Excel Extra February 6, 2026

From the Head Coach

It's High School States Weekend

Every year the TISCA High School States Championships is a unique meet for us. While we have over 60 swimmers competing in it, none of them are representing Excel. That doesn't mean that we aren't just as excited to see our swimmers competing for their high school teams. What we love about States is that it has a uniquely exciting environment as there are so many small teams competing at the same meet. Additionally, as our LSC encompasses three different states, this is the only meet that is only comprised of Tennessee athletes. Good luck to all the swimmers racing this weekend and make both your high school teams and Excel proud!

Next Three Weeks

Announcements

2026 Championship Meets

The 2026 Championship Meet Season will see Excel swimmers competing in 9 championship meets! While no swimmers will compete in all 9, most of them will swim more than one. Navigating the pathway through the championship selection process can be a little confusing for newer families so we have created a self-navigated guide to get you all through it.

Link Here

As always, your best resource will be your swimmer's own coach so if you have any questions regarding which championship meets your swimmers should attend, please don't hesitate to reach out.

SES Winter Championships Entry Process

While most of our meets follow the same entry process, SES Championships uses USA Swimming's Online Meet Entry system (OME). While for most meets, you can simply enter your swimmers through our own website, for OME meets you need to sign in to your own account through the USA Swimming website. Once you are logged in, look for the competition tab at the top.

From there, you will see "My Meets" in the drop-down menu were you will be able to choose "Southeastern Swimming Winter Championships. The coaching staff will need to add all the athletes into the meet but once we do, you will be able to see your swimmer there and choose events.

For this particular meet, swimmers will be required to have achieved at least one Southeastern cut. Every swimmer will also be guaranteed four races using the following formula:

one qualifying event earns 3 bonus events
two qualifying events earn 2 bonus events
three qualifying events earn 1 bonus events
four, five or six qualifying events earn no bonus events

Remember that you can choose any event, 200 and shorter, for bonus events (open events are also not eligible for any swimmers who have not qualified in other open events). As always, please feel free to reach out to your coaches for any questions.

Excel Aquatics Swim School

As you may know, Excel Aquatics has a swim school that offers lessons in multiple locations. While "creating" new swimmers is a nice benefit, the true purpose is offering what may be a life-saving skill to as many new swimmers as possible. In that vein, we are looking to expand our teaching staff and that's where our parents come in! If you are one of the many of our parents that are already at the pool during practices we would love to recruit you! While there is no prior teaching experience necessary, this will be a paid position that even comes with a 50% discount for monthly dues for your swimmer at Excel (or for the highest level swimmer for families with multiple children). If you are interested in signing up, please contact our Swim School Director Dawn Van Ryckeghem at coachdawn@excelaquatics.org

How are we stacking up?

Throughout the short course season, we will be carefully following our team's national ranking as we aim to break into the top 40 for the first time every. You can follow along here!

Excel recognition programs

Over the course of the short course season, our club will be tracking a series of recognition programs to help motivate our swimmers to succeed un a multitude of events. While ultimately these programs do reward success, they are designed to be achievable by any level of swimmers, not just those with the most experience. You can always find the running totals for each on the "Running Total" report.

Heat Winner: Place in the top three swimmers in your age group for number of races won throughout the year. This award tends to favor those athletes that are attending meets, swimming a lot of events, racing hard but most importantly, improving throughout the year. Winners will receive a "Heat Winner" bag tag. IMX Awards

IMX Bronze- Earn an IMX score between 1,000-1,999
IMX Silver- Earn an IMX score between 2,000-2,999
IMX Gold- Earn a minimum score of 3,000

IM Hall of Fame

Level 1- Attain a Southeastern Championship Qualifying time standard in every event available for your age group.
Level 2- Attain an Age Group Sectionals Championship Qualifying time standard in every event available for your age group.
Level 3-Attain an NCSA Junior National Championship Qualifying time standard in every event available for your age group.

Want to become a swimming official?

All of our parent volunteers play a vital role in hosting meets. We simply could not host meets in your absence. While most jobs take little training or experience, meet officials go through an educational and training process that enables them to help officiate at all meets. In fact, our own Excel officials have outnumbered the host team officials in both our first two meets. We are very grateful to our officiating crew but are always looking for new members. What do officials do?

Ensure a safe and fair competition for all our athletes
Satisfy all their volunteer requirements
Have the best seat in the pool
Have access to hospitality

If you have any interest in becoming a USA Swimming Certified official, please contact Laura DeMotte at officials@excelaquatics.org

Excel Weekly Update

Our Weekly Update for 2-6-26 has been released so check it out! You may have noticed that we are receiving intros from a wide variety of sources. Olympians, SEC Champions, officials, swim moms and vendors are just some of the folks who have made an appearance. If you are traveling and want to send us an intro from a unique location, we'll be sure to include it. Interested in seeing where they all come from so far? Check out Excel Aquatics from around the world below!

Check out where our intros have come from on this World Map

Coaching Staff

Have a questions for a coach? Feel free to reach out.

Brentwood High Performance: Steven Murry- Head Coach
Brentwood Senior Groups: Benji DeMotte- Site Coordinator
Brentwood Varsity Groups: Brennan Riddle
Brentwood Junior Groups: McKenna Morello
Brentwood Teal & Bronze: Daun Lutz
Gallatin All Groups: Andreea Ianoli-Mitrofan- Site Coordinator
Murfreesboro All Groups: JJ Langhals- Site Coordinator
Spring Hill All Groups: Carrie Vaughan- Site Coordinator
Muletown All Groups: Lynn Powell
Administration: Shannon Oliver- Team Administrator
Meet Director: Lori Biller

Sponsorship Corner

We are so grateful for all of our partners whose support of Excel Aquatics makes much of what we do possible. You can visit each of our sponsors using the links below.

Interested in becoming a sponsor of Excel Aquatics? Contact: Sponsorships@excelaquatics.org

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