You can view all of the international Olympic Trials changes, postponements and cancellations here.
One of the few remaining Olympic Trials meets still on the international swimming schedule has now been eliminated.
Today, Tuesday, March 17th, British Swimming has announced it will be cancelling the 2020 British Swimming Championships, the meet which represented the nation’s sole qualifier for this summer’s Olympic Games.
After the latest announcement from the UK government, which advises against non-essential contact and mass gatherings of people, British Swimming can confirm that the British Swimming Championships and the British Para-Swimming International Meet (BPSIM) have been cancelled, read Britsh Swimming’s announcement.
Additionally, the selection policies will be reviewed by British Swimming’s World Class Performance Leadership Group pertaining to the Olympic Games pool and open water swimming, European Championships, Europan Junior Championships and FINA World Junior Open Water Championships.
The FINA Diving World Series scheduled to take place at the London Aquatics Centre March 27th – March 29th has also been postponed, as have the British Elite Junior Diving Championships originally slated for April 6th – April 9th.
The British Summer Championships scheduled for July 21st-26th will be revising its qualification window and proceed in light of the several qualifying meet cancellations around the region.
The statement concluded, “We at British Swimming, along with all sports organisations, are hugely saddened by the current situation. We know how hard all of our athletes, coaches and volunteers work to keep sport going, but at the same time are very aware that the current situation transcends sport. We are all responsible for public health and we shall do everything we can to support this both during the current pandemic and on a daily basis.”
Really unfortunate. Disappointed to see it has been cancelled altogether. Means we now have to miss out on seeing potential breakout performances from the likes of Dean and a potential comeback from Dawson among others,
Well, given how things have been progressing in the UK in recent days, it’s not unexpected. I maybe thought they might postpone rather than simply cancel, but I guess British Swimming didn’t want to postpone the uncertainty and mess with athletes’ tapers even more, and given the medical experts expect things to only get worse over the next two-three months, this seems sensible.
It seems likely that they’ll now simply more or less pick the team they want for the Olympics, based on a set of criteria that would include performances at major championships over the past 12 months (including probably Junior Worlds/Euros, and last year’s Euro SC). They’ll also as ever be some discretionary picks, mostly to boost relays.… Read more »
Man, I’m not sure if Adam Peaty has a shot at making the team now!
The “reviewing current selection policies” is the interesting part. This may confirm the view that BS will ‘select’ the team without actually holding a selection meet/Championship. Will it be retrospective, for example all swimmers who made world finals in 2019, including relays, will be automatically selected? Or perhaps some kind of ‘virtual’ trial based on time-trials in home pools? Difficult few months ahead for an organisation that lacks creativity & leadership.
Will home pools be open much longer? They’ve closed in other European countries (and some in the States). If so I suspect British Swimming will pick the team sooner rather than later, and maybe try to get the government to grant exceptions on pool closures for their Olympians to train.
My expectation is that athletes on lottery funded performance programmes will be granted exceptions to train. Possibly just at NCs as you say, rather than home pools.
That’s nick Pyle on the plane then
No one:
Absolutely no one:
Not a single soul:
British Swimming: picks Nick Pyle over Adam Peaty in the 100 breast.
He is currently Ranked No.9 in Britain. 6 of the 8 faster of him are within 3 years of him in age. Surly he cannot be logically picked?
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British Swimming: Hold my beer
In another statement “We at British Swimming are thankful we no longer have to go through with the charade of holding a selection meet (ps- don’t You dare call them Olympic Trials) and can now properly select all of our favourites and their mates”. Yup, that’s our governing body in a nutshell.