Finals & swim-offs

In a championship-style meet, the sprint strokes run prelims, then the fastest swimmers advance to finals. Finals (and any tie-breaking swim-offs) are created as linked sibling events of the prelim.

Advancing to finals

Once a prelim is finalized, its finals panel appears. It always shows the projected start lists — marked provisional while a qualifying tie is outstanding — so coaches can see the likely field early. When the field is settled, choose Seed finals: the app builds the finals heats from the prelim results — the fastest qualifiers, seeded for finals, with consolation/“second” finals per your league’s championship format.

Swim-offs

When a tie at the qualifying boundary would decide who advances, the finals panel flags it (and the notification bell raises it, with a hint of who to notify). Two ways to resolve it:

• Generate swim-off — creates the swim-off as a linked event so the tie can be swum on deck; it’s seeded on the time that tied.
• Decline the swim-off (“Won’t be swum…”) — when the swimmers or coaches settle it without a race, the desk states the finish order and a reason; the software never picks a winner. The ruling is recorded against the operator’s account.

Either way, the resolved rank is stored on the swim (“Ruled n” on the results board) and carried into the Meet Manager exports; the swimmers’ published places and points are decided by their times, the ruling only orders within the tie.

Scratching from a final

A swimmer who withdraws after prelims gets a finals scratch (with an optional reason) — their prelim result, place, and points survive, unlike recording a no-show, which would corrupt the prelim standings. Scratched swimmers appear in a “Scratched from the final” list with a Reinstate button, and advancement is recomputed live: scratching a swimmer above a contested cut can dissolve a boundary swim-off by itself (both tied swimmers qualify), and reinstating restores it.

What doesn’t advance

IM, the 100s, and relays are timed finals — they’re decided directly from the timed swim and correctly do not create a separate finals round.

Next

Once finals are swum and finalized, move to Scoring.