The Swedish Swimming Federation has finalized their 12-swimmer roster for the 2012 London Summer Olympic Games that will kick off on July 27th, and the most notable thing about the locked-down list is that there was no last-second addition of National 200 IM Record holder Simon Sjodin. If you’ll recall, there was a last-second push via petition from other of Sweden’s elite swimmers to convince their Olympic committee that his 22nd-ranked swim in the 200 IM was worth a spot in the Olympics.
Despite getting 1,067 names onto the list, the push still came up short and there was no last-second salvation.
Also absent from the list is former Arizona State All-American Rebecca Ejdervik. She made a last-second effort to grab a second sprint spot in June at the Sette Colli Trophy, but apparently came up short of the standards with a 1:08.94.
Sweden has also rounded out their full aquatics lineup with two divers, including Anna Lindberg, a 6-time European Champion between the two springboard events. She will compete on the 3-meter in London (there is no 1-meter event at the Olympic level).
Women
Sarah Sjostrom
Therese Alshammar
Jennie Johanssen
Martina Granstrom
Stina Gardell
Michelle Coleman
Gabriella Fagundez
Ida Marko-Varga
Joline Höstman
Therese Svendsen
Men
Stefan Nystrand
Lars Frolander
Divers:
Anna Lindberg
Christopher Eskilsson
This is just ridiculous.
It wouldn’t cost them much more to take Simon Sjodin on the team.
With his ranking (and 2 per nation), there is great chance he can qualify for semis.
Trust me, most Swedes absolutely loathe the way the Swedish Olympic Committee handles things, and there’s a lot of criticism in the press. Simon is one of the smaller omissions to be honest who hasn’t gotten a lot of talk. Sweden have many athletes qualified via the A cut not going, despite not having anyone else competing at that specific event. They won’t send tennis, table tennis players well qualified via rankings. They won’t send athletes to the track and field events who realistically have chances to reach the finals(but not medal). And they won’t send swimmers, obviously. They actually set their own time/ranking/other requirements for every event that are well above the A cut for the most part.. The… Read more »
Why wasn’t he selected in the first place? He has the A cut…
Coach Peter – the story has something to do with the Swedish Olympic Committee having extremely high standards for selection. Something like top 12 or top 16 in the world, but they haven’t given an official explanation.
Actually, the swedish olympic committee claims that a possible top 8-placement is required to qualify. They actually gave Simon a time that he had to do in order to qualify, but didn’t put him on team even though he managed to do the time (it was 1:59.4something, which is the time he swam at european championships).
Wow, that seems a bit extreme… reminds me of the dad of 3 very enthusiastic boys on my team who refused to let them compete as he didn’t see the point since they weren’t likely to win (and it was a bother to drive them…).
Guess the Swedish budget is a bit tight? Who knows when an athlete will step up if provided the chance…shoot…even making it to semis in the Olympics is huge!
An Aussie friend of mine was ribbing me on how they will dominate the mens 4x 100 free relay this summer… he mentioned some little known US Swimmer (I think he writes on blogs on occasion) back in 2000 talking about smashing the Australians like guitars.… Read more »
It would be nice to be one of those two dudes!
Simon should have made it. Sweden can now join my **** list on countries with stupid qualifying rules.
I absolutely agree with you anytime you are allowed to take an athlete to the Olympics and you chose not to, especially when you only have 2 men on your roster, you have to do it. How else does Sweden expect to grow the sport in their country.