Official Times
What makes a swim time official in a GPSA dual meet, how backup timing works, and what to do when a swim has no valid time. This is the shared reference behind the role guides — the referee verifies times, the scorekeeper records them — and it explains the concepts both rely on. For the binding rules, see the GPSA Rulebook – Time Recording.
Times don’t score — places do
GPSA dual meets are scored by place (sweeps), not by time. The order of finish on the initialed Place Judge Form determines team points and ribbons; the clock does not. Times are still recorded for every swim, but they are informational — they feed:
- seeding for future meets,
- team and pool records,
- City Meet (Championship) qualifying standards, and
- time-drop recognition.
Because of this, a missing or garbled time never changes the score or a swimmer’s place. That is exactly what makes it safe to clear a bad time rather than guess at one. See Scoring and the referee’s Verifying Times.
How a time is recorded
A swim time reaches the scorekeeper through one of the recording methods GPSA allows, and is entered into Meet Maestro:
| Method | What it is |
|---|---|
| Electronic timing (Time Drops) | Times captured at the wall and sent to Meet Maestro. See Time Drops. |
| Lane slips | Written cards with the swimmer, lane, event, and time. |
| Lane timer sheets | Multi-heat timing forms — used in place of lane slips, or as a written backup alongside an electronic system. |
Times are recorded to hundredths of a second; a runner delivers them to the scorekeeper, who enters them into Meet Maestro. For the authoritative procedure, see GPSA Rulebook – Time Recording.
Backups and which time is official
Manual stopwatches are recommended as a backup even when an electronic system is running — but not every meet runs both, so a backup time is not always available.
A backup (manual) time is official only when the electronic system fails. When the timing system captured the swim, that time stands; the watch is a fallback, not an override. For how a specific system evaluates and reports its times, see the Time Drops page.
When there’s no valid time
Sometimes a timing issue — a missed button, a failed watch, a start that wasn’t captured — leaves a swimmer, or a whole heat, with no usable time and no backup to fall back on. The swim still happened and still placed, so this is not a no-show, scratch, or DQ.
In that case the time is cleared: the referee directs it, and the scorekeeper blanks the time in Meet Maestro.
- Do not fabricate a time, and do not fall back to the swimmer’s seed time. Both publish a swim that never happened and corrupt the swimmer’s record and time-drop history.
- There is no “NT” code to type in Meet Maestro — you clear (blank) the time field. A cleared time is published as NT (No Time) in the results.
- Because scoring is by place, the swimmer keeps their Heat Place and points exactly as they finished. A cleared time changes nothing in the standings.
When a time can’t be salvaged and there’s no backup, the only correct action is to clear it and let it publish as NT. A fabricated or seed-substituted time is worse than no time: it looks real, misrepresents the swim, and pollutes records and time-drop tracking. The place — set by the sweeps — is what counts.
This is a practice standard; the rulebook does not yet address a missing time directly. When the cause of a blank time is unclear, or a swim can’t be reconstructed, the referee makes the call — in consultation with both GPSA Representatives when needed.
Who does what
| Role | Responsibility for times |
|---|---|
| Timers | Capture each swim (button and/or stopwatch) and report any timing issue immediately. |
| Timing operator (if using Time Drops) | Runs the timing system and confirms each race is saved so times can be loaded. |
| Scorekeeper | Enters times into Meet Maestro, flags discrepancies to the referee early, and clears a time when the referee directs it. |
| Referee | Verifies times as an independent check on the sweeps, rules on discrepancies, and directs when a time is cleared. |
Spotting time problems
Times are an independent record of the same races, so they are a useful check on the order of finish. Obvious outliers — a time that doesn’t fit the event, a big unexplained drop from seed, or an order of finish that fights the times — should be raised early, while the heat is fresh. The scorekeeper flags them live; the referee verifies and rules. Neither re-ranks by time: a drastic mismatch triggers a check, not a re-rank. See the referee’s Verifying Times for the full method.
Questions?
Contact the GPSA Rules Committee for guidance on timing procedures or rules interpretations.