Dean Boxall Urges Australia To Get Olympic Swimmers Like Ariarne Titmus Back In Pool By May

Dean Boxall and Ariarne Titmus
Dean Boxall with Ariarne Titmus - Photo Courtesy: Swimming Australia/Delly Carr

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Dean Boxall, coach to World 400m freestyle champion Ariarne Titmus and 2015 double World backstroke champion Mitch Larkin, has voiced what elite programs across the world are planning for: a return to the pool for excellence programs working in controlled environments long before public and leisure pools open the doors when its safe to do so as the coronavirus pandemic is brought under control.

Boxall has called for Australia’s elite swimmers to be allowed access to a training pool in “the next two weeks”, saying they need to return “very soon” to prepare for the rescheduled Tokyo Olympic Games. He believed that if his swimmers only get back into full training by September, they will struggle to get back to best form in time for a Tokyo Games in July 2021. A return in July and August this year would still make things “difficult”.

His wish is one to be found far and wide on the wind across the world of water.

When Britain announced a wave of moves among national-team next-wavers on Monday, it effectively fast-forwarded plans to have the likes of Freya Anderson and others transit from local programs to Performance Centres with Olympic coaches.

That decision anticipates the probable opening, long before pools in general, of major training-centre facilities such as those at Loughborough and Bath universities. Their pools are not open to the general public, can continue to be closed to students and can be operated in controlled circumstances, including the numbers of swimmers in the pool at any one time, commensurate with efforts to ease lockdown measures.

Coaches and athletes the world over have been given a new date with the Tokyo Olympic Games, now due to start on July 23, 2021. Uncertainty does not only surround that new timeline: many did not yet know when national trials will be held nor do they have any clue as to when they will be able to return to daily training in water.

The likes of Katie Ledecky and Lilly King are reported to be training in backyard pools in the United States, while coach Bob Bowman said today that his team in Arizona is getting “very comfortable now with ‘I don’t know.’ ”  One of his charges, 2012 Olympic 200m freestyle champion Allison Schmidt is getting 45 minutes in the water three times a week at a local country club.

Boxall had to close his St Peters Western program a month ago as Australia imposed lockdown measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 and the International Olympic Committee and Tokyo 2020 organisers announced a year-long delay in staging the Olympics.

Australia is well down the league of nations that suffered the worst of the pandemic since the spread of the virus emerged from Wuhan in China. To date, 6,647 Australians have contracted the virus, which has caused 74 deaths in the country according to official figures, compared to 819,175 Americans, among whom 45,343 have lost their lives.

While wary of the threat posed by the pandemic, Boxall hopes that guidelines will soon be introduced to ensure elite swimming squad members can get back to pool training.

“I don’t want to be seen as someone who is not in touch with what is happening,” he told reporter Laine Clark of The Australian Associate Press (AAP). Dean Boxall added:

“I get it, people are dying. It is a terrible crisis. But you go to parks and you see stacks of people but we can’t get elite swimmers to swim in a pool. We want to get back in the water but we can’t, we are hamstrung. I am not talking about the whole swimming community in Australia returning to pools, just the elite guys.”

The longer Australia’s elite swimmers spent out of the pool, the longer it would take for them to get back in shape, the coach said, adding:

“They need to be in the water very soon, like the next two weeks, just to get the body back into a rhythm. Usually if you have a month off, it takes you two months to get back into it – it’s normally double. If you call it (pool training return) in September it is going to be a struggle. If you call it in July, August, it is still difficult – they need to get back in the water.”

Coronavirus survives in water for long periods of time, stretching to weeks and even months in some circumstances but the water itself in treated pools is not the issue. Rather, the risk comes down to the closeness of contact and hygiene habits in pools and open water.

Dean Boxall believed swimmers would not balk at any stringent conditions placed on them in return for permission to get back in the pool. He told AAP:

“Of course we want to be in line with government (coronavirus) guidelines, so give us heavy, strict protocols (at pool) and I promise you that we will adhere to them. If they told us we can only have one person an hour, or a person in every second lane, if this was the policy put in place we would follow it.”

Boxall said his squad members had “suffered a shock to the system” when the lockdown was imposed and Olympic plans blown off course. He said:

“Everyone grieved and dealt with it in a different way. But everyone has got through that stage. They are now going ‘I see a lot of people doing exercise, maybe we can get back into the water’.

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Roy Shepherdson
3 years ago

Bell end

Trent Hadley
3 years ago

“Just the elite” ?‍♂️

Jason Stegbauer
3 years ago

How do you classify just the elite swimmers to return to training??? That would be interesting.

Pamela Goldsbro
3 years ago

Jason Stegbauer … probably people that have qualifying times for Olympic trials!

Dirk G. Winkler
3 years ago

Jason Stegbauer
simple, more than 8 session weekly, more than 4500 meters a session. Competition background and times to show for it.

Pamela Goldsbro
3 years ago

Dirk G. Winkler … whilst I personally think that is a pretty good benchmark, most half decent high school aged swimmers are doing that and there would be too many people saying “little Johnny” should be is that squad driving the coaches nuts.

Jason Stegbauer
3 years ago

Dirk G. Winkler it’s not that simple Dirk G. Winkler….sorry.

Hoon Ko
3 years ago

Jason Stegbauer pretty sure he would say something like, a top 10 world time this year – conveniently so only like 20-30 Australian swimmers (men and women) would be considered “elite”

Jason Stegbauer
3 years ago

Hoon Ko that is why it is so wrong…..what about the competition.

Hoon Ko
3 years ago

Jason Stegbauer yeppp

Ophelia Ko
3 years ago

Seriously. ??‍♀️

Kevin Bolivar
3 years ago
Reply to  Ophelia Ko

Ophelia Ko if you don’t understand elite sports, don’t comment please

Ophelia Ko
3 years ago
Reply to  Ophelia Ko

Kevin Bolivar I have a kid in it. I understand it perfectly. Just as I understand that lives are also more important. And you have to be alive to participate.

Kevin Bolivar
3 years ago
Reply to  Ophelia Ko

Ophelia Ko kid is not the same of elite Olympic athlete, and that coach says not for everyone, only elite swimmers. Please read all article

Ophelia Ko
3 years ago
Reply to  Ophelia Ko

Kevin Bolivar Is representing one’s country elite enough for your interpretation of the word?
And yet, I would still have my kid be safe than having a chance of getting the virus.
Guess thats where we differ in priorities.

Rylo
Rylo
3 years ago

Fair enough I reckon. The swimming Australia podium squads should get access to their pools immediately. It’s not that complicated. There are already swimmers training in private (typically 25m) pools with their coaches one on one… given this is already happening, surely public centres can be provided to these podium squads as a first step. No issues whatsoever from me. I know of one centre already open… now for the others…

David Came
3 years ago

Plenty of ocean to tick your arms over, just need to think beyond the black line.

Kel Senior
3 years ago
Reply to  David Came

David Came not inland ? & can’t even drive to coast ??

David Came
3 years ago
Reply to  David Came

Kel Senior that’s a shame, live on the ocean and getting 3km a day. Hopefully the pools will be open soon.

Robyn Burton
Robyn Burton
3 years ago
Reply to  David Came

David Came. You too, have no idea. Its a lot more than ‘just ticking your arms over’.

Fiona Crabb
3 years ago

Ben Richardson love a good code brown!! ?

Monique McKay
3 years ago

?‍♀️

Melbourne swammer
Melbourne swammer
3 years ago

Titmus is not an “Olympic swimmer”–has never qualified for, or swum in, the Olympics.

GB
GB
3 years ago

Titmus is a world champion ready for her first Olympics and by far our best over 200, 400 & 800 as her world championship swims proved

Adelaide
Adelaide
3 years ago
Reply to  GB

Still, Titmus not an “Olympic Swimmer” per the headline, no matter how you spin it. That’s why we have qualifiers. It demeans those who have actually swum for AUS in the Olympics. And who is Dean kidding anyway, Arnie has a pool in her backyard.

Elaine Colborne
3 years ago

There are swimmers incl Ariane Titmus who have not yet qualified for the olympic team. 12 months of training can mean improvement in times. All these swimmers need pool time not just those with good times done at least 18 months before next olympics.

Nick Owen
3 years ago

Elaine Colborne no swimmers have qualified for the Olympics at this stage.

Elaine Colborne
3 years ago

Nick Owen I know. I’m a swimming mother many years experience with Australian teams daughter world rec holder. They need to be in the water.

Nick Owen
3 years ago

Elaine Colborne they sure do!! SA are back soon, hopefully won’t be long now.

Sam Johnsk
Sam Johnsk
3 years ago

Dean Boxall’s approach is going to lead to unnecessary illness and death. Stay home.

Peter Scott
3 years ago

So which is more important training elite swimmers or teaching non swimmers a skill that might just save them from drowning?…..?stay safe?

Peter Scott
3 years ago

The important thing is getting pandemic under control. Then extensive testing and continued social distancing and protective measures until way after a vacine has been developed and freely available. Sadly current estimates are that we are many, many months and potentially years from that senario. As thing stand a year might seem a long way away but in the timeframe of this pandemic planning to hold the Olympics in 2021 might well be too optimistic……?stay safe?

Annette Rose
3 years ago

Lisa Guthrie-Quinn

Lisa Guthrie-Quinn
3 years ago
Reply to  Annette Rose

Annette Rose they’ve mentioned it’ll go back in reverse order so hopefully pools will be open in the next few weeks. If footballers are being allowed to play shortly then there’s room to debate other sports might be able to return to some version of activity.

Dan Moren
3 years ago

Brent Falkner

Peter Robinson
3 years ago

I thought they were training at the AIS

Scott Hartwell
3 years ago

Agree Dean Boxall they are allowing the NRL to start training from next week … has to be fair ?

Lyn Dekkers
3 years ago

Julie Crimmins

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