{"id":470796,"date":"2021-04-24T13:41:45","date_gmt":"2021-04-24T20:41:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=470796"},"modified":"2021-04-24T13:42:39","modified_gmt":"2021-04-24T20:42:39","slug":"after-very-heartbreaking-experience-likith-prema-speaks-up-about-timing-manipulation-uzbekistan-refutes-allegations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/after-very-heartbreaking-experience-likith-prema-speaks-up-about-timing-manipulation-uzbekistan-refutes-allegations\/","title":{"rendered":"After \u2018Very Heartbreaking\u2019 Experience, Likith Prema Speaks Up About Timing Manipulation; Uzbekistan Refutes Allegations"},"content":{"rendered":"

After \u2018Very Heartbreaking\u2019 Experience, Likith Prema Speaks Up About Timing Manipulation<\/strong><\/p>\n

Likith Prema\u2019s<\/strong> swimming career has generally occurred far from the spotlight.<\/p>\n

The Indian swimmer started when he was four. A native of Bangalore, he trains alone, at different pools around the metropolis whenever he can get time in the water. As the COVID-19 pandemic has shut down India for much of the last year, that\u2019s become an increasingly difficult proposition, driving some swimmers to the brink of retirement<\/a>. Now that the country is being ravaged by the coronavirus, with more than 16 million total cases and a terrifying rash of new infections that have exceeded 300,000 per day over the last week<\/a>, it\u2019s not getting easier.<\/p>\n

But the 22-year-old breaststroker\u2019s dream is to represent his nation in the Olympics. No Indian man has ever attained an Olympic A cut; the first one to do so will mark a watershed for the subcontinent.<\/p>\n

All that history factored into Prema\u2019s decision to set up his phone and edit together a video showing what he alleges is timing fraud at the Uzbekistan Open last week<\/a>. For all those hours compounding into months and years that Prema has spent staring at the black line, toiling to trim fractions of a second off his times, seeing whole seconds undeservedly lopped off swimmers\u2019 times by meet administrators was an affront that he couldn\u2019t let stand.<\/p>\n