Commentary: Swimmers Need Better Choices Than Swimming in Poverty or Going Enhanced
Last week in Las Vegas, the Enhanced Games delivered life-changing money for swimmers while making a mockery of clean sport and competitive integrity and using those swimmers to not-so-subtly market controversial and dangerous pharmaceutical products. Days later on the other side of the world, International Olympic Committee President and Olympic-gold-medal-winning swimmer Kirsty Coventry stated that Olympic athletes should not be paid.
Door No. 3, anyone? Simply, elite swimmers deserve better options.
The Enhanced Games delivered what its founders and backers had hoped for: world-class times in most events. Cody Miller, a decade after winning Olympic bronze in the 100 breaststroke and helping the American men to 400 medley relay gold, surged in the breaststroke events. Kristian Gkolomeev swam faster than the world record in the 50 freestyle with a time of 20.81, though not without some red flags. Earlier in the event, he had won the 100 free in 46.60, a time that would rank third-quickest in history.
No top-level females had agreed to sign up for the Enhanced Games, so its CEO, Max Martin, was thrilled to brag about Emily Barclay, previously a little-known swimmer who swam a 50 free time that would have won a medal at every Olympics in history.
All a complete farce, of course. No wonder swimmers swam best times while pumping themselves full of banned substances and donning supersuits long since exiled from the sport. Back when those suits ruled the day in 2009, world records fell in almost every event, many by enormous margins. No one should kid themselves about the extent to which the suits alone change the competition; some benefitted more than others, and swimmers with high muscle density could suddenly contend in events that were never their specialties.
Remember Paul Biedermann breaking the world record out of nowhere in the 400 free? Sprinters like Cesar Cielo and Fred Bousquet could suddenly hang on for the entire length of the 100-meter race. And now Gkolomeev, a 50-meter specialist his entire career up to this point who did not even enter the 100 free at the Paris Games, suddenly does the same.
That’s not even touching on the impact of performance-enhancing drugs, which artificially improve performance while sometimes leaving life-long health effects. The Enhanced camp has delivered mixed messaging: swimmers joining up have argued this represents a second career, something totally separate from clean sport, but the business minds have openly encouraged the general public to use their drugs.
Anyone visiting the official website for the Enhanced Games will immediately see the statement, “You Know There’s More.” The site then encourages its audience to “Get Enhanced” and “Shop Enhanced” before mentioning anything about the competition that took place days ago.
That’s a sales platform and a scam, not a sporting event. So much for athlete-first.
IOC President Kirsty Coventry — Photo Courtesy: Emily Cameron
Then Coventry spoke up, poorly. She had achieved success, with seven Olympic medals and two golds, despite coming from the nontraditional nation of Zimbabwe. Performance-based payments, Coventry argued, would detract from IOC initiative aiding swimmers and athletes in her position. Even worse, Coventry opined that Olympic athletes should not be compensated for the use of their name, image and likeness during the Games because the IOC provides “beautiful venues,” “beautiful villages” and “a beautiful experience.”
Olympic athletes knew right away it was bogus. Matt Richards, the British freestyler who claimed gold and silver medals in Paris, summed it up perfectly: “I’m not saying this to complain – I absolutely love competing at the Olympics, and I’ll do it again. But the idea that athletes should be grateful for “beautiful venues and a beautiful experience” while the organisation around them operates as a commercial empire, generating billions every year, is one of the most backwards things in sport.”
Perhaps realizing the tone deaf nature of her comments, Coventry backtracked slightly. She only meant she disfavored prize money at the Games, claiming “that it would only benefit a small number of athletes.” The IOC, she believes, should “find ways to directly support a large number of athletes on their journey to becoming Olympians.”
A noble ambition, absolutely. What’s the plan for countering the deep pockets of the Enhanced Games? Keep offering $1 million bonuses, and Ben Proud will not be the last swimmer in his prime to defect. More might go the Hunter Armstrong route, competing clean against drugged-up competition in order to fund their Olympic hopes. Even those dedicated to clean competition and despising Enhanced might change their mind with that amount of cash on the table. As swimmers get older and consider their future prospects, including starting a family one day, the calculus changes.
The best pathway to discouraging this option? Create a better one within the current system, and do it quickly.
Maybe don’t try to blow up the status quo like the International Swimming League once did. That lasted just three years with hardly a speck of attention beyond the sport’s core audience, then flamed out after announcing its most ambitious schedule yet once its lone backer encountered financial difficulties.
Swimming already has top-notch signature events, with the Olympics and long course edition of the World Championships as highlights. Have a meet like that every year, and that’s where the stakes — and prize money — would be the greatest. Events like the World Cup circuit each fall, the China Open this March and the recent Mare Nostrum tour provide excellent chances for international racing during the year. Create more meets like that, and follow the China model for large financial incentives.
Athletes in all major U.S. sports leagues have achieved concessions from owners through collective bargaining. These individuals have won improved working conditions and minimum salaries from using their collective voice. That approach might be the only way to truly change swimming within its current parameters.
But the current reality has an IOC President feigning an athlete-centric approach since she only stepped away from competition a decade ago. Coventry’s words, however, fall more in line with IOC orthodoxy. Keep that up, keep preventing the athletes from thriving within the Olympic movement, and the shameful Enhanced Games will continue to gain ground.