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Australia pulls team from short-course swimming world championships in Abu Dhabi over travel troubles
- Swimming Australia cites the difficulties its swimmers would face returning home before Christmas as a reason for the withdrawal
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Swimming Australia has scrapped its national short-course titles and won’t be sending a full team to the world short-course championships in December because of travel difficulties associated with the Covid-19 pandemic.
Australia’s elite swimmers have recently returned from the Tokyo Olympics and are undergoing a mandatory 14-day hotel quarantine as part of the country’s strict border protection regulations.
Australian swimmers collected nine Olympic gold medals at the delayed Tokyo Games.
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Swimming Australia chief executive Alex Baumann issued a statement on Monday to confirm next month’s national titles had been cancelled, but said individual swimmers who have qualified and want to compete at the December 16-21 world short-course event in Abu Dhabi would be supported.
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“With limited options to return to Australia, the quarantine requirements following competition falling over the Christmas and New Year period and many of our athletes just undertaken more than 10 weeks away from home, we felt sending a team to the event was not viable,” Baumann said.
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