Swimming Canada has released its qualifying standards for the next Olympic quad, including the cuts for its newly-added Short Course National Championship meet.
- See the full set of Canadian standards 2025-2028 here.
- See the full set of Canadian standards 2021-2024 here.
The standards will feed into the country’s new ‘Canadian Way’ scheduling system that will bring a bit more organization to the country’s annual rotation. The locations for most of the major meets, including the 2028 Olympic Trials in Toronto, have already been named.
The standards also have a note about Open Water Trials, which will be held “in partnership in USA Swimming.” This implies that Canadian open water swimmers will be chosen out of USA Swimming’s Trials, scrapping the experimental Cayman Islands hosts.
The standards are labeled for 2025-2028, but include a note that “Standards will be reviewed annually in August to ensure size of meets are still appropriate and changes will only be made if required.”
For the biggest meets – Trials – standards have gotten a little faster in the new quad, though rarely more than a 1% drop. As an example, that equates to .51 seconds faster in the women’s 100 free; but only .17 seconds in the women’s 100 breast.
Canada has different standards for Juniors and Seniors to qualify to its National meet, which allows junior-aged swimmers to get experience without the meet becoming too large.
The biggest reaction from Canadian swimming people has been about the short course standards, which are quite a bit faster than the standards at the Canadian Open.
This is turning heads because the August timing of that meet replaced the country’s traditional junior meets – the Eastern and Western Championships and Junior Nationals. Some coaches were expecting the short course meet to be more accessible to junior-aged swimmers, but the time standards will keep many of them out (they’re faster, for example, than the Juniors standard to qualify for the National Trials meets).
2025-2028 Women’s Standards
| Event | Trials – Senior | Trials – Junior | SC Champs – SCM | SC Champs – LCM | Canadian Open – SCM | Canadian Open – LCM |
| 50 fr | 26.52 | 27.23 | 26.01 | 26.79 | 26.36 | 27.15 |
| 100 fr | 56.94 | 58.58 | 55.83 | 57.51 | 56.61 | 58.31 |
| 200 fr | 2:04.00 | 2:07.20 | 2:01.59 | 2:05.24 | 2:02.47 | 2:06.14 |
| 400 fr | 4:25.15 | 4:30.43 | 4:20.00 | 4:27.80 | 4:21.15 | 4:28.98 |
| 800 fr | 9:11.99 | 9:21.43 | 9:01.27 | 9:17.51 | 9:02.58 | 9:18.86 |
| 1500 fr | 17:46.28 | 17:59.67 | 17:25.58 | 17:56.94 | 17:36.18 | 18:07.87 |
| 50 bk | 30.47 | 31.04 | 29.88 | 30.77 | 29.96 | 30.86 |
| 100 bk | 1:04.22 | 1:05.87 | 1:02.97 | 1:04.86 | 1:03.64 | 1:05.55 |
| 200 bk | 2:19.60 | 2:22.70 | 2:16.89 | 2:21.00 | 2:17.89 | 2:22.03 |
| 50 brst | 33.67 | 34.56 | 33.02 | 34.01 | 33.26 | 34.26 |
| 100 brst | 1:12.93 | 1:14.92 | 1:11.51 | 1:13.66 | 1:12.29 | 1:14.46 |
| 200 brst | 2:38.35 | 2:42.80 | 2:35.28 | 2:39.93 | 2:37.33 | 2:42.05 |
| 50 fly | 28.31 | 29.09 | 27.76 | 28.59 | 27.94 | 28.78 |
| 100 fly | 1:02.36 | 1:03.99 | 1:01.15 | 1:02.98 | 1:01.95 | 1:03.81 |
| 200 fly | 2:20.84 | 2:23.28 | 2:18.11 | 2:22.25 | 2:17.87 | 2:22.01 |
| 200 IM | 2:20.93 | 2:24.20 | 2:18.19 | 2:22.34 | 2:20.19 | 2:24.40 |
| 400 IM | 5:03.06 | 5:08.43 | 4:57.18 | 5:06.09 | 4:57.84 | 5:06.78 |
2025-2028 Men’s Standards
| 23.73 | 24.56 | 23.27 | 23.97 | 23.42 | 24.12 | |
| 100 fr | 51.57 | 53.25 | 50.57 | 52.09 | 51.07 | 52.6 |
| 200 fr | 1:53.53 | 1:56.47 | 1:51.33 | 1:54.67 | 1:51.62 | 1:54.97 |
| 400 fr | 4:03.10 | 4:10.18 | 3:58.38 | 4:05.53 | 3:59.01 | 4:06.18 |
| 800 fr | 8:29.46 | 8:44.23 | 8:21.51 | 8:36.55 | 8:27.93 | 8:43.17 |
| 1500 fr | 16:23.72 | 16:31.79 | 15:59.76 | 16:28.56 | 16:06.66 | 16:35.66 |
| 50 bk | 27.67 | 28.23 | 27.13 | 27.95 | 27.09 | 27.9 |
| 100 bk | 58.29 | 1:00.11 | 57.16 | 58.87 | 57.89 | 59.63 |
| 200 bk | 2:08.48 | 2:11.69 | 2:05.99 | 2:09.76 | 2:06.13 | 2:09.91 |
| 50 brst | 30.15 | 31.04 | 29.56 | 30.45 | 29.41 | 30.29 |
| 100 brst | 1:05.39 | 1:07.45 | 1:04.12 | 1:06.04 | 1:04.36 | 1:06.29 |
| 200 brst | 2:22.41 | 2:28.54 | 2:20.62 | 2:24.83 | 2:20.41 | 2:24.62 |
| 50 fly | 25.67 | 26.19 | 25.17 | 25.93 | 25.14 | 25.89 |
| 100 fly | 55.69 | 57.41 | 54.61 | 56.25 | 55.30 | 56.96 |
| 200 fly | 2:06.55 | 2:10.89 | 2:04.58 | 2:08.32 | 2:04.34 | 2:08.07 |
| 200 IM | 2:09.02 | 2:12.21 | 2:07.10 | 2:10.91 | 2:06.94 | 2:10.75 |
| 400 IM | 4:37.96 | 4:44.63 | 4:32.56 | 4:40.74 | 4:33.61 | 4:41.82 |
The performance development path for junior swimmers beyond the provincial level becomes unclear. For Ontario, the largest province, there are now only two meets, with just one high-level championship in mid-July.
Eliminating the Easterns/Westerns and the Canadian Junior Championships (currently run simultaneously with LC Summer Nationals) leaves few meets for all but the top-tier swimmers. For instance, only 12 boys under 17 (including two unattached Americans from our trials) have made the new Summer Nationals 100m freestyle qualifying time this season. Will there be Jr finals so they all get a second swim? Or no Jr finals so they get even fewer races?
The current times and design will likely result in a sparsely attended summer meet with few qualifiers… Read more »
(for a little more context, there are a total of 39 entries at next week’s nationals/CJC (all ages) under next year’s QT in the M 100fr. https://results.swimming.ca/2024_Speedo_Canadian_Swimming_Championships/
Trials standards should be faster for both men and women.
They could be, but with a few exceptions (eg. 50 fr) this year, in an Olympic year, there were only 6-8 heats of each event.
There aren’t all that many Canadian swimmers even hitting the current standards, so unless you want a meet with like 150 swimmers, I think the standards are fine.