USAS Officials Information

What's involved in becoming a Certified USAS Official? 

There are 4 steps:

• Attend a Sroke and Turn Clinic that goes over the technical rules for the four basic strokes and other basic information.
• Become a non-athlete member of USA Swimming.  The cost is $50 per year and is tax deductible as charitable expense if you itemize.  Some teams will reimburse their parent officials. For insurance purposes, you must be registered with USAS before you can start the apprenticeship. USAS membership must be renewed by Dec 31st each year. The first year membership is valid from Sept through the end of the following year.
• Apprentice 6 sessions in at least 3 different meets and a variety of age groups and swim levels.  You will work alongside a certfied official so that you can get tips and practical experience before going out on your own.  Most meets have 2 sessions per day with different age groups or levels in each session.  
• Take an online, open book test on the rules.
• All certifications expire on Aug 31 st of even years.  In oder to recertify, officials must have worked the required minimum number of sessions and take the recertifcation test online.

Once certified, most officials will work at sessions that their children are swimming.  You're at the pool anyway, you might as well get out of those hot bleachers and get a front row view of the competition.   The more you officiate the better you will become. 

After one year, you may choose to advance to  starter.  After a year at starter you may advance to referee.  For full details see NCS Officials Cerification Requirements.

Swim meets depend on volunteers like you to provide our swimmers with the best experience possible. If your personality doesn't fit with being an official, there are plenty of other ways that you can volunteer: hospitality, timing, computer results, clerk of course, heatsheet sales, etc.  Please don't leave the work to others.  The load is much lighter if everyone helps out.  Besides, those meet sessions go by a lot faster if you're busy and the hospitality folks take wonderful care of our volunteers. 

Video on Judging Strokes  (WMV format)

• Breaststroke
• Backstroke
• Butterfly
• IM Back to Breast transitions
• You Make the Call
• Final Points
• Video explanation

Other Helpful Links:

• Official's Page NC Swimming    Select the Officials tab
• Official's Page at USA Swimming
• USA Swimming Technical Rules:  Mini- rulebook 2007
• USAS Online Certification Test
• Training Resources at USAS- lots of information on officiating procedures and guidelines
• Situations at USAS : real life examples from swim meets and explanations of the appropriate call and the rules that support the call.  Many of the certification test questions come from these examples.

Downloadable Documents

TSA S&T Clinic Info:
S&T Clinic Notes  
Sample DQ Slip
TSA rules pertaining to S&T judges

USA Swimming Info:
USAS Non-Athlete registration form

Information for new S&T judges:

• Stroke and Turn Clinic Notes: details of what is covered in my S&T clinics.
• Sample DQ Slip
• Stroke Rules: all the stroke rules fit onto ONE page.  Handy for new officials as long as you're young enough to read the small print.
• Jurisdictions: USAS suggested jurisdiction
• Rules Interpretations Summary: one sheet summary of the interpretations handed down by USAS Technical Rules Commitee

Referee forms:

• On Deck Lane Change:  I use these to log when a swimmer swims in the wrong heat or lane or when heats are combined on deck.  I print them in colored paper so they stand out.  When a change is made, the starter or ref fills out this form and send to the Hytek operator so they have a record of what changes were made.  
• 8 lane Sign in sheet and assignments
• 10 lane Sign in sheet and assignments
• DQ Log: for tracking disqualifications
• Tally Sheet for distance events
• Relay Take-Off 10 Lane designed for use as full or half page.
• Relay Take-Off 10 Lane Cut sheets- desgined to be cut  into separate pieces, one for each relay heat. 
• Timing Correction Worksheet
• No Show Slip- for tracking penalty events for scratch rule penalties.
• Incident Report -USAS form for reporting injury or property damage
• 2006 Stroke Briefing
• Paralympics American Record Application
• Heat Malfunction Calculator-  an .exe file written by my husband that will calculate differentials.  it doesn't have a print function but you can hit Alt-Print Screen to save an image of the screen to the clipboard and then paste it into a Word doc or image file and then print that.