Timeline for World Champs in Melbourne Could Hinge on IOC Decision Concerning Beijing

MELBOURNE, Australia, July 7. NEXT month, the International Olympic Committee is expected to announce whether the championship finals of the swimming events for the Beijing Olympics will be switched to the morning, in order to meet a request by NBC Television. If that scenario does unfold, it could influence the way the 2007 World Championships are conducted.

Recently, NBC asked that prelims be held in the evening in Beijing and finals be held in the morning so that it could broadcast the championship races to its United States audience in primetime. That type of change, obviously, would influence the preparation of the athletes. Consequently, reports out of Australia have indicated that if the Olympic alterations go through, there’s a possibility that the World Champs will follow a similar timeline. The World Championships are slated for Melbourne in March.

Beyond the World Championships, expect several meets to adopt a morning-finals format to acclimate athletes with the different format. Around the world, there has been a strong distaste for the possibility of moving the finals to the morning, mainly because of the suggestion that American television is more important than the athletes. During the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, half of the finals were held in the morning, with the other championship races conducted at night.

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