FINA confirm plans for UAE swim centre

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  • The Hamdan Sports Complex (l) plays host to top swimming events.

    Plans for setting up a FINA-accredited swimming development centre in Dubai are indeed under way, according to the executive director of the sport’s world governing body, Cornel Marculescu.

    The UAE Swimming Federation had previously indicated that arrangements were being made to create a facility that would cater to the region and Marculescu confirmed that FINA and local sports entities are trying to finalise everything “as soon as possible”.

    With swimming making major strides in the Middle East, and the Hamdan Sports Complex hosting a slew of international and local meets as well as providing a home for numerous academies and athletes, Marculescu believes Dubai is the perfect venue.

    “We are trying to build this together with the federation and the Dubai Sports Council. And we have to do it in the Middle East, it’s important, because swimming here is developing so much,” Marculescu told Sport360 on the sidelines of last weekend’s FINA/airweave Swimming World Cup.

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    “This venue here is fantastic, the facility of this Hamdan Sports Complex is unbelievable. With these three, four swimming pools, it’s a fantastic place to prepare.

    “We would run our development programme here, with scholarships to swimmers from the region, providing their expenses for accommodation, for school, for training and food.

    “I cannot tell when exactly (the centre will be up and running) but we’re working very hard on this together with the UAE Swimming Federation to get this finalised as soon as possible.”

    The Swimming World Cup series concluded with its eighth and final stop in Dubai on Saturday and for the first time the meets were held in a long course 50m pool instead of the usual 25m – a change that was met with mixed reactions from the swimmers.

    “It’s the first time we’ve had in the 50m pool and we did that for one purpose only – to allow the swimmers to achieve standard times for qualification for Rio Olympics,” explained Marculescu.

    “I think the reaction was very mixed. There are swimmers who like more speed events, there are swimmers that like 50m. But next year we have the World Short Course Championships in December, in a 25m pool, so the series next year will be 25m to prepare for the World Championships.”

    While stars like Cameron van der Burgh and Chad Le Clos – the current and former champions of the series – have been big fans of the switch to the Olympic standard long course, Katinka Hosszu, World Cup winner for the past four seasons, said the change took her by surprise.

    “We were talking about this a lot, it’s hard to say now for me,” explained Hosszu, a Hungarian world champion and world record holder in the 200m individual medley. 

    "We tried, with my coach and husband Shane, to make a programme that basically we knew exactly what we’re doing by Rio, that was our plan from London. So we’re pretty much doing similar things each year.

    "Obviously we look at what was good and what wasn’t and we try to improve on the programme.

    “I don’t know how it’s going to affect my season, but I sure hope that it will be helpful. Hopefully when we go into January it will be easier and I can improve even more.

    "Obviously we will see what happens in Rio and we can look back on how it affected my preparation.”

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