On the evening of August 12th, CCTV sports reporter Zhang Chaoyang revealed that Zhejiang swimmer Wang Shun was elected as a member of the AQUA Athletes’ Committee. Subsequently, the reporter obtained confirmation from Wang himself.
The 31-year-old has medaled in the 200 IM at the three last Olympic Games, with his first medal coming at Rio 2016 when he walked away with bronze.
Wang became the first swimmer not named Michael Phelps to win the Olympic title in the men’s 200 IM since 2000 at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, coming through with the swim of his life in the final with a then-Asian Record time of 1:55.00, taking down Great Britain’s Duncan Scott by 0.28 at the touch.
In Paris, he took bronze again, out-touching American Carson Foster for the final podium position by exactly a tenth of a second.
He medaled in the event at both the 2015 Kazan and 2017 Budapest World Championships as well, walking away with the bronze medal at both competitions.
Wang is still the current Asian record holder in the 200 IM, courtesy of his 1:54.62 from the 2023 Asian Games.
While Wang is the only publicized elected member at this time, SwimSwam anticipates a full list of the results sometime early next week.
The committee is made up of:
- 20 athletes from elections conducted at the World Aquatics World Championships
- 10 swimming athletes, comprised of one male and one female athlete from each AQUA continent (Asia, Africa, Americas, Europe, and Oceania)
- 2 open water athletes, one male and one female
- 2 high diving athletes, one male and one female
- 2 artistic swimming athletes, one male and one female
- 2 water polo athletes, one male and one female
- 6 athletes appointed by the World Aquatics President (subject to the approval of the AQUA Bureau)
- 6 honorary members appointed by the World Aquatics President (subject to the approval of the AQUA Bureau)
- All athlete(s) from any of the aquatics disciplines who are members of the IOC Athletes Commission
The committee has no formal voting power, except that the group’s elected chair serves as an ex officio member of the Bureau and Executive. The group does have an advisory role to communicate athletes’ perspectives to AQUA on matters on the organization of competition, technical rules proposals, to bring forward any “suggestions” or “remarks” made by athletes during competitions, and to participate in technical committee meetings.
The current committee includes a number of high profile swimmers, including Alia Atkinson, Therese Alshammar, Dmitriy Balandin, Dylan Carter, Ana Marcela Cunha, Anthony Ervin, Jessica Hansen, Siobhan Haughey, Chad Ho, Ranomi Kromowidjojo, Daniel Kowalski, Adam Peaty, Simona Quadarella, Shane Ryan, Matthew Sates, and Ferry Weertman.
Only a handful of these swimmers ran for re-election: Sates, Haughey, Balandin, and Ryan.
For more details on all athletes that ran for positions on the committee, check out SwimSwam’s full breakdown of the candidates.
Am I only one who misread the headline? I read…Wang Shunned elected member of aqua athletes’ committee. I was wondering why he shunned a member of the committee until I read the article.
He revealed it first and THEN got confirmation?
“Subsequently, the reporter obtained confirmation from Wang himself.” ➝ No he did not. Wang Shun only verified the news with 体坛报, a Chinese sport newspaper, on 8/13. Wang Shun never made any response to Zhang Chaoyang’s news.
Moreover, Zhang Chaoyang does not have a press card. Not saying that the news is incorrect, but his source of information is really questionable.
“While Wang is the only publicized elected member at this time, SwimSwam anticipates a full list of the results sometime early next week.” ➝ The full list of the election results has already been posted on World Aquatics’ official X and Instagram account.
https://x.com/WorldAquatics/status/1956022742026776800?t=V4N2RS-U626ONgfYY63XPw&s=19
https://www.instagram.com/p/DNV2rl9NyVn/?igsh=YW5rdzRsODBxNThp
This article didn’t say Wang responded to Zhang’s news, it said Zhang obtained confirmation from Wang himself, which was most probably done privately.
Then how did Swimswam know about this? Zhang told Swimswam that he obtained confirmation from Wang himself?
In any case, even Zhang really obtained confirmation, I believe Wang did not give him tacit approval for releasing the news on his Weibo in a rather informal way. Not until today did Wang Shun repost the election results from World Aquatics’ official Weibo account.
By stating that Wang never made any response to Zhang’s news, my take is that Zhang revealing the election results has nothing to do with Wang’s personal will.
nonsense
https://swimswam.com/world-aquatics-confirms-u-s-federal-investigation-into-chinese-doping-tests/
Everybody have fun tonight! Everybody Wang Shun tonight!
Everybody….You know what to do ! 🤪
… tonight?
The full list is out on World Aquatics Instagram page a few days ago
Come on Steve