So About Those Stiff British Swimming World C’ships Qualification Standards

2019 BRITISH SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS

• Tuesday, April 16th – Sunday, April 21st
• Tollcross International Swimming Centre, Glasgow, Scotland
• SwimSwam British Selection Policy Analysis
• Results

After all is said and done with the 2019 British Swimming Championships, a 25-swimmer roster has been revealed for this summer’s World Championships in Gwangju, Korea.

Among the lineup, just 5 individuals won specific events and also got under the British Swimming-mandated automatic selection time: Adam Peaty in the men’s 100m breast, Daniel Jervis in the 1500m free, Max Litchfield in the 400m IM, Duncan Scott in the 100m free, 200m free and 200mIM and finally James Wilby in the 200m breast.

However, an additional number of athletes were selected for the roster based on achieving a British Swimming-mandated consideration time in their event or by earning 2nd place in their event still under the selection time. Those in this category include Molly Renshaw, Alys Thomas, Ross Murdoch, Ben Proud, Luke Greenbank, James Guy, Freya Anderson, Aimee Willmott, Tom Dean and Siobhan-Marie O’Connor.

To add yet another layer to qualification process, the British Swimming selection policy specifies 8 wild card spots that would be at the coaches’ discretion, factoring in the need to qualify relay teams for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games, the use of alternates to rest key athletes, etc. Among those swimmers identified in this grouping include Jess Fullalove, Anna Hopkin and Scott McLay.

You can review the entire roster as a refresher here.

British Swimming tells SwimSwam that individuals’ specific events will not be revealed until the day before competition begins in Korea. As such, look for another analysis post shortly, detailing who we think will be selected to swim which events based on times, other athletes nominated for the roster, etc.

Below, however, is a snapshot view of who was selected specifically based on the supposedly black-and-white qualification system. I’ve included data to compare who would have made the list had British Swimming utilized the FINA A standard as the QT as opposed to its ultra-stiff selection standards.

Had the FINA A standard been used, 8 swimmers not on the list below would have qualified for individual events, with 6 of them being female and 2 male. Chloe Golding, Jocelyn Ulyett, Katie Matts, Charlotte Atkinson, Alicia Wilson and Abbie Wood would have all made the World Championships line-up in their respective events listed below, as they dipped under the FINA A cut.

For the men, David Cumberlidge and Mark Szaranek would have made the grade if they competed for any other nation using FINA A cuts as the qualification criteria to make the Worlds roster.