The International Swimming League (ISL) issued a statement on the eve of its Grand Final, acknowledging the financial difficulties that its faced throughout the 2020 calendar year while also emphasizing the importance of moving forward in spite of the challenges.
“Despite the significant financial challenges that all sports rights-holders have faced this year and against all the odds, the ISL has managed to deliver a fantastic product in its second season,” the league said in the statement. “We have witnessed an incredibly successful 6 weeks in the Budapest bubble, while supporting athletes, highlighting talent and showcasing superhuman capabilities.”
The ISL says it felt it was important to carry on for the sake of the sport in what has been a difficult year for everyone.
“Our belief is that we are working for the greater good of swimming,” the ISL said. “This year could have been a career-ending disruption for many swimmers who need to make a living. The swimming industry has been put under great strain with all pools closed and no competitive meets. There was a huge gap with no competitive swimming at the world level and we felt it our duty to step in to help save the sport.”
The league says that in order to move forward into this season, it needed to reinvest a lot of extra money into the product.
“We needed to maintain momentum after the first season, and at no point did we want to postpone our operations until 2021,” the league said. “We believe we have an obligation to our athletes both from a financial and mental point of view. This has meant a huge additional financial commitment to the project in 2020. We launched the ISL Solidarity Program in April to financially support our athletes to help prepare them for the current ISL Season 2020, in the lead up to major events in 2021, and a full ISL season in 2021-2022.”
SwimSwam has reported that multiple vendors from the ISL’s inaugural 2019 season claim to have not yet been paid their full amount owed, and the league acknowledged as much, vowing to repay all debt before gearing up for Season 3.
“The work has not been easy,” the league said. “For the first two seasons, we have been mostly focused on showcasing athlete talent and our product to the widest audience possible. We had hoped for meaningful revenues to come in but alongside the impact of the pandemic our commercial operations have also failed significantly with most projections not materialising. The way we approach the market will need to be different going forward.
“Our head-down approach to deliver Season 2020 may have caused friction with some suppliers but we will honour all obligations, which are less than 5 percent of last year’s overall expenditure. Going forward, and before planning starts for Season 3, we will need to close all outstanding issues from the past and we will adjust our internal organisation and processes to improve our operational discipline to continue being a reliable partner to all our suppliers.”
You can read the full statement here.
The ISL Grand Final will get underway on Saturday, Nov.21 at 8 am ET, and conclude on Sunday, Nov.22 beginning at 12 pm ET.
There is only so far 25m pool swimming of which 12-15 m is underwater can go in capturing a bigger following . It does not help when some unknown person swims 4.11 400 scm which is about 1973 standard. Keena Rotthammer who swum a 4.18 LC in a nylon onesie would be 64 years old now . And this is a Pro swimmer in a ISL final? Nobody but Mum& Dad & the cat be watching that.
ISL competition in Budapest this fall was fantastic for swimming lovers. But, they need to do much more to lure in some other sport lovers and not only swimming lovers.They claim to showcase some “swimmers with superhuman capabilities” but this capabilities are measured by the stopwatch……The team concept is important but to show superhuman capabilities you need to show the times of all the swimmers at the end of each race. World as well as continent and national senior and junior records have to be not only seen but emphasized and in my even rewarded. World records as well as ISL records should be seen as an incentive to have the swimmers aspire for greatness. The swimmers should be rewarded… Read more »
I’d hope they pay their amounts from season 1 before season 3 also. Seems to me all they did here is say how much of a good job they did. Hopefully they keep their word, seems like they are going to court soon.
People should read their contracts carefully and honor them – both sides.
the ISL is SO FUN! I hope they can figure this out. They really have delivered a fantastic product this year. I know it’s not likely, but i would love if they did a 6-week format again next year, if they’re still around. This has been a real treat, especially since we didn’t have the olympics we were all excited for.
Huge fan of the ISL, crossing my fingers that we get season 3
Agree mostly, but the 6-weeker is exhausting too. Makes Mr. Dressel’s achievements all the more noteworthy.
This thing is about to fall like a house of cards. It’s really too bad because ISL is a great concept and very entertaining to all swim fans.
I would just like to say that this seems to be the nicest way to acknowledge their issues and assure their fans that shit’s not hitting the fan. If I were in the same position, I’d put out the exact same press release.
The real question is if they can walk the walk, which means to continue doing the good things they’re doing while paying everyone and generating some revenue. I wish for the best.
Extremely well written, direct, acknowledging the issues, pledging to fix them ASAP, & providing the context that the A/P is “less than 5 percent of last year’s overall expenditure”. Seems to imply the athletes were full-paid (or at least close) too. A most hopeful statement!
It’s going to work. I’m confident, so many more people watched this season than last. I have faith