2025 World Championships
- July 27 – August 3, 2025 (pool swimming)
- Singapore, Singapore
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Not every swimmer who has battled gastrointestinal illness this week has bowed out of races as a result. Australian Tara Kinder joined the parade of perseverance this week in the 200 breaststroke, after which she shared that she had been hit hard by stomach problems.
Kinder started her meet with a 2:09.45 in the 200 IM in prelims, the fastest swim of the first round of racing. That knocked almost a second off her previous best time done at the Australian Swimming Trials.
While she added in semis to miss the final, she says she “reset for the 200 breaststroke, knowing I was primed for some special swimming.”
But that’s when things went sideways.
“48 hours of hell,” she said in an Instagram post. Blaming food poisoning, part of a category of gastrointestinal ailments that have ripped through this week’s World Championships in Singapore, she says that she lost 5 kilograms (11 pounds) “and some confidence.”
But Kinder says she made the decision to not let the illness beat her.
“30mins before the race, i chose to step up. not for a result, but to be brave and make sure i could never ask myself “what if.” a swim not reflecting my abilities, but one using up the little fight i had in me.. and carbs.
While she finished 25th in the 200 breaststroke semifinals in a 2:29, well shy of her best time of 2:24.61 from June, she says that she still found value in the attempt.
this past year has been a whirlwind of swimming highlights with life on land feeling like it’s falling apart. so it’s hard to untangle how i feel about this comp… but I’m glad i was here.
It was fun, it was painful, it was a stepping stone.
but most valuably, it was the moment i proved to myself that i 𝘣𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨 on the world stage.thankyou for all the love 🩷
A number of swimmers, including Americans like Gretchen Walsh, Carson Foster, and Torri Huske, Brits like Katie Shanahan, and Kinder’s Australia teammate Sam Short have withdrawn from events at different stages citing gastrointestinal issues.
How do professional teams get food poisoning?
The question I have is did any of the US coaches or other staff get “food poisoning”. The transparency of this is similar to Jeffrey Epstein files – we’ll never know the truth, it will be hidden and never talked about again.
We need to stop calling this food poisoning. The US Team was sadly affected by some kind of food borne virus in Thailand. They brought it to Singapore, and as viruses do, it is spreading. It is affecting some people more than others. Team USA leadership needs to be held accountable for their decisions. Lochte and Phelps commenting on how bad the team is – I hope they mean the leadership and not the athletes.
a food borne virus, also often known as food poisoning
Food poisoning is when food becomes contaminated by bacteria which produce toxins which cause gastro intestinal upset. Hence food poisoning isn’t contagious. You have to eat the infected food. It could not have travelled from Phuket to Singapore
This is gastroenteritis (likely viral such as norovirus) and it is extremely contagious when you touch surfaces that others touch (it can take out hundreds or thousands on a cruise ship)
The USA Swimming team was irresponsible by racing whole infected and shedding the virus everywhere which affected other teams
Every single athlete from every country would have swam while unwell if able.
Not every but many as demonstrated by both Kinder and Martinenghi
Food poisoning can be viral
The Brits have also been affected and stayed at the same Thai camp as the US. Have a YouTube look for Katie and Freya at the camp, they show the food setup. Lots of flies as well.
I suspect the confusion arises because “food poisoning” symptoms can be exactly the same as many highly transmissible viral infections that cause gastroenteritis – that are not food related. A little crazy people who are presumably vomiting and pooping themselves are sharing the pool with others.. Usually that would be a no no.
Lots of virus/bug experts on this page!
I’ve been around long enough to remember the norovirus NCAA men’s meet. The NCAA largely contained the illness by doing a delay (IIRC something like 24-48 hours) and then implementing very rigorous venue cleaning protocols in conjunction with local health department recommendations. FINA really should have done something similar.
I hope teams learn a lot from this whole debacle.
The illness could be a variety of different possibilities. Norovirus and E Coli of various types are common during travel especially in SE Asia. In Thailand, associated with bathing elephants because of exposure to the mud they play in, leptospirosis is common and can be prevented by pre treatment with doxycycline 200 mg a day starting 2 days before possible exposure and taking until after the travel period. Most of these illnesses will run their course in healthy people without serious complication but the Norovirus and E Coli and the other common pathogens Salmonella, shigella, yersenia and campylobacter can all be spread in water and through fecal oral transmission. Leptospirosis is usually only spread animal to human so that would… Read more »
Leptospirosis is spread through urine. Urine-oral to be exact. It is also fatal without antibiotics as it causes kidney and/or liver failure depending on which serovar is causing the infection. It is not a GI thing at all.
Also, Team USA tested negative for Norovirus.
Not usually fatal but certainly can be … most often self limited 3-4 day illness. Spread in the water/mud the elephants urinate in. The slow march way this is spreading acts more like E Coli or one of the other bacteria or less likely viruses that spread fecal oral… all this information can be found on the CDC website and with literature searches on pub med