A Letter From Dave

LIAC members and Families
Going into our first season with the new Freedom Pool facility I first wanted to take a moment to thank all of you who have been a part of this great accomplishment.
The Freedom Pool is the result of years of efforts by many parents, former swimmers, friends and our not-for-profit Long Island Swimming LTD. We opened to rave reviews from the national swimming community as we hosted the US Open and National Junior Championships this summer. As wonderful as that was, we look forward to the real purpose of this facility. To develop great competitive swimming in Nassau County for the next 30 years.
As you may know, we have been delayed in the completion of the enclosure over the pool. One of the rigid bents, (beams over the pool) was damaged by the vendor and needs to be remanufactured. This is happening now, but it is a process. As a result, our south end wall is not complete. We are working with the company to get this rectified as soon as possible. The reality is we are still a few weeks away from the solution.
We expect the hallway from the Aquatic Center to be installed within the next two- four weeks.
We have put up tent side walls and will continue to add walls and barriers as weather dictates.
With the water temperature kept at 82 degrees the swimmers are not cold when they are in the water. We feel we will be able to mitigate the wind on deck which will intern allow the deck temperature to be significantly warmer than outside.
A couple of pieces of information. Before the Nassau Aquatic Center was built we regularly swam outside in a heated pool at Christopher Morley Park through October into November. One year we swam up to Thanksgiving and stopped only because the leaves were clogging the gutters.
Many parts of the country swim outside year-round, including the NCAA Champion Stanford Swimming Team. Their January temperatures closely correlate to the temperatures we have in November. We will certainly have a warmer deck with our semi enclosed structure and hallway.
For the short term as we complete the enclosure we ask that the swimmers wear their parkas, (or coat) and sneakers onto the pool deck. That’s all they really need. When practice starts parkas come off and they get into the warm pool. At the end of practice put the parka on and go into the Aquatic Center. This is how it’s been done in northern California since the 1960’s and all is good.
Thanks for your patience. Being in this environment won’t make anyone sick and it will make
us stronger.

Dave Ferris
Long Island Swimming
USA Swimming National Team Coach