Journey Begins in Lausanne for 2015 Hosting Hopefuls

Last week, FINA officially kicked off the journey to the 2015 World Chanpionships when it hosted representatives of the 5 nations that are interested in hosting the 2015 World Aquatics Championships. With less than 6 months to go until the 2011 event, the world is already ramping up for the next Olympic cycle’s equivalent meet, that will be the final major meet in the leadup to the Rio de Janeiro Olympics.

The federations that attended were Hungary, Hong Kong, Korea, Morocco, and Russia to hear about the bidding process. The delegations then hurried back home to prepare their bids, with the winner being announced during this summer’s meet in Shanghai. All of the represented nations are from the Eastern Hemisphere, which means the trend of a decade without an event in the Americas will continue. The United States once again declined to bid for the event, which there has been an increasing clamor for, meaning that the most decorated nation in the history of swimming (they have more than twice as many FINA medals than their closest competitors from Germany) has still never hosted the premier, long-course version of the World Championships.

Let’s break down each of the host countries.

Hong Kong

Though Shanghai, China is playing host to the 14th version of the games, this wouldn’t diminish Hong Kong’s right to host the 16th version. While Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of China, they are represented within FINA by their own Hong Kong Amateur Swimming Association. At any rate, I think there will be hesitance to take the meet geographically so close to where it had been just four years prior, and that Hong Kong’s chances are probably closer to “none” than “slim”. At any rate, they’ve got some experience hosting World Championships before, as they did host the 1999 short course meet, which were a big success. There’s also no doubt that the region, whose per-capita GDP ranks in the top 10 of the world, would have the money to put up a great facility and an all-around spectacular (and lavish) event.

Hungary

Hungary has really ramped up its efforts to attract these type of events. While the nation is quite poor, Budapest is one of the most underrated tourist destinations in Europe, and it would certainly satisfy the unwritten “World’s Great Cities” clause. I’m high on Hungary, but they could really use a transportation upgrade, as their mass-transit infrastructure is crumbling. The water polo part of the event would get possibly the hugest draw it’s ever seen. This is my front-runner, as Budapest has done an excellent job in hosting the 2006 and 2010 European Championships at the Alfred Hajos Swim Center.

Korea

Swimming has exploded in popularity in South Korea since the emergence of Tae Hwan Park as one of the best (and richest) swimmers in the world. The problem here is the lack of swimming infrastructure in the country, as it is sort of “new money” to the aquatics world. They have a little bit of a swimming history, but Park was already by far the best swimmer in the country at 16. This, combined with their rapidly growing economy, makes me nervous that Korea could see a repeat of Dubai in 2010: a huge, impressive complex with lots of fanfare, but an arena that’s never more than half full. Also, with so much of their excitement built around one personality, who doesn’t even train in the country, there’s a chance that the flame will have faded by 2015.

Morocco

Casablanca did host the 2010 African Championships, but even at that event, which is the weakest of continental federations, they only won 6 medals. It’s not a requirement for hosting the meet that a country be one of the top swimming nations in the world, but when you’ve never had a swimmer go faster than 52.4 in the 100m free, it might be time to reconsider your priorities. The money of running an event like this is better invested into a grass-roots program to grow the sport from the ground up. And without getting too political, Morocco will have to demonstrate in the next 6 months that their country has a long-term plan for stability as rumors swirl that the Egyptian protests will spread throughout the North-African region. This match wouldn’t be a good one for either Morocco or FINA, and hopefully both sides realize this before they make the same mistakes as Dubai did when bidding for 2013.

Russia

Russia is the safest pick of the crew. They have a long-established swimming history, and like Hong Kong have hosted a successful short course meet in the past. Moscow hosted the 2002 meet, where 7 world records were set. Amongst the competitors, Russia also has the strongest and richest swimming history. They would also offer the best t0tal-package, with an incredible history in all 5 FINA disciplines. Furthermore, with the awarding of the 2014 Winter Olympics and 2018 World Cup, the investments in sporting infrastructure in Russia is going to come to a blazing speed. But could this leave FINA uncertain about whether the pool of dollars would dry up without focus on the pool, as this would be the lowest-ranking of the three events.

In recent years, FINA has seemed to focus on two major components when making selections: Ability to throw large amounts of dollars at the event, and expanding the sport into large new markets. This is not withstanding the 2013 event in Barcelona, Spain, which was a late-day replacement after Dubai backed out. That selection was based mainly on the ability to put together a successful event on a shortened time table. My preference would be to see the meet in Hungary, but based on what we’ve seen lately, my prediction is South Korea.