How to Read Heat Sheets
What is a Heat Sheet? What Does it say?
The Heat Sheet is a program that shows all the participating swimmers and what events they will participate in as well as the heat number and lane number. The announcer will say the event and heat number and there is also an electronic board with this information.
Changes to the Heat Sheet will be made the morning of the meet based on swimmers who don't arrive on time or do not attend. We will also "combine" races to speed up the meet. For example, if we have 3 girls swimming Fly in the 15-17 age group and 3 boys -- we will combine them into one heat to save time.
The announcer will say if heats are combined. Please pay attention when it gets close to the time your swimmer's event is.
Event Number: There are 48 events in each meet.
Heat Number: In each of the 48 events, there are HEATS. Each heat has 5-10 swimmers - depending on the size of the pool.
Lane Number: This will tell you which lane your swimmer is scheduled to be in.
Seed Time: Once a swimmer participates legally in an event, they will have a "seed time" in that event for the next meet. Swimmers are placed in heats and relays according to their seed times*.
Results
Seed Time: The swimmer's fastest time prior to this meet.
Finals Time: The time they swam at this meet
Heat Winner: First child to touch the wall (if not DQ'd).
Heat Sheet Explained
