has never previously acquired a swim time, then the swimmer has a "NT" (No Time) and is usually grouped together in the latter heats with other swimmers who also have a NT.

But how do the swimmers get assigned in their lanes for their respective heats?
General rule of thumb:  the fastest swimmers are positioned in the middle lanes.
Using the information available from 2020 USA Swimming Rulebook  (102.5.3, page 28), I created the below graphical table.  I highlighted two rows in yellow as the 8-lane and 10-lane formats are the most common ones you will encounter (the 8-lane format is most common for the US SCY). 

<Lane assignments>

So for an 8-lane pool:
- the fastest swimmer (1st-seed) will start from lane 4
- the 2nd fastest swimmer will start from lane 5
- the 3rd fastest swimmer will start from lane 3... and so on.

For a 10-lane pool:
- the fastest swimmer (1st-seed) will start from lane 5
- the 2nd fastest swimmer will start from lane 6
- the 3rd fastest swimmer will start from lane 4... and so on.

Some people say the middle lanes have an advantage as the swimmers are able to have a better view of all of the swimmers in their race.  There is also the popular opinion that the middle of the pool will have the least resistance as there is less choppy water caused by the wake (or current) produced by other swimmers, especially during a short distance sprint race.  However, there has been many instances of swimmers from the "outside" lanes winning major races - FINA even has a whole article that documented winners from outside lanes in past competitions.

Personally, one of my most memorable sporting event that I have watched on TV was seeing the Australian swimmer Kieren Perkins winning Gold in the Men's 1500m free event in the 1996 Olympics from lane 8 (although the video quality is not that great, you could watch the YouTube clip of the last 90 seconds of that race here).  Many people had already written him off prior to that race and Perkins just barely qualified for the finals, so was seeded on lane 8.  He ended up winning the race quite comfortably and won gold in back-to-back Olympics.  So if by any chance your swimmer gets discouraged for being assigned in one of the outside lanes, do tell them they should NOT be discouraged or disappointed and just do their absolute best.  Getting one of the middle lanes does not always guarantee a good result!

Until next time, keep on cheering for your swimmers! 🏊🏊🏊

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