The Olympic Games will be held in Paris from the 26th of July to the 11th of August 2024. South Africa’s swimming team normally wins the bulk of the country’s medal haul from the Games, which happen every four years. The swimming team has won 16 medals in the pool, which include six gold medals, since 1996.
The team is, however, faced with a huge issue when it comes to their preparations and training in the pool… load shedding.
The national swimming team returned to the country on Monday from the world championships in Doha. Pieter Coetzé came third in the 200m backstroke final, earning the team’s only medal. The team finished 25th on the medal table.
Coach Rocco Meiring trains most of the South African swimming team at the University of Pretoria. He explained at a press conference at OR Tambo Airport earlier this week: “As it stands now, the Olympic team is not assured of a facility to prepare for the Olympics. The open-air Tuks pool needs to be heated so the water is warm enough for swimmers to train in comfortably. If it’s too cold, the swimmers can’t execute their strokes effectively. The question is, how will we be affected by load-shedding? The athletes cannot prepare in cold water.”
As reported by Business Day, Swimming SA president Alan Fritz stated that they had two options to try to remedy this situation.
“We can ask [sport] minister Zizi Kodwa, through his office, to speak to the minister of electricity and the minister of mineral resources and energy to exempt at least two areas in our country in terms of swimming pools.
That is very much doable,” he said, adding the second area would be either the pool in Gqeberha, where the Olympic trials will be held in April, or Durban.
If we have to create a central environment and a bubble for the athletes to train, we must do that.
The second [option] is to find the money to buy the two generators … I suggest you’re going to need about five to six million to do that, and we will put that forward to the Lotto and to the ministry.”
