Indian Swimmers continue to suffer. Who’s to blame?


Yet again, in another “Unlock” announced by the government, swimming pools have been left out. This was the third instance of the “Unlock” when various aspects of the economy were restarted. Gyms, malls, sports complexes, etc. have been allowed to open. Still, swimming pools continue to be disallowed much like cinema halls, entertainment parks, theatres, bars, and so on. Not surprisingly, Indian competitive swimmers who have been waiting many months for the pools to reopen are distraught. They have been let down by the government and the various swimming bodies that promised pools would be reopened.

For the past few weeks, elite swimmers like Virdhawal Khade, Srihari Nataraj and renowned coach Nihar Ameen have been beseeching the sports minister Kiren Rijjiju and the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to pay attention to their plight. Numerous tweets have been posted tagging the Swimming Federation of India (SFI), MHA, the sports minister, imploring them to open up the pools for competitive training. India’s highest-ranked swimmer Virdhawal Khade has even gone to the extent of talking about retirement from the sports if there’s no headway. Their exhortations haven’t been answered, except with stoic silence. It’s almost like these swimmers have been banging their heads against the wall, or a better analogy would be they have been dumped in the Arabian Sea without a life jacket.

The predicament and the frustration of the Indian swimmers is quite understandable. It has been over four months since the pools have been closed, that is practically a third-of-the-year. For athletes, who typically spend anything from 4-6 hours in the water, perfecting their strokes, tumbles, catch, and so on, this extended break can be devastating both physically and psychologically.  This is all the more so because they were eagerly preparing for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics (which will now be held in 2021). All the preparations, milestones, timelines have gone for a toss.

Qualifying for Olympics is a tough call, especially so in aquatics. The selection process is as follows; participating countries are allowed up to two qualified swimmers per individual event and one relay team. Each country is allowed a maximum of fifty-six swimmers (twenty-eight male and twenty-eight female). Though each country is free to select the swimmers, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) establishes a standard that must be met for a swimmer to be eligible to compete at the Olympic Games. The top swimming body, FINA publishes two sets of time-standards for each of the events: the “Olympic Qualifying Time” known as the “A-Time” and the “Olympic Selection Time” known as “B-Time.” Each country may enter up to two swimmers per event, provided both swimmers meet the qualifying time or A-Time. A country may enter one swimmer per event who meets the qualifying standard or B-Time. Any swimmer who meets the qualifying time will be entered in the event for the Games; a swimmer meeting the B-Time standard will be eligible for entry, and their entry will be allotted/filled in by ranking. A country that does not receive an allocation spot, but has at least one swimmer who meets a qualifying standard may enter the swimmer with the highest ranking. If a country has no swimmers meeting either qualifying standard, it may enter one male and one female in total.

Thus, B-Time qualification will only ensure an invitation to the Olympics if the total available quota slots (878) are not filled. So far, six Indian swimmers have attained the B-Time, Virdhawal with a timing of 22.44s in 50m freestyle. Sajan Prakash (1:58.45 in 200m butterfly), Srihari (54.69s in 100m backstroke), Kushagra Rawat (8:07.99 in 800m freestyle), Aryan Makhija (8:07.80 in 800m freestyle) and Advait Page (8:00.76 in 800m freestyle). Yet, these qualifications count for nothing as only an A-Time can get you the position in the Olympic swimming team. For Virdhawal the target is 22.01; 1:56:48 for Sajan and 53.85 for Srihari. Rawat, Page and Makhija have to clock 7:54:31.

The time difference between 22.01 and 22.44 might not seem much to a common man, but in swimming parlance, it is equivalent to an aeon, a difference between a life-time spent in celebration or in ignominy.

While Indian swimmers struggle to attain these qualifying times, the case is pretty different for a power-house like the US. To give an idea, till August 14, 2019, over 1000 swimmers had attained the qualifying times for different events in the US. To illustrate the high-level of competition, let’s take the 50 Freestyle male event, six swimmers had achieved the A-Time, the best being Caeleb Dressel with 21.04. Some 23 swimmers have attained the B-Time. Indeed, there were 23 swimmers between the timeline of 22.01 to 22.67. Now, the US team can send only two swimmers for this event. Thus, at the US trials, all these swimmers will have to battle out, and only the top two will get to wear the stars and stripes. All these A-Times and B-Times count for little when you are in the US.

And we are just talking about the US, other swimming powerhouses like Australia, Japan, China, UK, also have their robust selection processes that ensure that they will be sending their very best for the competition.

In contrast, no Indian swimmer has ever attained the A-Time for any Olympic events. That should give an idea of where we stand in the sport, globally. Basically, we are scraping at the bottom. Period!

But then swimming is a critical sport for any country wishing for Olympic glory. There are a total of 37 events in swimming discounting the other aquatic events like diving, etc. That’s a good 111 medals on offer; gold, silver and bronze. Even the union minister of sports Kiren Rijiju understands the importance of swimming, stating, “India will have to focus on aquatic sports, especially swimming if the country wants to excel in Olympic Games.”

The minister went on to add that, “Historically, the top countries in the Olympics have bagged a large number of medals in swimming. In the last five Olympics, the  US won about 31 per cent of their total medals in swimming. There is a great opportunity for any country because of the sheer number of events that take place in aquatics. Today, we don’t stand anywhere in swimming at the Olympic level, but there is a huge potential in the sport if we act with dedication, proper planning and adequate resources.”

Simply put, if a country desires to be an Olympic power-house, it can’t without paying attention to aquatics, especially swimming events.

So, why are we failing badly? Why is it that a country of 1.3 Billion can’t find talent to attain an A-Time?

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Junior-Swimming In India Being Crushed By Swimming Federation

Being a swimmer in India is a tough thing. Much tougher than other being a sportsperson in any other sports. Besides the obvious comparison, of how other sports like cricket, badminton or for that matter even Kabaddi are given more preference, and so on; there is much more that an Indian swimmer has to battle with on a day-to-day basis.  And it is not just infrastructure, the lack of good pools or great coaches or financial support, it is the apathy of the government and the sports bodies.

The sad fact is that to be a competitive swimmer in India; in addition to oodles of talent, perseverance, fortitude, an individual also requires something as unfathomable as luck or divine benevolence. Because not only are the swimmers spending hours daily trying to scrape off 0.02 microsecond of their best times, but also to dance to the tunes of associations and swimming bodies that function in manner that can be at best described as whimsical.

Take the latest instance of how the Swimming Federation of India (SFI), the premier governing body for swimming in India has delivered a body-blow to junior swimmers. Every year, swimmers across the country compete first at district-levels and then state to be able to qualify for the National (Junior & Sub-Junior) competitions. Thousands of swimmers practice the hardest as its their one chance to shine in the sports, considering how few such competitions are conducted. Given the humungous amount of enthusiasm and talent, the competitions are really fought hard and with fervour at the junior levels. It is only at the senior levels that you see the numbers dropping drastically, largely due to academics or just want for better opportunity.

Given the fact that one sees the maximum numbers at junior levels; shouldn’t the SFI do more to promote it. To find new talent, raw talent and nurture it to greatness?

For the past couple of years, there have been talks of how the SFI wants to merge these 4 age-groups into 3. The reasoning, apparently, is ease of conducting the competitions. The objective apparently is to make things easy for the babus.

So swimmers across the board were surprised when a notification from SFI floated across the Internet, talking about how the age groups had been merged into 3 categories.   The swimming sports body has revamped the age brackets as follows: Group I (15 To 17 Years), Group II (12 – 14 years), and Group III (9 – 11 years). While it might not seem much different on first look, but a closer examination makes it clear as to how younger swimmers have been short-changed in the revamp.  While the elder group (15-17 years) has been retained as is, the other groups are now 3-year groupings instead of two. So, a 9-year-old girl or boy will now have to compete against a 10 and 11-year-old. And a 12-year-old will have to face off against a 13 and a 14-year-old

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Are you Swim-Dad or Swim-Mom? Here’s a way to find out..

Swimming when you do it for leisure is pretty harmless. In fact, it is a good and healthy vocation for the body and the mind. But, when it is taken as a sport, it kind of transmutes into something else. Swimmers seem like a different species altogether. They are focused, private individuals who are interested in just three things: swimming, eating, and sleeping, not necessarily in the same order. In that way, swimming as a sport is something quite different, it is an abiding passion that not only sucks in the sportsperson but also their folks, their parents.

Sometime between when the kid is practicing in pools and participating in local meets, a strange transformation takes place with the parents. At some ill-opportune moment, they transmute from normal fun-loving folks to an obsessive passionate lot. Called as the Swimming Parent (a Swim-Dad or a Swim-Mom), these are pretty normal beings most of the times but shows traces of abnormalities in the proximity of a water-body like a swimming pool or a sea. Abnormalities include garrulous or loud behavior, a fascination for trivialities like splicing or leg movement, and obsession over lap-times. The inflicted one is not shy and inhibited in showing his/her excitement or disappointment to the world at large. At meets, the Swim-Dad can be seen nervously timing the different heats and thunderously timing the ones that have his kids. Usually, he or she does not swim yet, knows the nuances of each stroke. He or she is well aware of dietary practices even though their body might not reflect it. He or she is obsessed with timings, records, and tournaments. And usually is not much liked by officials and coaches. The good thing is that, once away from the pool, the Swim-Dad displays normal tendencies, but now and then, some mutations occur and the Swim-Dad is equally obsessive even in while sitting in the living room.

To know whether you are afflicted by the syndrome, here’s a list of statements of the primary traits. Count how many the number of traits that you agree with and then compare it with the result at the end. So, let’s find out if you are a Swim-Dad (or a Swim-Mom). Here goes:

If pools excite you, 50 mt makes you happy, 100 mt makes you ecstatic and anything less than 25 Mt is disappointment

If keeping records of your kid’s performance is your favorite hobby, or better, your only hobby

If you go to meets armed with your camera, clipping all races for posterity Continue reading