Summer Paris 2024 - Swimming

[Wickzki]

So what are we talking here do we finally need that ‘probe’ into our men’s team? Like the one Roy & HG called for back in Athens when only Thorpe & Hackett won gold? It is proving just to be a bridge too far to match other countries male swimmers. Kyle being the only thing close to having another ‘Freak’ athlete swimmer post Thorpe & Hackett and his main event being the most competitive in world swimming probably played its part in not grabbing the gold medals you’d ideally would’ve liked.

Sorry for the rant but I'm more than a little passionate about this topic having spent years working in sports and having a kid in the school system who is old enough to decide what sports he wants to participate in.

It shouldn't be a surprise that we're struggling so heavily on the men's side of swimming.

It starts at the grassroots level and builds from there.

For starters, if you're a potentially great athlete the money is much better (and easier) to get in many other sports.

Most sports have amazing gateway programs that are super easy to get into. For example, for AFL you have AusKick and junior footy. Similar programs exist for rugby league, soccer, basketball, etc.

There's 60-ish AFL players drafted each year. All of them making a living wage by being on an AFL list. There are approximately 60 players playing collegiate basketball in the US which helps lead to about 400 jobs in professional basketball both here and around the world. God knows how many Aussies are playing football here in Australia as well as Europe/Asia/Americas, etc. Lots involved in cricket academies, rugby league, baseball, etc.

Comparatively, there are 41 Australian Olympic swimmers (men and women combined), many competing at their second or subsequent Olympics. How many of them make a sustainable income and don't have to supplement their swimming earnings with a "real job"?

Compared to swimming these other sports have much greater pull. Swimming is exclusive in comparison. Many of the athletes who could emerge as Olympic-quality swimmers will pursue other opportunities before they even consider swimming. That leaves swimming with a smaller pool of potential athletes in a country with much fewer people than some of these European, North American, and Asian countries who are excelling.

That said, I'm not at all surprised that athletes like Marchand are having success. His rise coincides perfectly with Paris having the Olympic games. That's not a "fluke" - it's intentional. I don't know how many people here are old enough to remember when Sydney won the right to host the Olympics in September 1993 but what those who were will remember is just how heavily the Olympics sports were pushed in the subsequent years. The same is true of France for these games and most other Olympics. Increasing amounts of money poured into making our Australian athletes be as successful as possible in Sydney and to make the country proud of its progress on the world stage.

I'm the treasurer for my local school's parents and citizens group. The only Olympics sports program that has reached out to our school has been Little Athletics which we've encouraged the kids to sign up with. However, that leaves an issue for every other sport (who haven't made contact). We can't help get kids into programs if they do nothing to promote them in the school system. We have their target market (the kids). At the same time, we've had all of the other professional bodies hit us up with marketing material (e.g. AusKick with the Brisbane Lions sending players to help coach it!).

If the AOC and Swimming Australia want sustainable, long-term, success they must find a way to match it with the other sports. Given we have Brisbane in 2032 now is the perfect time to do so.

No inquiry needed.

 

[revo333]

I don't know how many people here are old enough to remember when Sydney won the right to host the Olympics in September 1993 but what those who were will remember is just how heavily the Olympics sports were pushed in the subsequent years. The same is true of France for these games and most other Olympics.

I'm old enough to remember and everything you said I agree with.

With more and more money going into women's sport in the numerous codes in our country it will be interesting to see if our females are still as successful in the pool in 20 years time.

 

[Firewalker]

We still have one shot left to fire, McAvoy in the 50.

But really what did we have before Thorpe and Hackett? We will build into Brisbane so I expect we will unearth some talent over the next 4-6 years.

Just like we built into Sydney, in 1992 at Barcelona we won 1 Swimming gold medal in 96 we won 2. Come Sydney it came together and we won 5, that talent continued into Athens where we won 7 gold in swimming, but it’s really been dropping away since then.

Yeah 100% when the country had many more factors against it you did have to rely totally on rare gold from super anomalies like Perkins, Thorpe & Hackett or a ridiculously rare crazy upset like Armstrong and Sieben.

No doubt not much access to the best athletes will always be there so it’s rare in the first place when athletes go through the system and rarer to find any outside of Queensland these days however it’s always going to be slightly disheartening that despite many of those factors to begin with some of the bigger barriers that were working against Australian male swimmers that did make it through the system back even 25-40 years ago are a lot less of a factor and despite the massive improvements and investment made they still seemingly need to rely on the same irregular sporadic events to all come together to get a rare men’s swimming gold medal.

We have very high expectations don't we.

However we do have to take a step back and realize that we are small country competing against a very big world. I believe that sure there should always be a lookout for improvements but you just have to appreciate Australia's achievements as part of a of a truly global context where everyone else is trying to do the same thing.

It’s true fighting out of your weight class given population and participation numbers you do get success with targeting specific events and as the East Germans in the 70s & 80s and Chinese found out in the 90s albeit using their drug cheating methods the smarter and easier events to get gold when maybe you have factors working against you is the women’s side of the sport.

That being said the amount of investment made by Gina and all the strings that come with it you wouldn’t rule it out that she would think about pulling the funding of the male swimmers or make them jump through even more ridiculous hoops because they didn’t win any gold. Maybe she’ll make them be her personal litter bearers after the games…

 

[Wallaby]

I agree with all you say. However, every other country has the same issue - the popular professional sports are not Olympic sports. OK - there's 2 gold medals for soccer, a few for tennis. 2 for basketball - there's 20 for swimming (and there are plans to add mixed relays, now that they've been successful in the athletics). Track athletics have more than 20, plus another 15 or so in the field. Gymnastica has about 20.
I haved no doubt that several Olympic level sprinters from Australia have been swallowed up by AFL or Rugby league or Netball over the last 100 years, because those are the sports that kids WANT to play, and then when they become teens they start to understand that it can be a career. The same goes for soccer all over the world, NFL, cricket and baseball etc.

We still do very very well - have a look at this table.

https://www.medalspercapita.com/#medals-per-capita:2024

It shows that there is no country in the world with a similar or greater population that has been as succesful at the Olympics (and that is primarily because we are one of the very few countries that have swimming as a semi-major sport. And the reason our female swimmers have historically been better than the men is that up until now, there has been no money in women's professional sport to lure them away - could be interesting with the rapid rise of real professionalism in women's AFL, NRL and soccer in Australia).

The only few games where we another country of similar or greater size did better was when the Brits decided to put money into cycling and rowing (ie very technical sports, but with lots of medals), and focussed on 'marginal gains'. And with the revelations about their cycling program with Team Sky, most of us are very suspicious of 'marginal gains'.

 

[LukeParkerno1]

Chalmers and ZSK did as well as we could hope for. Mollie is a young swimmer who will get used to the expectations she wasn’t terrible but sure she would admit she wasn’t great either. Least it wasn’t the American winning

 

[faible]

So you’d think that mean’s no Gold for any Australian man again in the pool just like London in 2012 and also Beijing in 2008, also means only 3 Australian male swimmers (Horton, Chalmers & Stubblety-Cook) have won Gold in the last 20 years (4 Olympics) . Both ZSC & Kyle with absolute horrible luck they didn’t add to their’s given the out of the ordinary performances they copped in their events tonight.

So what are we talking here do we finally need that ‘probe’ into our men’s team? Like the one Roy & HG called for back in Athens when only Thorpe & Hackett won gold? It is proving just to be a bridge too far to match other countries male swimmers. Kyle being the only thing close to having another ‘Freak’ athlete swimmer post Thorpe & Hackett and his main event being the most competitive in world swimming probably played its part in not grabbing the gold medals you’d ideally would’ve liked.

EDIT:

Ha!!! Both thinking about the probe at the same time

Sorry for the rant but I'm more than a little passionate about this topic having spent years working in sports and having a kid in the school system who is old enough to decide what sports he wants to participate in.

It shouldn't be a surprise that we're struggling so heavily on the men's side of swimming.

It starts at the grassroots level and builds from there.

For starters, if you're a potentially great athlete the money is much better (and easier) to get in many other sports.

Most sports have amazing gateway programs that are super easy to get into. For example, for AFL you have AusKick and junior footy. Similar programs exist for rugby league, soccer, basketball, etc.

There's 60-ish AFL players drafted each year. All of them making a living wage by being on an AFL list. There are approximately 60 players playing collegiate basketball in the US which helps lead to about 400 jobs in professional basketball both here and around the world. God knows how many Aussies are playing football here in Australia as well as Europe/Asia/Americas, etc. Lots involved in cricket academies, rugby league, baseball, etc.

Comparatively, there are 41 Australian Olympic swimmers (men and women combined), many competing at their second or subsequent Olympics. How many of them make a sustainable income and don't have to supplement their swimming earnings with a "real job"?

Compared to swimming these other sports have much greater pull. Swimming is exclusive in comparison. Many of the athletes who could emerge as Olympic-quality swimmers will pursue other opportunities before they even consider swimming. That leaves swimming with a smaller pool of potential athletes in a country with much fewer people than some of these European, North American, and Asian countries who are excelling.

That said, I'm not at all surprised that athletes like Marchand are having success. His rise coincides perfectly with Paris having the Olympic games. That's not a "fluke" - it's intentional. I don't know how many people here are old enough to remember when Sydney won the right to host the Olympics in September 1993 but what those who were will remember is just how heavily the Olympics sports were pushed in the subsequent years. The same is true of France for these games and most other Olympics. Increasing amounts of money poured into making our Australian athletes be as successful as possible in Sydney and to make the country proud of its progress on the world stage.

I'm the treasurer for my local school's parents and citizens group. The only Olympics sports program that has reached out to our school has been Little Athletics which we've encouraged the kids to sign up with. However, that leaves an issue for every other sport (who haven't made contact). We can't help get kids into programs if they do nothing to promote them in the school system. We have their target market (the kids). At the same time, we've had all of the other professional bodies hit us up with marketing material (e.g. AusKick with the Brisbane Lions sending players to help coach it!).

If the AOC and Swimming Australia want sustainable, long-term, success they must find a way to match it with the other sports. Given we have Brisbane in 2032 now is the perfect time to do so.

No inquiry needed.

We also pay quite poorly for gold medals, saw a post the other day that we pay ~ $13k for one, the US is paying over $30k, and some of the European countries (Italy is one I think) were well over $100k.

Limited financial compensation makes it pretty hard to lure and retain high level athletes, plus we don't have a college style pathway. I believe quite a lot of the European swimmers have gone to US colleges because the pathway is simply so much better than anywhere else in the world.

If they want a big result in Brisbane they've got a lot of work to do.

 

[faible]

Also RE: the men's 100m final, Brett Hawke has.... thoughts.

Login • Instagram

Welcome back to Instagram. Sign in to check out what your friends, family & interests have been capturing & sharing around the world.

www.instagram.com

 

[apollo_creed]

It won’t though, because China will cover-up threaten and bribe everyone just like they always do.
Just look at the Tokyo medals they tested positive and all still have the medals.

He hasn't tested positive and we won a gold earlier in the games with a convicted doper as part of it. Do you think that should be handed back?

 

[Gibbsy]

Also RE: the men's 100m final, Brett Hawke has.... thoughts.

Login • Instagram

Welcome back to Instagram. Sign in to check out what your friends, family & interests have been capturing & sharing around the world.

www.instagram.com

Mealy-mouthed rant. Either say it or don’t. “It’s not humanly possible” negates the brilliance of other swims in other races, indeed other performances in other sports. Athletes have been using that line as motivation since time immemorial.

 

[outabounds]

Chalmers and ZSK did as well as we could hope for. Mollie is a young swimmer who will get used to the expectations she wasn’t terrible but sure she would admit she wasn’t great either. Least it wasn’t the American winning

Mollie is also not as tall as the other sprinters, its an enormous advantage in sprint swimming to be taller. Ive no doubt that she is going to find it tougher at the 100m events.

 

[LukeParkerno1]

I prefer to believe the bloke is that good but when it’s one of the swimmers in that cloud I have my doubts

 

[Kram]

You can't categorically say he is cheating without any hard evidence, I dont like that at all. But anyone that knows anything about the sport and that event is understandably rather suspicious by the massive amount they absolutely smashed that field and WR by. Especially given China's shady PEDs history.

The pool has even been very, very slow. I think it was the first record even broken so far?

 

[LukeParkerno1]

Mollie is also not as tall as the other sprinters, its an enormous advantage in sprint swimming to be taller. Ive no doubt that she is going to find it tougher at the 100m events.

100%, weirdly Shayna has a better body type for sprints. Just feel the expectation got to her a bit not as bad as it did to Cate when she flopped but still a bit. She probably misjudged the first 50m

 

[LukeParkerno1]

You can't categorically say he is cheating without any hard evidence, I dont like that at all. But anyone that knows anything about the sport and that event is understandably rather suspicious by the massive amount they absolutely smashed that field and WR by. Especially given China's shady PESs history.

There were those famous fly swimmers who came from the blue in London never to be seen again. I have my doubts but until hard evidence let’s appreciate it juiced or not it’s a fantastic swim

 

[Kram]

Mealy-mouthed rant. Either say it or don’t. “It’s not humanly possible” negates the brilliance of other swims in other races, indeed other performances in other sports. Athletes have been using that line as motivation since time immemorial.

Yep whilst there is justification in being sceptical of it he just looks like a knob ranting there.

 

[skipper kelly]

You would have to love pain to swim the 200 fly.

Especially if you couldn't stop for a rest or lean on the ropes.

 

[faible]

You can't categorically say he is cheating without any hard evidence, I dont like that at all. But anyone that knows anything about the sport and that event is understandably rather suspicious by the massive amount they absolutely smashed that field and WR by. Especially given China's shady PESs history.

The pool has even been very, very slow. I think it was the first record even broken so far?

Yep first WR all meet, quite a few ORs have gone but there's been a lot of WRs in the last few years since Tokyo.

Also I believe the largest winning margin in the 100m free since 1928.

Pretty exceptional swim, chunking 0.40 off a WR you set in Feb, in a pool universally regarded as 'slow' and smashing a pretty talented field who all swum times around what you'd expect in a slower pool. It's a real outlier of a swim.

A quick google says he set a Chinese Record and PB of 47.65 in 2022, PB'd again with 47.22 in May 2023, took that down to 46.80 in Feb 2024 and now down to 46.40 in July 2024.

That's a big, big drop in < 2 years. He's young and going from 17 - 19 can be a pretty big physical jump, but 1.2s in 18-24 months is a lot at that level.

 

[Xtreme]

The Aussies (coaches and ex swimmers) whinging about the 100m swim is just sour grapes. By all means if any tests come back positive then go all in on the pile on!!

Until then, stay salty.

 

[Tadpole]

But as I said, officially they still have those medals.

It was covered up denied and everyone was just told “Nothing to see here, move along”.

Have the people running the AFL started doing a side gig in the swimming world with their masterful cover ups and rug sweeping?

 

[Visions]

Pan was always favourite and as usual Kyle pinched a silver medal. WR smashed 46.40 A 0.40 cut off his WR.

You don’t break a world record by a huge margin like that in a short distance event like that through natural ability alone.

 

[LukeParkerno1]

You don’t break a world record by a huge margin like that in a short distance event like that through natural ability alone.

Tend to agree and that's what my gut feeling is telling me, 0.1 or 0.05, sure that happens but 0.4 seconds in a pool that no one is going close to the records, to be it's questionable, not saying either way just that it is very dubious.

 

[Visions]

He hasn't tested positive and we won a gold earlier in the games with a convicted doper as part of it. Do you think that should be handed back?

The convicted doper got found out and served her suspension.

The country that gave the world Covid has numerous athletes over and above the norm test positive and not only do they not get suspended, they are allowed to keep their ill gotten gains as the corrupt organisations sweep everything under the carpet.

Why wouldn’t they cheat when they keep on getting away with it due to the weak insipid authorities running it all.

 

[LukeParkerno1]

The convicted doper got found out and served her suspension.

The country that gave the world Covid has numerous athletes over and above the norm test positive and not only do they not get suspended, they are allowed to keep their ill gotten gains as the corrupt organisations sweep everything under the carpet.

Why wouldn’t they cheat when they keep on getting away with it due to the weak insipid authorities running it all.

Just have a look at the Sun Yang case for evidence, you recon if he was Australian he wouldn't have got the mandatory 4 years in the first place?

 

[apollo_creed]

The convicted doper got found out and served her suspension.

The country that gave the world Covid has numerous athletes over and above the norm test positive and not only do they not get suspended, they are allowed to keep their ill gotten gains as the corrupt organisations sweep everything under the carpet.

Why wouldn’t they cheat when they keep on getting away with it due to the weak insipid authorities running it all.

So how do you know she's not doping again? She has done it in the past?

Yet you're accusing a Chinese athlete who wasn't even implicated in the recent stuff as far as I know.

Seems like double standards to me. And this is from someone who is in totally agreement with your general sentiment re: what happened with the Chinese swimmers.

 

[GreyCrow]

I think its fair to question if EVERY Chinese athlete competing at these games was in a doping program given the recent past

23 - thats twenty three - that were caught. The odds are highly likely that some skated through

The latest revelations during the Paris Olympics will increase already high tension between the World Anti-Doping Agency and the U.S. anti-doping body over the handling of a case involving 23 Chinese swimmers, who tested positive for trimetazidine (TMZ) weeks before the Tokyo Games.