Swimming Olympic Trials are Held too Late

The swimming Olympic trials are held in late June/early July. While this has always been the case, Natalie Coughlin (eleven time Olympic medalist) thinks that this time is way too late to hold trials.

"I absolutely hate how late we have our Olympic trials, and always have," Coughlin said during a teleconference on April 17, 2012.

 Coughlin, who earned six swimming medals at the 2008 Olympic Games, acknowledges that there are arguments for and against holding Olympic trials earlier. She just doesn't necessarily agree with all of those arguments, she said.

 For instance, the end of the college swimming season could interfere with trials, and some coaches believe that allowing swimmers to qualify for the Olympic team too early makes swimmers complacent.

 It's the second argument that Coughlin doesn't agree with, she said. Because of the advent of post-collegiate and professional swimmers, complacency is less of an issue than it would have been in the past, she said.

 "The way swimming has gone in the past decade or so, having a lot more older swimmers -- a lot more post-graduate and professional swimmers -- I think that the idea of complacency, it's not something that would exists where we're all mature adults," Coughlin said during the teleconference. "The Olympic team 15 years ago was quite a bit younger so it was kind of a different group of people."

 Coughlin argues that holding the trials earlier would allow for more decompression time in between team selection and the Olympic Games. In addition, it would allow athletes to spend more time focusing on the events they are actually swimming in the Games, rather than spending time training for events in which they might not qualify.

 "For swimmers to swim multiple events, we have to qualify in each and every event, and you don't want to be training for an event you're not going to compete in for the London Games," Coughlin said during the teleconference.

 Despite what she sees as a less-than-ideal trials schedule, Coughlin believe the U.S. team will do well and come out on top in London, she said.

 "I think it will work out for the U.S. team, I just think it makes us all a lot more stressed out not knowing what we're doing this summer," Coughlin said during the teleconference. "…So it's difficult. I would prefer the earlier, but there's nothing we can do to change it this time around."

--This review with Coughlin was done by Sandra Johnson

I, too, believe that the trials are too late. By the time that college swimming ends and trials begin there is so much time for relaxation to take place. In order to get the best results the trials should really be during a swimmer’s competitive season or rather, at the very end of it. This way they are the fastest that they can be.