The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) will decide whether Wesley Roberts can compete at the Olympics after World Aquatics denied the 27-year-old Cook Islands swimmer a universality place in Paris.
World Aquatics declined to comment on the ongoing case, but the organization likely denied Roberts’ universality application because he has already competed in two Olympics: Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2021. Limiting universality swimmers to two Olympics is a new rule change announced in 2022 along with a maximum age of 30 (as of Dec. 31, 2024), both of which are meant to refocus the initiative on domestic development of young talents who might still break through with Olympic qualifying times.
CAS arbitrator Kristen Thorsness, a U.S. Olympic rowing champion at the 1984 Los Angeles edition, will oversee a hearing on the matter on Tuesday morning. Swimming at the Paris Olympics starts on Saturday.
In April, World Aquatics removed its requirement for universality swimmers to have competed at either the 2023 or 2024 World Championships in order to be eligible. However, that rule change would not have impacted Roberts’ eligibility as he has competed at the past three World Championships.
Roberts made his Olympic debut eight years ago in Rio, placing 44th in the 1500 freestyle (15:44.32). In 2019, he won Cook Islands’ first-ever swimming medal at the Pacific Games in the 200 free (1:51.36). At the pandemic-postponed Tokyo Olympics in 2021, Roberts placed 37th in the 200 free (1:50.41) and 400 free (3:55.65).
Roberts said he came close to retiring in 2022 before he found a renewed love for the sport. He placed 34th in the 400 free (4:00.67), 37th in the 200 free (1:50.24), and 50th in the 100 free (50.43) at the 2022 World Championships. The following summer, Roberts placed 39th in the 200 free (1:51.27) and 49th in the 100 free (50.27) at the 2023 World Championships. This past February, he finished 30th in the 100 free (49.41) and 35th in the 200 free (1:49.78).
Roberts currently owns national records in every freestyle event (23.94/49.41/1:48.55/3:52.50/8:17.39/15:40.36) as well as the 50 butterfly (24.67) and 200 IM (2:09.81). The Cook Islands are located in the South Pacific Ocean, about halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand.
I wonder where Robert’s trains. With a population of 17,500 people, the Cook Islands seems like a tiny settlement for swimming.
I wonder if there’s like 1 pool for the islands.
I see it’s under the jurisdiction of New Zealand. Maybe this is like a Puerto Rican swimmer who spends time on mainland America.
They do not have a pool. Most of their athletes are based in New Zealand, but Wes is based in Australia.
This seems like a pretty cut-and-dry case, no? New rule says no universality for swimmers with 2+ Olympics under their belt, he’s been twice. It’s hard to see a world where he swims.
It does. Which makes it even more curious that the CAS accepted it and hasn’t ruled yet. May just be a timing lag – took them three days to rule on the Jamaica issue, which was the first case in the ad hoc Olympic CAS office.
Let him cook
It seems pretty reasonable to not let someone keep competing at Olympics after Olympics using a Universality spot without breaking through to an actual qualifying time.