2019 INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING LEAGUE – EUROPEAN DERBY
- Saturday, November 23 – Sunday, November 24, 2019
- 5:00-7:00 PM Local Time (12:00 noon – 2:00 PM, U.S. Eastern Time)
- London Aquatics Centre – London, England
- Short Course Meters (SCM) format
- European franchises: Aqua Centurions, Energy Standard, Iron, London Roar
- Start Lists
- Day 1 Complete Results (with Corrected MVP Standings)
A hallmark of International Swimming League competition is that all 4 teams competing at each stop of the series are staying in the same hotel as often as possible – which has been a specific request made by athletes after more divergent arrangements in other series.
This morning in London, where teams are staying at a Holiday Inn Express, teams’ preparations for the 2nd day of the European Derby meet were disrupted by fire alarms that went off starting around 9AM, with the hotel being evacuated for about 30 minutes.
A hotel representative says that the cause of the alarms were a faulty sprinkler system, and not an actual fire.
While 9AM isn’t a particularly early wakeup call, especially in swim culture, with jet-lag ringing strong in for athletes who have been travelling around the world, with some hopping between continents from Australia to the US to Europe over the last 2 months, it’s conceivable that some could still have been asleep. More likely, for most, it was a disruption to a morning routine, though not a significant one with 8 hours to go until the 5PM meet start time.
Ultimately, though some teams will be dealing more with jetlag than others (London Roar and their contingent of Australians jumping out), all teams would have had the same impact from the evacuation, so its unlikely to impact the outcome of the meet.
The teams’ hotel is only about a 5 minute walk from the meet.
TEAM SCORES THROUGH DAY 1
- Energy Standard – 238
- London Roar – 224
- Aqua Centurions – 178
- Iron – 165
Racing will resume on Sunday at 5PM local time, noon U.S. Eastern time.
The meet fixers should have gone for the Staybridge Suites at the mall next to the Olympic park- same quick walk distance to the pool, and for usually about what the same cost per night as the Holiday Inn Express goes for, you get huge by European standards rooms including a full kitchen where you can warm up what you buy from the grocery store downstairs and eat it on proper plates. And part of the same hotel group as the HIX if there are sponsor considerations involved.