“Now is the chance for them all to come together, train together, compete together in a friendly atmosphere; that’s the main goal. But maybe we will use this period of time to teach them a little bit about how to change from an amateur mindset to a professional mindset. <\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

We now have a chance to work with them on that.”<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

As the swimming world dreams of a post-coronavirus return to the water in shoals, pods and clubs, the International Swimming League (ISL)<\/strong> is planning\u00a0to make the biggest splash.<\/p>\n

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Katie Ledecky – Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick<\/p><\/div>\n
Of the total,\u00a0 <\/span>$6m will go on monthly wages of at least $1500 per swimmer to tide them over. ISL\u2019s 30 \u201cambassadors\u201d, the likes of Olympic gold medallists Katy Ledecky, Katinka Hosszu, Cate Campbell, Sarah Sjostrom, Mireia Belmonte, Adam Peaty, Ryan Murphy, Caeleb Dressel,\u00a0Florent\u00a0Manaudou\u00a0<\/strong>and Chad Le Clos<\/strong>, will receive between $3,500 and $5,000 a month. Grigorishin has also set aside $5m for prizes and bonuses to be paid for weekend League matches.<\/p>\n
There’s a key to the money: they have to be there.<\/p>\n
Solidarity Swim Camp<\/strong><\/h2>\nGrigorishin will also fund five weeks of training and competition<\/a> for all 10 teams at a venue yet to be decided, the Gold Coast in Australia among favourites<\/a>, in October and November this year. The timing of the camp is subject to developments in the\u00a0coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic<\/strong> including an end to social distancing and a restart of whole industries, including the travel and sports sectors.<\/p>\n
The plan evolved from a conference call with League team managers and coaches. In an exchange between James Gibson,<\/strong> head coach to Energy Standard<\/strong><\/a>, the team Grigorishin started, and Cali Condors<\/strong> manager Jason Lezak<\/strong>, the American relay legend said \u2018look we may soon have a problem with some swimmers because they will end their careers because they\u2019ll have no income, no sponsorship contracts for the next year. They will just stop swimming\u2019, recalled Grigorishin. He added:<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I started to think about how we can help them to get through this tough period and we came to this idea of solidarity.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Described by media as a ‘Swimming Reality TV’ gathering, Solidarity Swim Camp will offer the class of pro-swim pioneers a chance to graduate in professional mindset studies, says Grigorishin.<\/p>\n
Think more Survivor<\/em> than either Jungle Camp <\/em>or Love island<\/em>; more tactics and tendons than trauma, tenderness and tension; more brain and brawn in balance; more athletic achiever than famous just for being so. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
Yes, there\u2019ll be a chance to reacquaint, to form new friendships-for-life, to test and learn from each other in training, to bond in the common cause of excellence in swimming.\u00a0 <\/span>Team colours and flags will be flown, too, in the next-level of a fun competition format that last year jolted the very best in the pool away from the championship formats and cycles that have dominated the sport since at least the dawn of World Championships in 1973.<\/p>\n
Grigorishin, however, sees Solidarity Swim Camp<\/strong> as more than bringing the League family back together and celebrating common interests.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
A Chance To Fast Forward The Swimming Revolution<\/h2>\n $\"Konstantin$
Konstantin Grigorishin Photo Courtesy: ISL<\/p><\/div>\n
“Repatriation of the community, that’s the main goal of the camp,” says Grigorishin, adding:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to use this five-week camp to create a collective subconsciousness among swimmers.\u00a0How, we thought, can we implement this feeling of unity, one of unification, that they understand that they have power when they stand together. This will be a great experience. It\u2019s unprecedented in swim history for all of them to come together\u00a0 <\/span>Yes, many come together during a World Championship or an Olympics but just for a few days, a week or so.\u00a0 And then just to race – and not so many swimmers at the elite end.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
That latter reference takes Grigorishin back to the cultural divide he believes is essential to establish between the traditional Olympic-format competition in the pool and the League\u2019s format, with its lack of prelims, a team-based entertainment show of lights, cameras, action. Grigorishin explains:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Olympic Games is about some super swimmers and then a lot of amateur swimmers but there an no \u2018tier-two\u2019 swimmers, athletes who are professionals but not on the same level as Katinka [Hosszu]<\/a>, Sarah [Sjostrom], Adam [Peaty]<\/strong> and others like them.\u201d<\/p>\n
“Now is the chance for them all to come together, train together, compete together in a friendly atmosphere; that’s the main goal. But maybe we will use this period of time to teach them a little bit about how to change from an amateur mindset to a professional mindset. We now have a chance to work with them on that.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
On what? Excuses, he suggests before providing a couple of examples: \u201cI\u2019m not ready to compete in this match because I have a holiday booked with my girlfriend or I have to go and collect some grapes in my vineyard or whatever.\u201d<\/p>\n
I laugh. Grigorishin allows himself a snigger but adds: \u201cIt\u2019s not a joke, though, these are real situations.\u201d In note a few occasions where star turns have shown up at media events in the branded clothes and kit of companies working in direct opposition to the swimmer\u2019s own sponsor. He\u2019d noticed, too, but reeled the line out further into the depths:<\/p>\n
\u201cYes. It\u2019s another issue which we would like to change. Can you imagine Liverpool soccer team – and each player shows up with a different sponsor logo on their t-shirt? It must sound mad to those in the world of organised professional sport. In swimming it\u2019s normal, each one showing up in different things when they\u2019re at work as a team. That has no impact on the spectator: they\u2019re just confused.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Grigorishin has already done much to show athletes the power they have when they stand together and demand better governance from the guardians of the sport. When the ISL took on FINA in legal challenges to the international federation\u2019s \u201canti-competition monopoly\u201d in court in the United States, the League also backed a class action brought by Hosszu<\/strong>, the Hungarian triple Olympic champion, and American swimmers Tom Shields <\/strong>and Michael Andrew<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
Those challenges followed a ruling in the European Union that called on international sports federations to change rules that gave themselves the right to dictate whether and where athletes could compete. Competition rules allow swimmers, among others, to race for money in competitions organised by entities that are not affiliated to FINA, even though FINA rules can be used to forbid such interactions.<\/p>\n
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Matt Biondi, the director of the Athletes’ Union, with Adam Peaty in London – Photo Courtesy: Craig Lord<\/p><\/div>\n
On Solidarity Swim Camp, we may get to see swimmers discuss with experts where they next intend to take their challenge to the top table of the sport in the wake of Olympic legend Matt Biondi\u2019s appointment as the head of The Swimmers\u2019 Alliance<\/a>.<\/p>\n
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Make Adam Peaty Your Mature Model Of The Athlete, Matt Biondi Urges Americans<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n
2020s Vision \u2013 The Athlete Voice: Matt Biondi\u2019s Mission To Enrich & Educate Swimmers<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
In December 2018, after FINA had blocked a move for the ISL to host a competition in Italy, the League turned to Plan B: call more than 30 of the world\u2019s leading swimmers together in London and introduce them to their own power through a series of presentations given by experts in a number of fields in or related to professional sport.<\/p>\n
One speaker was Rachel Aleks<\/strong>, assistant professor on labour relations at Cornell University in New York, who told the swimmers:<\/p>\n
\u201cBoycotts are not something anyone wants. You also have to understand that your power is the right to withdraw your services, your labour.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
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Sarah Sjostrom – Photo Courtesy: Gian Mattia D’Alberto\/LaPresse<\/p><\/div>\n
Weeks before, Olympic champions Adam Peaty<\/strong> and Sarah Sjostrom<\/strong> were among swimmers who had learned from their respective domestic federations that FINA had demanded to know what penalty was going to be imposed on the athletes because of their support for the ISL. \u201cThe letter was asking, \u2018Why are you saying these words about us?\u2019 That just made me more determined to speak up,\u201d said Peaty, adding that \u201cswimming has been stuck in a rut doing the same things for 30 years and more\u201d.<\/p>\n
It was time for change, time for something else to live in harmony alongside the Olympic program, something that gave swimmers a home for all years and seasons not just the one every four years.<\/p>\n
World-Class \u2018Tier-Two\u2019 Swimmers Fins A Home For Their Excellence<\/h3>\n $\"ISLsolidairityprogram\"$
Cate Campbell gets a helping hand from London Roar coach Mel Marshall – Photo Courtesy: ISL<\/p><\/div>\n
Swimming has for decades been a sport in which retirement of athletes aged between 17 and 20 is commonplace. For many, there was simply no prospect of remaining, no chance of putting off school-finishing exams, degree courses or simply moving on in life in other ways designed to cater for the long-term. Their sport was distinctly short-term; and for the most part highly subsidised by the Bank of Mom and Dad, not \u201cOlympic solidarity\u2019 nor \u2018FINA solidarity\u2019.<\/p>\n
The subsidies and support for development and universality in swimming has not been available for many \u2018tier-two\u2019 swimmers, as Grigorishin describes them. He means those third- and fourth-best Americans and Australians among the world\u2019s best 20 who have had nowhere to go to earn money once they miss the big-meet team by 0.5sec or less in any passing season.<\/p>\n
More than 20 years have passed since this author proposed to FINA that the fastest 30 swimmers in the world across all events on the global rankings, regardless of where they came from, should have a golden ticket to the World Championships. The suggestion did not fit the universal model. For FINA et al it was a non-starter and as such many \u00a0\u2018tier-two\u2019 swimmers were confined to the back of the queue when it came to international prospects, let alone any ability to fund their way through the sport.<\/p>\n
Grigorishin is aiming to make a market of what FINA and its members have long rejected. He tells Swimming World:<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a completely different strategy and format [to the Olympic model]. For us it\u2019s really important to have 300-400 highly competitive swimmers. It\u2019s not just about a few superstars or 40-50 swimmers or even 100 swimmers. It\u2019s about everybody [at the top end of swim speed]. This is a big difference for us because, of course, for the federations, some, shall we say \u2018tier-two swimmers\u2019, they\u2019re not so important because if they have no chance to win the Olympics or be a medallist, they are not so useful, they [the federations] don\u2019t care about them. For us they are necessary, they bring real value.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
That philosophy underpins the style and substance of Grigorishin\u2019s vision for Pro-Swim.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
Traditional Funding Models<\/h3>\n
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Hannah Miley. Photo Courtesy: Connor Trimble<\/p><\/div>\n
Funding models include the British lottery system in which the weekend flutter that enters the public purse is handed out to sports federations on the basis of \u2018return for money\u2019, namely \u201csuccess\u201d. Surveys found that the public want to see their heroes winning come the Olympic Games not finishing \u201ca plucky seventh, his best Olympic result\u201d before instant return to anonymity in the absence of any other reasons \u2018why we should care\u2019.<\/p>\n
What happens next is key.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
No member of the public ever said \u201cwe want you to drop funding for the best two medley swimmers in Britain, because they\u2019re ranked world top 12 not world top 3\u201d; no member of the public ever indicated that lottery money should be denied to the undefeated best in the country in order to fund the next wave yet to prove itself capable of toppling reigning champions\u201d.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
Even so, in Britain, Hannah Miley, a Commonwealth champion of 2010 and 2014 for Scotland and Olympic finalists in 2008, 2012 and 2016, ands Aimee Willmott, Commonwealth 400IM champion of 2018 for England and Olympic finalist in 2016, had their funding removed after the Rio 2016 Olympic Games even though they remained and remain yet the fastest medley swimmers in British Swimming history.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
The ISL offered a financial lifeline – and a fun format that involves a two-hour competition window over two days, no four-hours qualification sessions and long finals that turn a swimming meet into an exhausting, three full days of commitment for athlete, parent, partner, child, fan and everyone else involved.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
Wayne Goldsmith<\/strong> has urged swimming program organisers to consider the “end-user experience”<\/a> among the reasons why engagement in competitive Olympic sports is in decline. He says:<\/p>\n
“Competitive Swimming is one of those sports experiencing significant declines in the number of kids committing to training and racing.\u00a0In response, National Swimming Organizations around the globe are looking for new ways to deliver the swimming experience to children and families.<\/p>\n
“However, it is fair to say that swimming has in general been slow to react to this crisis with the majority of swimming administrators and coaches continuing to do things \u201cthe old-way\u201d and hoping that the participation trends turn around by themselves.<\/p>\n
“The key to helping competitive swimming to not only survive \u2013 but to thrive \u2013 is to look at the \u201cend-user\u201d experience.”<\/p>\n
The news of further support from the League was met with cheer from League swimmers and coaches.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
James Gibson<\/strong>, head coach to the Energy Standard squad and the ISL team that lifted the inaugural League Trophy in Las Vegas<\/a> last December after a tight tussle for supremacy with London Roar, summed up the celebratory mood with this Instagram post:<\/p>\n
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A post shared by J\u1d00\u1d0d\u1d07s G\u026a\u0299s\u1d0f\u0274 MBE (@jamesgibson____)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

A Chance To Fast Forward The Swimming Revolution<\/h2>\nKonstantin Grigorishin Photo Courtesy: ISL<\/p><\/div>\n“Repatriation of the community, that’s the main goal of the camp,” says Grigorishin, adding:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n