SA swim coach says Olympics look scary after Doha

Scary! That’s how top swimming coach Rocco Meiring views the looming Paris Olympics after watching performances at the world championships in Doha.

Meiring is already worried about the effects of load-shedding on water temperatures come winter, which could sink many medal hopefuls, including his star from Tokyo, Tatjana Schoenmaker.

But even if his Tuks pool were to enjoy an uninterrupted power supply for the next five months, watching new talent rise to the fore in the absence of the established stars who gave the unseasonal championships a miss was a cause for concern.

“You could mistakenly say that the best of the world were not all at this competition,” Meiring said on his return this week. “What people forget is that there are so many others ready to take their place, which has happened.

“So suddenly there are no spaces left open and you have new swimmers that are stepping up. So looking towards the Olympics, it’s scary to see at what level our opposition are performing in February, which is a month that we are not supposed to be competing.

“If you ask me whether I’m confident and I’m happy and whatever, looking forward to the Olympics, hell no, I’m not,” he said, emphasising that the last batch of preparation between now and the Games needed to be done properly.

One of his swimmers, Erin Gallagher, who made two finals in Doha, finishing fourth in one, echoed his view.

“It’s very scary,” she said, but pointed out they were in uncharted waters with a championships never before having been held five months before a Games. “I feel like no matter how you race now, it’s no indication of how you’re going to perform in July. And there’s no blueprint to this. I don’t know. It’s never really been done before.”

The unusual scheduling was the result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“All of us are pretty much guinea pigs at this point in time,” Gallagher said. “So, ja, on one hand, it’s very nerve-racking, and the other, it is exciting to know that the rest of the world is performing and swimming fast. And that’s an ultimate motivation for the rest of us.”

Pieter Coetzé, who won the country’s only medal in Doha, a 200m backstroke bronze, said the depth in world swimming was noticeable by the absence of the stars.

“Some finals, it took a faster time to make the final than in previous years, even though maybe the winning times were a bit slower [than previous years]. I haven’t really thought too much, too far ahead to the Olympics yet, because the main thing now is just the daily activities. So I think I’ll take it day by day.”

Lara van Niekerk, the double breaststroke champion at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, who struggled last year because of illnesses, said the gala had given her an intimate understanding of how much work needed to be done.

“It was a big wake up call to show me there’s still a lot of work to be done. I can’t just sit back and it’s not all going to happen overnight. So it was good to be able to compete there at that level to see where the competition is and how everyone is looking.”

Her coach, Eugene da Ponte, focused on the advantages of competing at the championships.

“This was just about going there, getting some experience, getting some racing in, being put under pressure situations and having to perform because those are all things we’re going to experience once we get to Paris. And it's good practice for us because it’s the one thing we really get starved of here in SA — being put in really high-pressure situations.

“People don’t understand the types of pressures you feel when you get to these kinds of galas.”