I had a swim meet this past weekend and would like to thank-you for all the support you gave to me. Sonia and David were there for support and made sure I did not missed my events.
Like running, each person is racing against their own age group. Even though most of my swimmers  in my age group were not at this meet, I still needed to compete against their time. For example, during course of the year I was at the 50-54 age group. For 100 yards butterfly  for the 50-54 group placed 68th in the country. Now since I aged up to the 55-59 age group for this meet, I placed 37th in the country.
The relays are set up differently than age group. Because their might not be enough swimmers at different age groups to have a relay, USMS set up relays by minimum age . Example, +45 group means the swimmers age must be 45 or older to form a relay. The next relay group is +55 group.  I participated in two events (400 Medley relay and the 800 relay) for the +55 group. In the 400 Medley relay, which each swimmer swims a different stroke, we come in 5Th place. What really surprise me was the 800 free relay. The four of us were exulted and just wanted to finished.  After we finished the relay, I took down the time and compare it the other relays around the country. To my surprise we took 1St place at the time of 8:57.49.