In competitive swimming, the term short course (abbreviated SC) is used to identify a

swimming pool A swimming pool, swimming bath, wading pool, paddling pool, or simply pool, is a structure designed to hold water to enable Human swimming, swimming and associated activities. Pools can be built into the ground (in-ground pools) or built abo ...

that is in length. The term is also often included in meet names when conducted in a short course pool. "Short course" is the second type of pool configuration currently recognized by World Aquatics and other swimming bodies for pool competition; the other/primary pool length being "

long course An Olympic-size swimming pool is a swimming pool which conforms to the regulations for length, breadth, and depth made by World Aquatics (formerly FINA) for swimming at the Summer Olympics and the swimming events at the World Aquatics Champion ...

", where the pool is 50 meters in length. Swimming events at the Olympics and at the World Aquatics Championships are conducted in a long-course pool. The " World Aquatics Swimming Championships (25m)", colloquially the "short-course worlds", are held in alternate years from the long-course worlds. Short-course competitions may be held in a longer pool into which a temporary barrier has been placed 25 metres from one end as a turning point. In the United States, the term "short course" is more commonly applied to competition, which is more common in that country. Short-course yards is generally abbreviated as "SCY" to differentiate it from short course meters (SCM). The US national federations, USA Swimming and U.S. Masters Swimming, both maintain SCY USA records; FINA does not currently recognize records set in SCY, but does recognize/keep SCM records. USA college (including

NCAA The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates College athletics in the United States, student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, and Simon Fraser University, 1 in Canada. ...

competition) and high school swimming are traditionally swum in SCY. Short-course meter competitions are also denoted by listing of the actual meter distance: "25m" (in swimming, a space is not placed between the number and the ''m'' for meter).FINA World Swimming Championships (25m)
page of the FINA website (www.fina.org); retrieved 2011-07-30 Lists of

world The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that Existence, exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk ...

and other records are kept separately for short- and long-course events; the short-course time is usually faster than the long-course record for the same distance. This is assumed to be connected to the increased number of turns and hence wall push-offs, where swimmers can get powerful leverage from the wall.

References

Swimming {{swimming-stub