USMS Award Recipient

U.S. Masters Swimming Dorothy Donnelly Service Award



Recipient: Bob Upshaw
Year: 2011
LMSC: Pacific

Bob Upshaw was instrumental in making it possible for open water swimmers in Pacific Masters LMSC to follow their standings throughout the open water season. Prior to Bob’s intervention, the OW points calculator had the difficult task of manually compiling points for more than 1,000 swimmers each season to come up with winners in each sex/age group. Bob developed a system that allows OW swimmers to log on to a website and track their point total and standings. During the process, he realized that not every events timer and organizer was reporting results the same. Since computer programs are only as good as the data that is fed into them, Bob coped with the various formats and other issues and affected change. In addition to Bob’s contributions to open water swimming, he served on the board of Manatee Masters and developed an online “virtual trophy case” for the Manatees to display the many awards the club has won over the years.