Organizers of the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games have released the daily competition schedule to mark three years out of the opening ceremonies in SoFi Stadium, which will later be converted to a swimming venue.
The news confirms the swimming dates from July 22 through July 30, which will include awarding the last medal events of the Games between 3:00-4:30 PM local time, before the Closing Ceremony at 6:00 PM at the Los Angeles Coliseum.
Swimming prelims will be held from 9:30-11:30AM each day and finals will be held from 6:00-8:00PM each day, local time, except for the final day of competition. That day will have no prelims session (which is the norm for the Olympic Games, and will be held earlier in the day, 3:00-4:30 PM, designed to conclude just before the closing ceremony.
The schedule did not specify or clarify which dates the new stroke 50 meter races would be held, though the nine day schedule indicates that the IOC is not adding an extra day of competition to accommodate the six added events (50 fly, 50 back, and 50 breaststroke for each gender). The Olympics expanded to a nine day swimming schedule for the Paris Olympic Games.
With the Opening Ceremony to be held on Friday, July 14, that gives organizers about eight days to finish construction of the temporary natatorium in the home of the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers. Organizers are currently planning for a configuration that provides 38,000 seats for the swimming competition.
The competition pools will be built and covered by a stage during the opening ceremony, but a temporary stand will need to be built after the opening ceremony.
Hosting swimming in the football stadium, a plan likely inspired or confirmed by USA Swimming’s hosting of the Olympic Trials at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis in 2024, necessitated the move from its traditional spot in the first week of the Games. Instead, swimming was swapped with track & field (athletics), one of the other crown jewel events, which will run from July 18-24 at the LA Memorial Coliseum.
The first medals of the Games will be awarded in triathlon, which will be held along Venice Beach on July 15.
All Olympic Aquatics Dates
- Swimming – July 22-30
- Open Water Swimming – July 17-18
- Water Polo – July 15-July 23
- Women’s final – July 22 (expected)
- Men’s final – July 23 (expected)
- Diving – July 16-22
- Artistic Swimming – July 28-29
Now we know this, what is the best program order? I know we’re not the ones who get to decide, but I’m genuinely intrigued as to how best to organise the schedule so that we have fantastic finals sessions, and athletes that want to swim multiple events can.
The finals sessions are still scheduled to be two hours long. No shot the 200 semis are going anywhere unless there’s a half hour break between every race.
200 semis won’t survive – throw an olive branch & expand to 10 lane finals.
Hopefully Mr.President doesn’t pull another Chelsea stunt and snatch away one of Summer McIntosh’s gold medals
Meanwhile, the Paralympic swimmers are being relegated to an outdoor pool built in a parking lot. Nevermind about the athletes with albinism, body-temp regulation issues, and vision problems. Good luck para backstrokers! Certainly, there are many reasons why the Olympics/Paralympics have not been held outside for decades. Oh, and where are the training camps this time around? Team USA (you know, the REAL team) is in Thailand before heading to Singapore. US Paraswimming gets to go to the exotic locale of the training center in Colorado Springs. Maybe, if they’re lucky, they’ll get to go to another military base for a week before the competition.
This format was made for Michael Andrew with a home Olympics in LA, but I really wonder whether he will qualify in any of his events? Only the 50BR seems likely based on the way he is swimming now and who is coming up over the next 3 years, with the 50fly a crapshoot.
No chance he’s in the 50 fly in 3 years. 50 breast maybe but he’s going against any number of old pros + teenagers who will inevitably randomly pop off before 2028
conspiracy theory: theyre going to drop semis to nudge summer into the 200 free / 200 back instead of 800 free and pave the way for katie to 5 peat. if i were usa swimming ceo thats what i would suggest to la 2028 organizers lol
Katie hast even committed to participating yet. Do we really need to start demeaning her three years ahead of time?
Katie has said she’s swimming through LA multiple times
She said she wanted to and that she will try, but has to take it year by year at this point. Sounds pretty uncertain to me compared to how she talked about going to Paris in 2021. Sure, this year so far has been treating her much better than anyone could have expected, but there are three more to go.
yes she has
https://x.com/ClutchPoints/status/1866272462851477726
SoFi should be the largest venue ever in history to host Olympic swimming competitions. It looks like a quasi outdoor stadium or a halfway one between indoor and outdoor.