New information on the USA Swimming website says that four retired Olympians will serve as captains of the newly-introduced SwimSquad Battle teams, drafting national teamers for a running competition throughout next year’s TYR Pro Swim Series.
You can check out the page here. The biggest notes:
- The national team will be drafted into 4 squads. (Athletes can opt out if they wish).
- Prior to each meet, the captain will select 6 swimmers from their overall roster to score.
- Each of the six athletes is designated for one specific category, and can score in up to two events from that category. The categories are:
- Free (50 through 1500)
- Back (50 through 200)
- Breast (50 through 200)
- Fly (50 through 200)
- IM (200 and 400, not the mystery order 200 IM)
- Flex (any two races)
- An athlete must make the top 8 to score points:
- 1st: 10
- 2nd: 8
- 3rd: 7
- 4th: 5
- 5th: 4
- 6th: 3
- 7th: 2
- 8th: 1
The winning squad at the end of the Pro Swim Series will get to donate $10,000 to the charity of their choice, while athletes can win sponsor prizes (though NCAA athletes are barred from the prizes due to amateurism rules.
These come as part of the tweak of Pro Swim Series format introduced earlier this year.
We don’t yet know who the four retired Olympians will be (could the GOAT be involved??), but we’ll know soon, as the teams will be drafted at USA Swimming’s Golden Goggles event on November 19.
This is just plain stupid, the dumbing down continues (here come the down votes).
Phelps, Spitz, Caukins, Biondi, Meagher, Thompson, Piersol, Barrowman, Hyman.
What a great way this “could” be to attach the history of the sport — to the current stars.
Reality is that they are probably recently retired.
But as a fan of the sport’s history, this would be pretty cool to see happen.
Kind of like ABCs “Battle of the Network Stars” in 1976. If you’ve never seen this, it’s well worth a look! Go to 7:45 of this video to see Mark Spitz and Howard Cosell announce the swimming relay. Bruce Jenner is there too. Much fun.
https://youtu.be/cUazuwRBr8I
Hopefuly, it won’t be 4 prelims relay Olympians. I’ll bet on Peirsol, and, as a dark horse, Weber-Gale for the men (both on USA Swimming Committees). Plummer would be nice. Dirado and Beisel for women. The GOAT isn’t really retired until he actually skips an Olympics.
I’m not sure Beisel is officially retired. I know she said she was done after Worlds, but her social media shows her practicing quite a bit!
Pro swim league with owners. I’ll invest! It could work!
I may be missing something but isn’t this just four ex swimmers in a fantasy league? They want to get some attention and keep it throughout the series? Set up a site where fans can play along.
I do appreciate that any opportunity for the swimmers to get “prizes” is a good thing.
This is cool!!