LEN, the governing body for aquatics sports in Europe, has announced that it will align its age group standards with the new range that was published by World Aquatics (formerly FINA) earlier this year.
This means that the ages for European Junior Records and qualification for the European Junior Championships will now move to 14-18. Previously, the competition was for females aged 14-17 and males aged 14-18. A swimmer’s age is based on their age as of the end of the year, not the date of competition.
The European Junior Championships are hosted (almost) every year, meaning that both boys and girls will have a chance to qualify for the meet five times, rather than the previous four.
This is the second change of ages at the European Junior Swimming Championships in the last decade. Through 2015, the meet was for females aged 15-16 and males aged 17-18.
Unlike the World Junior Championships, the European Junior Championships have a much loner history. The first event was held in 1967 in Linköping, Sweden, and the 2023 edition in Belgrade will be the 49th event.
Since a 2021 coup for control of LEN, arguably the second most-powerful body in swimming, the European organization has become much more closely-aligned with World Aquatics. LEN was previously led by Italian Paolo Barelli, who is the chief power-rival of World Aquatics president Hussain Al-Musallam in global aquatic sport.
After his ouster as the president of LEN, Barelli has been suspended twice by the new World Aquatics Ethics Panel, which alleges corrupt behavior.
Beautiful young lady!
She is – I guess – Nikolett Padar from Hungary, winner of multiple golds in the World Junior Championship in 2022
I did not see the caption 🙂 Her name is misspelled there anyway