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How Well Will FINA Mop Up After Suit Wars?
Jan 14, 2010 - Craig Lord
The FINA Bureau, the body of 22 officials that represent the will of the ruling Congress of the international swimming federation, meets in Bangkok today and tomorrow. Among many items on the agenda are some spill-over issues from suits wars: what to do about world record and whether masters swimmers will follow the same rules as apply in the elite race pool or not.
SwimNews understands that the favoured proposal before FINA on masters opposes any division of rules in swimming. Bodysuits and use of non-textiles would then be barred from use in the masters pool too. Many believe that such a move would make sense on a number of levels, including parity between two sectors of the swimming world that allow cross-over (elite racers over 25 years of age obliged to stick to one rule in one pool should observe the same rule when racing in masters); and application of all the sound arguments that got rid of the silly, shiny suits of 2008 and 2009 from the elite race pool, including fairness of competition and cost to the competitor of expensive equipment with a short shelf life.
If FINA does indeed vote for parity, there would be significant rejoicing in the masters pool among the many who do not want the sport that plays a huge role in their lives, for health and well-being as well as sporting purposes, to be a battleground for expensive so-called "technology" that has been barred from the elite race pool. The basic message is: we just want to swim.
Some of those among pro-apparel, pro-equipment-sport lovers embittered by FINA's final decisions in 2009 desperately cling to the hope that the bodysuit prop will be there to bolster their performances and egos. They also cling to a hope that the shiny suits will make it back into the elite race pool. They claim that swimming is now going to be slower, less worth watching, less appealing to the wider public, less inspiring. What a load of baloney, say those who believe swimming has been delivered back to swimmers, coaches and all those who work each day to hone natural talent with hard and smart work.
On world records, the coaches commission of FINA out forward a well-meaning proposal that aimed at being fair to all swimmers: it suggests two sets of records, one pertaining to conditions in the race pool pre-2008 and post 2009 ( two eras that can much more readily be compared with each than the 2008-09 seasons in which suits made of performance-enhancing non-textile fabrics dominated what had become an equipment-based sport) and one pertaining to 2008-09, and era which stands out in a truly significant way for being like no other departure the sport has ever known in terms of performance-enhancement from equipment worn by a swimmer.
SwimNews shares the view of the World Coaches Association (which is not too far from what the FINA coaches commission is suggesting, but without the listing of two sets of records): that lines ought to be drawn in the world-record book that allow all 2008-09 standards to be honoured while also honouring the right of swimmers to have their performances regarded fairly with regards to prevailing race conditions as decided and dictated by FINA. FINA allowed the shiny suits and FINA, recognising its big mistake, got rid of them. Now FINA must recognise one of its paramount reasons for being: to deliver fair and standardised race conditions and allow like-for-like comparison of performance in a sport that relies much on speed and the time shown on the clock, not just within a race but in a way that respects the thread of history in a sport that will have been governed by FINA for 102 years this summer.
Here is the model that SwimNews favours:
When FINA declared in the 1950s that all world records must be set in pools 50m long, no swimmer who set a record in a 20-yard, 25-yard etc etc pool was dishonoured. But a line was drawn in the best interests of all and in a way that reflected altered race conditions. This is how history was and is recorded in the official book of world records:
200 'fly women world record
Progression
Note how it got slower at first....no problem.
When FINA recognised world s/c records, it took the world best time in each event and made that the FINA standard time. Anyone who got past that got the record and on it went from there. No problem.
Here is how it would translate to 2010:
Women 200m backstroke progression:
The last line is theoretical, of course, and one suspects that Coventry is capable of going faster than that fictional time: she is among those who can say that the gap between her pre-2008 best and post-2008 best is much smaller than it is for many who leapt ahead in the shiny suit era.
Back to the model - again, there is no problem and no swimmer is dishonoured and all swimmers would be chasing records set under prevailing race conditions, conditions that are so substantially different to those of 2008-09 that comparison is worthless. If you cannot compare performance on the clock in swimming, swimming loses one of its assets right there.
And here are some debating points on Swimming World's Split Time feature.
Some in FINA are leaning back on an old model: we caused the problem, we have partly resolved it but will take a "wait-and-see-do-nothing" approach to those issues that carry the complexity that we delivered to the subject at heart. There can be no question that after the revelations about the GDR in the early 1990s (and even more so after the court cases of 1999 that brought to light gruesome details of the extent and nature of State Plan 14:25 systematic doping process within the GDR and led to criminal convictions for officials and coaches who made victims of those they played s sick game of rogue guardians with for 20 years) that FINA should have taken far more action than it did do or has done since. Criminals sit yet on the list of greats and honorees of the sport, the FINA "pin" winners.
Doing nothing has rarely been a good idea in the wake of mistakes that need rectifying in order to smooth the transition back to a place of fairness and integrity in the race pool. We will soon know what, if anything, the FINA Bureau has decided, for now. If nothing happens this time, of course, there is yet time to get to the right decision before the all-important summer season dawns on a new day for swimming.
What is certain is that the decision is indeed FINA's to make. Some suggest that "outside forces" are at work and it is they who control FINA. There are undoubtedly "outside forces" at work, for we live in the world. But that conclusion as an excuse is a little like saying "can't blame George Bush for all that war stuff, or Tony Blair or Bin Laden on his side because they were all subject to outside forces'. Right. Well, no, wrong. Governance comes with responsibility, and the taking of it.
In swimming, FINA runs the ship. FINA takes the credit and the money when and where due. It must also take the wrap when things go wrong. In suit wars, something went wrong and then something was put right. The majority agree with the decisions taken. The rest must live it. None of which means that FINA cannot tidy up a little more after the mess it - with or without a helping hand from "outside forces" - created.
