CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR SWIMMERS OF THE WEEK: Our swimmers of the week are: Linus Maples and Vivian Nicol. Linus showed great improvements at our swim meet against LifeTime Cary! Vivian always tries so hard at each practice and meet and is always a great listener. Swimmers of the week receive a gift card in recognition for their hard work.

COACH'S CORNER:

• Coach Audrey: Hello families! Our swimmers had a great meet this past Tuesday! It was fantastic to see them applying the skills we've been honing in practice. We've been working on stroke techniques for all four strokes, relay starts, and refining underwater dolphin kick. Looking ahead, we have an away meet this Tuesday and the exciting Cary City meet this Saturday. We'll be preparing for this action-packed week. As always, feel free to email me with any questions or changes to the meet lineups at [email protected].
• Coach Sophia: Hello parents! This past week we worked more on technique and we worked a little on our stamina. Our technique is looking better so next week I plan to focus more on stamina to try and increase our speed. We have our Cary City meet coming up this Saturday so I will try my best to try and work on swimming full laps with the kids who signed up. Feel free to reach out with any questions or concerns at [email protected]!
• Swamp Pups: Hello parents! This past week we have continued to work on using our arms with our legs while swimming. I am seeing a lot of progress from all of the kids and I plan on continuing to work on this next week. As always, it is important for your kid to be comfortable with putting their face in the water, especially when adding arms. Now that the end of the season is approaching, the swamp pups will have an unique opportunity to swim at our last home swim meet on July 16. I will be sending out more information on how that will go this upcoming week. Feel free to reach out with any questions or concerns at [email protected]!

NEXT MEET! Our next meet is Tuesday July 9. We are the away team and will travel to Wellsley. Address is: 100 Widdington Ln, Cary, NC 27519

The Meet Theme is: Neon Out

• We need swimmers for the parent relay on Tuesday! We’d like to have 2 full relays, which is 8 parent athletes. Wear your suit, warm up with a few swamp-jacks, and join us for a fun race.
• Arrive at 5:00pm to get settled, swimmers numbered and meet volunteers sign in (even if you are 2nd shift).
• Wellsley Food: Pizza, chicken tenders, and subs from Publix. Various candy and drinks. Cash and Venmo accepted.
• Wellsley Parking: There is a parking lot outside the pool, however it is small. If there are no spots left, leave the parking area by making a left on Widdington and finding a place on the street. There are no parking restrictions, but we do ask that all parking be kept on one side of the street
• Swim meet officials meeting at 5:45pm outside of pool entrance
• Heat sheets will be on display on a board at the meet (coaches and several volunteers will also have these to do their jobs, like kid pushers, clerk of course, etc), showing the lane and heat that each swimmer will be in. Please check relays in addition to individual events. Swimmers might swim in a relay of an older age group when there are not enough swimmers in that age group to make a team of 4.
• If your swimmer’s status has changed (especially if they planned to swim and no longer can), please let us know ASAP. Coach Audrey ([email protected]) and Coach Sophia ([email protected]) need to adjust the heat sheets and having as much time as possible to do that is very helpful. You can copy the board ([email protected]) so that we can try to get heat sheets updated before they are printed. We understand kids can get sick at any point and sometimes meets can be overwhelming, so please just communicate with a coach if you need to leave, or your swimmer can no longer participate in event(s) planned.
• We have filled all shifts for this week's meet! Please remember to sign in when you arrive with Katie Richards and email her ([email protected]) if you need to change your volunteer position or have any questions.

ICE CREAM SOCIAL: The social committee has scheduled our Ice Cream Social following 5pm & 6pm practices on Friday July 12. Flyer is attached!

CARY CITY MEET! The annual Cary City Invitational Meet will be on Saturday July 13th at Scottish Hills Recreational Club. Come out to cheer on our swimmers and and bring your Disney Pixar CARS spirit! Swimmers age 4-10 will participate in the morning and swimmers age 11-18 will participate in the afternoon. There will be a fun craft/activity for all swimmers from 5-7p on Friday July 12th, held in conjunction with the ice cream social! Look for both the social event and the craft/activity either in the pavilion or the clubhouse.

BANQUET: LET’S TACO ‘BOUT CELEBRATING OUR SWIM SEASON! Please be sure to save the date Friday, July 19 from 6pm - 8pm for the annual swim team banquet at Ritter Park. Food, drinks, and desserts will be available. The cost is $12.00 per person, and free for anyone ages 3 and under. Larger families will be capped at a max of 4 paid people. Please RSVP through our Meet SignUp and submit payment through the payment page by July 12. More information is available on the website here: oxxfordhunt.swimtopia.com/EOS-banquet.

RECRUITING A TREASURER: The Swampfoxxes have been without a dedicated treasurer this season (thank you Tim Pelc for pulling double duty as president and treasurer!). Because the treasurer is an elected position, we’d like to find someone we can nominate and vote into the position at the banquet on 7/19. Please let us know if you have interest in serving as the treasurer for the team. We cannot operate without our amazing parent volunteers!

TSA CHAMPIONSHIPS: The TSA Championship Meet at Triangle Aquatic Center on Sunday July 21. Registration and payments were due yesterday, and if you missed the registration, please reach out to the board ASAP. This year, swimmers will be broken into age groups with 8 and unders starting at 8a (7:15a warm up time), 9-10s at 11:30a (10:45a warm up), 11-12s at 2:30p (2p warm up) and 13+ at 5:30p (5p warm up).

FUNDRAISING COMMITTEE NEWS: Tickets for our No Fuss Fundraising Raffle are on sale now through the last swim meet: oxxfordhunt.swimtopia.com/shop/128666. Each $15 donation gives you a chance to win one of our donated prizes, which currently include: one free Swampfoxx registration, one free lawn mowing, two pints of homemade ice cream, a charcuterie board for 6, two dozen baked cookies, two dozen homemade hot wings, swim lessons and more! Check out the team store to see the list of prizes.

YEAR ROUND SWIM OPTIONS: Attached you will find a flyer from the YMCA of the Triangle (YOTA) year round swim program. There are several year-round swim options including YOTA, Raleigh Swimming Association (RSA), Triangle Aquatic Center (TAC), and Marlins of Raleigh (MOR) to name a few. Tim Pelc has offered to share information about the program at YOTA.

PLEASE CHECK THE TEAM COMMUNICATIONS BOX! Ribbons from swim meets are all in the black Team Communications Box. The Box lives in the Swamp Shack and can sometimes be found on the pool deck during practices. Parents should try to check the box at least once a week during the swim season. Thank you!

LIVE ACTION PHOTOS AND FACEBOOK PAGE: You’ve probably seen the wonderfully talented Elena Movchan (Adam and Anastasia’s mom) taking photos at meets. The link to her photos is on the team website and can be found directly here https://evm-photo.com/swampfoxxes-2024. Please be sure to credit Elena and her business when using photos.

MARK SWIMMER AVAILABILITY: It is important for all swimmers to declare their attendance for meets (select meet entry for each meet online). This should always be done at least one week prior to a meet so the coaches can properly plan the heat sheets and minimize changes. Please mark your swimmer for the Tuesday 7/16 meet by this Tuesday 7/9. Attendance will close on Friday 7/12.

MEET RESULTS: You can find the meet results in the Swimtopia app, and a PDF report is also available on our website, under past events.

TEAM SHIRTS & SWIM CAPS: Each swimmer receives a team shirt and swim cap included in their registration. Team shirts have been distributed over the last 2 weeks during practices, see Katie Herndon for pick up if you haven’t yet received yours. If you have a little swimmer that has requested an XS shirt and hasn’t yet received it, please be patient as we have had to order additional shirts due to late registrants that weren’t in the initial order count. All swim caps should have been picked up by now. Additional caps are available for purchase on our website and in the Swamp Shack. Extra 2024 team shirts are now available for sale on our website under merchandise.

OTHER TEAM MERCH FOR SALE: Custom Swampfoxx Swag is available through our Team Store on SwimOutlet. We have items with last year’s logo and this year’s logo available. If you don’t see a customized item you want, please reach out to Katie Herndon, she’d be happy to add any item that’s available for customization on SwimOutlet. Please note that items purchased through this site will be shipped directly to you and may take 1-2 weeks to receive due to the extra time needed for customization.

MORNING PRACTICES are available 9-10a daily except Wednesdays after Tuesday evening meets. We are in the final week of practices, with our final evening practice on Monday 7/15 and our final morning practice on Tuesday 7/16.

Please let us know what questions you may have or use other parents as a resource, either in person at the practice or via our FB parents forum!

Your Oxxford Hunt Swim Team Board