My D is an rising senior swimmer. She already received several emails from college coaches, she is interested in applying some top D3 schools like Uchicaho, washU or Mit and her academic is very competitive too.
Right now her main concern is her shoulder got injured since May and she has been doing physical theropy and weight training with her coach. She went back to swim practice with coach at mid of June but havnt attended any long course meet yet. Her coach said no time is better than bad time. She is so afraid of that if college coach ask her about long course swim, she is a very honest girl she will say the truth but does anyone know will college coach care very much of her long course season time?
No coach my daughter (also a rising senior) has talked to has cared a bit about LC times. She has good SC times but she is very short, so walls are her friend; her LC times are not nearly as good as her SC times. No one cares; no one has even asked for her LC times. She is being recruited solely on her SC times from her junior year. If I were your daughter, I would focus on getting good, tapered SC times as early as possible in the fall season if she needs to be faster to get support from the D3 coaches. If her junior year times are already fast enough, she should be fine with the times she has.
My daughter is an incoming freshman who will be swimming D1 starting this year, she has been asked for long course times this summer because the are looking to make sure you arrive on campus having trained and completed over the summer, but was not really asked about long course times last summer as a junior except in the context of let us know if you have some great long course swims that would convert to faster times than your best SCY times. One of my daughter’s team mates was also recruited to very competitive D1 with no long course training or times due to surgery related to injury the summer before senior year. However injury and recovery is a part of swimming the college coaches are very familiar with.
Thanks so much for all your replies. Yes, we are planning to have her shoulder full recovered by fall before going to any meets.