Category Archives: Swimming

Swimming boss defends athletes lobbying national gallery to take down Gina Rinehart portraits

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Swimming Queensland chief Kevin Hasemann says ‘I’ve never been to a gallery’ and furore has ‘evolved into something I could never have imagined’

The head of Swimming Queensland has defended a campaign that saw Olympic champions lobby the National Gallery of Australia to take down portraits of their patron, Gina Rinehart, because they were deemed “offensive”.

An acrylic colour portrait by Vincent Namatjira of Australia’s richest woman was the target of the campaign along with a second black and white portrait by Namatjira in ink and pencil.

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More than 90% of marine animals caught in NSW shark nets over summer were non-target species

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Exclusive: New documents reveal NSW government division over controversial program as data reveals death toll

More than 90% of marine animals caught in shark nets off New South Wales beaches over the summer were non-target species, with new documents revealing division within the government over the controversial program.

More than half of the 208 non-target species – such as turtles, dolphins and smaller sharks – that were caught in the nets over the past eight months were killed, data obtained by conservationists show.

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Israeli swimmer Gorbenko booed at world championships as GB’s Colbert wins gold

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  • 20-year-old won silver in 400m individual medley
  • Jeers were partially drowned out by cheers and applause

Israeli swimmer Anastasia Gorbenko was jeered by some of the crowd after finishing second in the women’s 400m medley on the closing day of the World Aquatics Championships in Qatar on Sunday.

The 20-year-old Gorbenko was being interviewed after the race when the jeers rang out at the Aspire Dome in Doha. She smiled and then sighed when she was booed again, this time as she mounted the podium at the medal ceremony. Others in the crowd clapped and cheered, partially drowning out the jeers.

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‘I just count the laps’: Canadian swimmer, 99, breaks three world records

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Betty Brussel sets records in the 100- to 104- year-old age class in Saanich, while inspiring members of local swim club

By the time an exhausted Betty Brussel finally swims to the finish and pulls herself from the pool, an Olympic athlete could have covered the same distance at least three times. But the 99-year-old Canadian’s quiet determination has led her to shatter world records and transformed her into an unlikely celebrity within the amateur swim community.

At a weekend swim meet in the British Columbia city of Saanich, Brussel broke the existing world record in the 400-metre freestyle, knocking nearly four minutes off the previous standard in the 100- to 104-year-old age class. She repeated her record-breaking performances in 50-metre backstroke and the 50-metre breaststroke that same day.

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Drowning deaths: kayaker dies off Victorian coast amid spate of deadly water incidents

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Search crew finds body of man near Rosebud beach on the Mornington Peninsula after two-hour search

A kayaker has died in waters off Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.

Emergency services were called to Rosebud beach about 3.30pm on Thursday. There were reports a man on an inflatable kayak had got into trouble and gone into the water up to 800 metres off shore.

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NSW drowning deaths climb to four since Christmas as lifesavers send holiday warning

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Royal Life Saving Society chief says Australians may not be ‘as strong swimmers as we believe’ as December toll hits 22

Another person has drowned in New South Wales, adding to the rising drowning death toll that has prompted a warning from lifesavers at what is considered the deadliest time of year.

Four people were pulled from the water at Port Stephens on Wednesday afternoon, including a 33-year-old man who could not be revived and died at the scene.

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Olympic swimming champion Ariarne Titmus shares relief after benign tumours removed from ovary

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Swimming great describes ‘scary time’ after chance discovery during MRI scan for hip injury

Australian swimming champion Ariarne Titmus has had surgery to remove benign tumours from an ovary.

The women’s 400 metres freestyle world record holder discovered the tumours by chance when having an MRI scan on a sore hip.

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Seine to open for public swimming after Paris Olympics, mayor says

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Three monitored river bathing zones in the French capital will open in 2025, said the mayor, Anne Hidalgo

A quarter of a century after the late president Jacques Chirac promised Parisians they would be able to swim in the Seine within three years, the French capital’s mayor has confirmed three river bathing areas are to open in the city in 2025.

The sites – opposite the central Île Saint-Louis in the centre, by the Quai de Grenelle in the 15th arrondissement to the west, and at Bercy in the eastern 12th arrondissement – will be monitored by lifeguards and marked by buoys, Anne Hidalgo said on Sunday.

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Swimmers poised for biggest mass trespass so far at Kinder reservoir

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Sunday’s event in Peak District will mark anniversary of Kinder Scout protest, seen as crucial in establishing right to roam in UK

Up to 1,000 swimmers are expected to head to Kinder reservoir in Derbyshire on Sunday in the biggest trespass of the water to date. The turnout will mark the anniversary of a mass trespass that helped establish the principle of the right to roam in the UK.

The swim trespass of Kinder reservoir, situated below Kinder Scout where the 1932 protest took place, has become an annual event and is growing rapidly with the boom in wild swimming.

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Swimming Australia CEO Eugenie Buckley resigns with immediate effect

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  • SA on search for third chief executive in less than two years
  • National championships start on Monday on the Gold Coast

Swimming Australia is searching for another new chief executive after the shock resignation of Eugenie Buckley with immediate effect on Friday.

With less than 18 months to go to the Paris Olympics and the national championships starting on Monday on the Gold Coast, Buckley has left “to take up opportunities outside of the sport”, after taking over the top job in swimming in late 2021.

Australian Associated Press contributed to this report

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Four new wild swimming sites in England open for summer season

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Bathing waters in Rutland, Devon and Suffolk will be monitored for water quality regularly

Wild swimming fans will be able to enjoy access to four new sites in the UK that are being designated as bathing waters ahead of summer, the government has announced.

The sites in Rutland, Devon and Suffolk will receive bathing water status from next month, meaning they will soon benefit from regular water-quality monitoring.

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Naked ambition: Sydney swimmers bare all but fail to reach world record

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More than a thousand nude swimmers stripped off and plunged into Sydney Harbour for the annual event held for the first time since 2019

More than 1,000 Aussies have bared all in the annual nude swim, which has returned after a three-year hiatus.

The hundreds of nude swimmers plunged into the water off Cobblers Beach for the Sydney Skinny in the city’s north on Sunday.

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‘A heightened euphoria’: the Australian swimmer taking on the ice mile

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Peta Bradley won bronze at the ice swimming world championships after training in a NSW country dam

Covid lockdowns and the closure of the local pool forced a swim team in Armidale, New South Wales, to get creative – and now one of them has broken the Australian record for ice swimming and won bronze at the world championships.

Peta Bradley, 27, placed third in her age group for the 500m freestyle at the recent world championships of the International Ice Swimming Association (IISA) in Samoens, France, and placed ninth overall, setting an Australian record of 07.33.85. She set another Australian record by placing fourth in her age group in the 1,000m, and also came fourth in the 50m butterfly.

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Researchers warn of potentially fatal condition for open-water swimmers

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Swimming-induced pulmonary oedema involves the accumulation of fluid in the lungs of swimmers without it having been inhaled

A potentially life-threatening condition that can affect fit and healthy open-water swimmers causing them to “drown from the inside” may involve a buildup of fluid in the heart muscle, researchers have suggested.

Swimming-induced pulmonary oedema – SIPE – is a form of immersion pulmonary oedema and involves the accumulation of fluid in the lungs of swimmers without it having been inhaled. The condition is thought to be a result of increased pressure on the body’s blood vessels as a result of exertion, immersion and cold.

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Warning over tropical swimming spots after tourist swept away at Mossman Gorge

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Call for closures from water safety researchers comes as police search for woman missing in far north Queensland waterway

Experts have called for popular tropical attractions to be closed when waterways reach dangerous conditions, after an incident at waterhole in far north Queensland.

The search for a 54-year-old woman, who was swept away in distress at Mossman Gorge, 68km north-west of Cairns, entered its fourth day on Monday, with police divers scouring the water for the missing tourist. She was last seen in the water on Friday.

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Father drowns while trying to save teenage daughter off NSW beach

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Death at Black Head south of Port Macquarie comes after off-duty police officer died when rescuing his teenage son on state’s South Coast

A man has died while trying to save his teenage daughter who was caught in a rip at a beach on the New South Wales mid-north coast.

Police said the 42-year-old man entered the water after his daughter got into trouble at Back beach at Black Head, 75km south of Port Macquarie. He too was caught in the rip on Tuesday afternoon.

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‘This is a tragedy’: off-duty NSW police officer rescued teenage son before drowning

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Man, 45, was caught in a rip after getting his 14-year-old son to safety at a beach on the state’s south coast

An off-duty police officer who drowned at a beach on the New South Wales south coast had swum out to rescue his own son from a “substantial” rip, police say.

The man, who has not been named, had entered the water at a beach south of Narooma after his 14-year-old son was caught in a rip on Sunday.

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Australian denied gold at world short course swimming after bizarre re-run of final following technical error

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  • Isaac Cooper swam initial 50m backstroke in junior world record
  • US’s Ryan Murphy took gold in re-run in slower time

A shattered Isaac Cooper fought back tears after he was cruelly denied a backstroke world short course swimming gold medal in bizarre circumstances after the final had to be re-run.

Cooper was first home in the 50m final in Melbourne on Friday night but less than half the field completed the race after an alarm sounded due to a “technical error”.

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Commonwealth Games must do more for LGBT rights, says former swimmer

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Michael Gunning calls for event to push for change after a ‘petrifying’ visit to his home country, Jamaica

The former Team GB swimmer Michael Gunning has called on the Commonwealth Games to do more to help improve LGBTQ+ rights in member countries as he talked of his “petrifying” experience visiting his home country, Jamaica, for the first time since he came out as gay.

Gunning, who retired from swimming earlier this year to help promote equality in sport, said the event could do more on the global stage to push the issue.

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‘It’s a crisis’: US summer pools closed or cut back amid lifeguard shortage

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Officials say not enough lifeguards to open pools safely but critics say decision to cut services during Covid has had knock-on effect

A nationwide shortage of lifeguards is forcing local pools across the US to close for the summer, according to reports.

In major cities such as New York, Chicago, New Orleans, and elsewhere, public pools are reducing their hours of operation, or shutting down entirely amid an apparent shortage of lifeguards.

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