What short course and long course actually mean
Short course metres (SCM) is a 25-metre pool. Long course metres (LCM) is a 50-metre pool — the Olympic length. Irish heat sheets and meet packs write SC or LC in the title. That letter is not decoration. It is which race you watched.
In the United States you will also see short course yards (SCY) — 25-yard pools and a different set of records. In Irish club swimming you can almost ignore yards. You cannot ignore 25 versus 50. A time without a course is a rumour.
This page is the deep dive. Your Child's First Irish Gala covers the day — warm-up, marshalling, the long wait. Do not come here for packing. Come here so the number on the sheet is not compared to the wrong clock.
SC vs LC at a glance
Same child, same stroke, same distance. Different pool, different race. Use this table when someone in the group chat treats January as a verdict on December.
| Short course (SC) | Long course (LC) | |
|---|---|---|
| Pool | 25 metres | 50 metres |
| Also called | SCM, 25m | LCM, 50m, Olympic |
| Irish season 2025–26 | 25 August – 31 December 2025 | 1 January – 31 August 2026 |
| 100m turns | 3 | 1 |
| The clock | Usually faster — more walls | Usually slower — more swimming |
| Regional peak | Regional SC Championships | Regional Age Group & Senior LC |
| National peak | Irish Winter Nationals (25m) | Irish Open; Summer Nationals (50m) |
| Typical age-group week | Most club and Level 1–2 racing | 50m “as much as possible” — many kids stay 25m |
Licence levels — what a Level 1 time can and cannot do — live in Swim Ireland gala levels 1–5. Course and licence are separate stamps. A legal Level 3 time in the wrong course is still the wrong time for some championships.
Why 25-metre times are faster
Turns. Not magic, not a softer field, not “winter form.” A push-off is faster than swimming any stroke. Underwater kicking or a breaststroke pull-out is faster than surface stroke. The wall also breaks the cycle — a brief rest for the arms. Swimmers are quicker in 25m because they spend more of the race turning and gliding, and less of it in unbroken swimming.
A 100 in a 25-metre pool has three turns (25, 50, 75). The same 100 in a 50-metre pool has one (the 50). That is two extra launches and two extra underwater phases. Elite short-course times often sit about two to three per cent quicker than the long-course equivalent; a strong underwater can stretch that, a weak turn shrinks it. Age-group gaps wander. The direction does not.
Stroke matters. Freestyle usually shows the smallest gap. Breaststroke and backstroke often show more, because pull-outs and underwater dolphin are a bigger share of the race. Distance freestyle shrinks the percentage: more of the 400 is swimming, not walls. None of that is a formula for a PB list. It is why the January 50m swim is allowed to look “worse.”
| Distance | Turns in 25m | Turns in 50m | Extra walls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 50m | 1 | 0 | +1 |
| 100m | 3 | 1 | +2 |
| 200m | 7 | 3 | +4 |
| 400m | 15 | 7 | +8 |
Long course is not a harder child. It is more swimming between walls. That is the whole argument.
The two clocks
Take a swimmer whose short-course 100 free PB is 1:08.42. In January they swim long course and go 1:11.18. The family chat says they added almost three seconds. The sentence is true and useless. Those are two clocks.
Same invented 100 freestyle as the tracking guide. The left clock is last best in 25m. The right clock is a first honest 50m of the year. Do not subtract them and call it a crisis.
Compare this long-course swim to last long-course swim. Compare this short-course swim to last short-course swim. If you only hold an SC PB, the first LC time of the year is a first official time in that course — a baseline, not a fall from grace. Mid-season adds have their own story in why mid-season times look worse.
Conversion caveats
Meet Manager can turn a 25m time into a 50m estimate, or the other way, using a factor. Irish paperwork calls these Hy-Tek conversions. They exist so a host can seed a heat when half the field only has the other course on file. They are a translator. They are not a swim. The full conversion explainer — why the factor is only an estimate, which Irish championships refuse them, and why you never overwrite an SC PB — is how to convert SCM to LCM.
A common 100 free factor of the sort software uses is long course × 0.966 ≈ short course. On that rough maths, 1:11.18 long course sits near 1:08.76 short course — beside a 1:08.42 PB, not three seconds behind it. Your child’s gap will differ by stroke, underwaters, and the day. Strong walls stretch the short-course advantage. A sloppy turn shrinks it.
Never paste a converted number into the personal-best column as if it were swum. Write “converted seed” in the notes if that is what went on the entry. The official result is the time they actually put on the clock, in the pool they were in.
Do not keep one “best 100 free” that jumps between 25m and 50m. You will crown a short-course swim as the PB, then treat every honest long-course race as a disappointment. Finzy is not a conversion calculator. It is two lists that refuse to merge.
The Irish season — 2025–26, and the usual shape
Swim Ireland splits the year into two periods. I am using the 2025–26 Domestic Competition Plan (updated February 2026). The next season will publish its own dates. The shape rarely changes: 25m through December, 50m from January, as much as the pools allow.
The 2025–26 season ran 25 August 2025 to 31 August 2026.
Period 1 — short course. All events in 25-metre pools, 25 August to 31 December 2025. Club and regional racing, then Regional SC Championships, then the Irish National Winter Championships (25m) — 12–14 December 2025 on that year’s calendar. The international marker was the European Aquatics Championships (25m).
Period 2 — long course. Events in 50-metre pools as much as possible, 1 January to 31 August 2026. McCullagh International (50m) in February for the faster end. Irish Open Championships (50m) in April — Bangor, 8–12 April 2026. Regional Age Group and Senior LC Championships. Then the summer nationals: Age Group (12–14) at UL in July, and Youth & Senior after that.
| When (2025–26) | Course | What it is for most families |
|---|---|---|
| 25 Aug – 31 Dec 2025 | SC 25m | Club galas, Future Challenger / Aspiring Champions (SC), Regional SC, Winter Nationals |
| Jan – Feb 2026 | LC 50m where the pool exists | First 50m racing; McCullagh for those on that list; Aspiring Champions LC |
| April 2026 | LC 50m | Irish Open — LC times only, no SC conversions |
| Late spring | LC 50m | Regional Age Group & Senior LC Championships |
| July 2026 | LC 50m | Summer National Age Group; Summer Youth & Senior |
Most age-groupers live in the club and regional layer, not on the Irish Open start list. You still need the split. A goal that says “regionals” with no SC or LC is two exams. Qualifying windows are dated. If the goal is a consideration time, write the window and the course.
Why age-group kids often stay in 25m
Parents hear “long-course season” in January and expect every Saturday to move to a 50-metre pool. Ireland does not have that many. The National Aquatic Centre, UL, Bangor and a short list of others host the big 50m meets. Most club training, and a lot of Level 1 and 2 racing, still happens in 25-metre leisure centres. Swim Ireland’s own wording is “as much as possible.” That is a preference, not a guarantee that your ten-year-old’s Sunday gala is Olympic length.
The pathway matches that. Intra-club from seven, inter-club from eight, club invitationals from nine — typically 25m, fun first. Future Challenger is 10–14. Regional SC, Winter Nationals, and the Irish Open start from 13. Regional LC and the summer nationals start from 12. A child can race a full winter in 25m and barely touch a 50-metre pool until the coach says the trip is worth it. That is not a lesser season. Write SC on those times and leave them alone when the first 50m Saturday arrives.
Before you panic about “no long-course times,” read the meet pack. If it says 25m, the season has not gone wrong. The child is still racing. The clock is still the 25m clock.
Which Irish meets accept conversions
This is where families get caught. Some championships will take a Hy-Tek conversion for entry. Some will not. The 2025–26 notes (check the current pack — this moves):
| Meet | Course | Conversions for entry? |
|---|---|---|
| Regional SC Championships | 25m | SC times, plus Hy-Tek LC conversions |
| Irish Winter Nationals | 25m | SC, plus Hy-Tek converted LC |
| McCullagh International | 50m | LC, plus Hy-Tek converted SC |
| Regional Age Group & Senior LC | 50m | LC, plus SC conversions |
| Irish Summer National Age Group | 50m | LC, plus Hy-Tek converted SC |
| Irish Open | 50m | LC only — no SC, no SC conversions |
| Irish Summer Youth & Senior | 50m | LC only — no SC, no SC conversions |
A conversion that seeds a regional heat is still not a PB. A conversion that the Irish Open will not even look at is a reminder: if the target meet wants 50m, you need a 50m time inside the window, at the right licence. That is levels and course together, not one or the other.
Keep the lists separate
The job at home is small. Event, time, course. Official or not. After that you can argue about splits. Before that you are comparing two clocks and calling it character.
- ✓Read the pack: SC or LC, 25m or 50m.
- ✓Write the course on every time. No blank course column.
- ✓Keep a short-course best and a long-course best for the same event.
- ✓Mark converted seeds as converted. Never promote them to PB.
- ✓Compare January LC to last LC, not to December SC.
- ✓If the championship refuses conversions, you need a real time in that course.
How to run the list — official versus WhatsApp, seed versus result — is How to Track Swimming Times. This page is only the course rule. I built Finzy so a family can keep those two personal bests apart. We do not pretend a calculator can turn one clock into the other. We keep both.
25m and 50m are two clocks. Write the course, keep two PBs, and let January be a 50-metre race — not a failed December.
