Once upon a time, in a long-ago-forgotten decision, FINA handed the hosting duties for the 2013 World Championships to Dubai, UAE.
Not long after, though, in July of 2010, the UAE Swimming Federation rescinded their offer to host, declaring at the time that they preferred to focus their resources on developing their swimming program at the grass roots level. Enter Barcelona, who in September of that year was declared as the host of the championships on a bit of a rush-order.
Apparently Dubai’s grass-roots plan included hosting this year’s Junior World Championships, which they themselves swept in and took when Casablanca, Morocco had to drop that hosting bid.
There is certainly interest in swimming in the UAE, which has resulted in a number of National Records being broken since the declaration in 2010. That includes Mubarak Al-Besher, who has crushed all 6 of the National Records in the breaststroke races, and Mohammed Al Ghaferi, who has done similar things in the backstroke records.
There hasn’t exactly been an explosion, though there has been many quality results from expatriated swimmers who are citizens of other countries, but live and train in the UAE.
Organization in the federation hasn’t been great; there’s been no obvious update to their website (including adding a new meet calendar) in a year.
Now, the country is back on FINA’s radar to host once again with a very long-term view. After Kazan in 2015 and Guadalajara in 2017, the hosts for the 2019 and 2021 World Championships are still up in the air, with Grangju, Korea; Budapest, Hungary; Baku, Azerbaijan, and the UAE the qualified bidders.
The UAE has been the host to some of the bigger black marks on FINA’s reputation in the last few years, including as the hosts of the tragic race where American open water swimmer Fran Crippen died during a race, and pulling out of this year’s Worlds hosting bid.
They also swooped in and saved the day, though, for the Junior World Championships, a meet that is just now really beginning to take hold as one of the world’s major swimming events.
So, which way will FINA’s needle tip this week? Soon we will find out.
If the safety of the athletes is paramount, no race should be held in the UAE. Allowing Fina to hold races of any kind in countries like the UAE is asking for trouble.
Amen to that.
I am a swimmer in the UAE and it is one of the safest places ever. It is a safe city and has held many world class swimming events and world class events without trouble. It also has a low crime per capita, which is unusual for a big city.