Harvard Women's Swim Coach Vicki Hays must have been reserving all of her praise for the ten women--seven swimmers and three divers--who accompanied her to Pittsburgh this weekend for the Eastern AIAW Swimming and Diving Championships, because she had few kind words for the meet itself.

"This meet is not well run at all," Hays said after the first day of competition finally ended late last night. False starts in almost every heat, a breakdown in the timing mechanism, and poor officiating delayed the progress of the meet and aggravated all of the coachers. "We were all pretty patient," Hays said, "but if this continues..."

While her coach was doing a slow burn on deck, distance ace Maureen Gildea was busy setting the pool on fire in the 500-yd. freestyle. Gildea, who suffered a severe knee injury last summer and has spent most of the season recuperating from subsequent surgery, swam the best 500 freestyle of her Harvard career to win the consolation-finals-and-place ninth overall. Her time of 5:03, 98 was very close to Liz Kelly's University record.

Yardling sensations Debbie Zimic and Jeanne Floyd also mounted the starting blocks for the consolation heat of the 500 free. Neither swam a particular fast race--although Zimic went a season-best 5:08, 1 in the trials--as Floyd finished 13th in 5:14, 1, and Zimic took 15th with a 5:16, 1.

Breastroker Susan Kim and butterfly ace Kathleen McCloskey also turned in fine performances. Kim's 32.8 in the 50 was good enough for 16th place, and McCloskey grabbed 13th in the 100 with a 59.9.

The 800-yd. freestyle relay of Zimic, Floyd, McCloskey and Terri Frick placed sixth in the finals with a new Harvard record of 7:57, 8.

Sharing

Divers Adriana Holy and Pam Stone, who shared first-place honors at the Ivy Championships two weeks ago, placed fifth and thirteenth respectively. Holy finished her preliminary dives in eleventh place, but moved up in the standings with each ensuring round. Sixth when the semifinal round was completed, the Currier House sophomore saved her best for last and advanced to fifth in the final standings.

As a team, the Crimson stands eighth overall behind such national powers as Pittsburgh, Princeton and Penn State. Princeton holds a narrow lead in team points over the Pitt Panthers. Tiger swimmers have monopolized the winner's circle, taking individual golds in every event except the 100-yd. butterfly.

Double-Winner

Princeton junior Charlotte Tiedman was the first day's only double winner, taking the 100-yd. breastroke and the 200-yd. individual medley. Tiedeman also swam the breastroke leg on the Tigers' victorious medley relay.

The Crimson hopes to move up in the standings during the next two days of competition with stellar performances expected from Gildea in the 1650-yd, free. McCloskey in the 200-yd. fly and Zimic in the 400-yd. IM.

THE NOTEBOOK: Junior Gwen Gorman, scheduled to swim in the 1650-yd. freestyle on Saturday, was unable to fly with the rest of the team to Pittsburgh because of a conflict with her Government seminar. Gorman flew in on her own late last night to join her teammates after fulfilling her academic requirements... All entrants yesterday managed to place in the top 17 of their events.