Swimming Australia, in a stroke that will surprise the swimming community over, has made a last-minute addition to their Olympic Swim Team in the form of 17-year old distance freestyler Jarrod Poort.
While it seemed that only ‘A’ times would get a swimmer onto the Dolphins’ team, when FINA notified the Australian Olympic Committee that Poort was among the invitees to the Games with a consideration time in the 1500, they immediately ratified his selection.
He was the winner of the race at the 2012 Australian Olympic Trials meet in March, and though his 15:13.38 knocked 11-seconds off of his personal best, it still missed the FINA Automatic time by about two more. He ranks only 28th in the world this year in the event.
This was to be the lone event that Australia wasn’t to be represented in at the Olympics, which would be a huge irony in that over the last 5 Olympic Games, Australia has 4 gold and 4 silver medals in the event. That’s a fact that has many Australians startlingly-worried about the state of their beloved distance program, especially considering that two of the world’s best (Sun Yang from China and Tae Hwan Park from South Korea) are training within their borders.
But Poort becomes the 45th member of the Swimming Australia Olympic Team, and there is hope that this will accelerate the re-development of this specialty ahead of the Rio 2016 Games.
“Since Trials I have been training like I was on the Team and going to London, so to have it all confirmed today is pretty cool,” Poort said. “I was thrilled when I was told this morning,” Poort said. “I knew I would find out either way around about now so I have been a bit anxious and it is really exciting.”
To read about the other 44 members of the Australian Olympic Team, click here.