Volunteer Roles Explained
Officials (Referee, starter, and stroke & turn judges): Being an Official gives you one of the best seats in the house, but you must be trained and certified. See our Officials page for more information.
Head Scorer/Scorer: Head scorer and assistant scorers tally swimmers' scores and team points. This is usually done on a laptop in the booth at the pool. You don't need to be particularly tech-savvy to do this job as Meet Maestro makes it really easy, but you should be comfortable using a computer for data entry.
Ribbon Writers: This job will be done the morning after swim meets at the pool during practice. Take printed labels with the swimmers' times and places, put them on the appropriate ribbons, and file them in the team box.
Timer: Each swim lane has at least one timer (using a stopwatch) from each team. You start timing when you see the flash on the starting system. Waiting to hear the beep would provide a less consistent time, which is why the starter system is equipped with the strobe light. As soon as a swimmer touches the wall to complete the race, you stop your timer.
Back up Timer: These individuals start their stopwatches at the beep and/or flash at the beginning of every event. If a timer has an issue with his stopwatch he will call out for you, and you’ll time his swimmer. Back up timers move from lane to lane and help if a timer is in need. It's important to pay attention as there are only a few seconds' time to react if a primary timer's stopwatch malfunctions and a backup stopwatch is needed!
Lane Slip Runner: These individuals collect the lane slips from the timers at the pool and the DQ slips from the officials and take them to the scoring table.
Heat Ribbons: These individuals stand at the end of the pool and give ribbons to the winners of each heat as they come out of the pool.
Bull Pen: The Bull Pen is the grassy area near the pool where the swim families sit. Two bull pen volunteers announce upcoming events and take the swimmers to the clerk of course to be organized prior to their events.
Clerk of Course and assistant: Clerk of Course is an organized seating area where the swimmers go prior to their events. Clerk of Course volunteers seat the swimmers on benches according to heat and lane assignments. Then they escort them to the pool for their event.
