Viewers of the 2024 Summer Olympics have been caught off guard by the surprisingly slow finish times in the swimming competitions.
The legendary Michael Phelps may be long retired, and no active swimmer will put on the clinics he performed at the 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016 games. Still, some of the world’s top swimmers have disappointed with their finish times at the 2024 Summer Olympics.
As Henry Bushnell of Yahoo Sports noted, the eight swimmers in the men’s 100-meter breaststroke final all finished with times that wouldn’t place them “better than eighth at the Tokyo Olympics three years ago.”
To put it into perspective, Italy’s Nicolò Martinenghi won the 100-meter breaststroke final with a time of 59.03 seconds. Three years ago, American Caeleb Dressel won gold with a time of 47.02 seconds, and eighth-place finisher Nándor Németh of Hungary finished a 48.10 seconds.
Given how much slower the swimmers have been at the 2024 Summer Olympics compared to the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, some viewers think the explanation is simple…that there’s a “slow pool” conspiracy theory:
So many lessons for track to learn as the swim community erupts into chaos at the hands of a “slow pool” — that could be us in a few years, but only if we let it happen!
— Kyle Merber⏱️ (@TheRealMerb) July 28, 2024
I dont know about all that but it’s definitely a slow pool
— Cap’n Scoot (@captscoot) July 29, 2024
@PardonMyTake @BarstoolBigCat no records are being broken because the pool is VERY SLOW https://t.co/WPtCmMcsUn
— Ben Treister (@treister_9) July 29, 2024
France not beating the slow pool allegations https://t.co/GX6wpBBe5B
— Mediocre Swim Analyst (@mediocreanalyst) July 28, 2024
Slow pool allegations are real.
That 100 breast was embarrassingly slow
— Slaylee Goatkeown (@SwimFanAus) July 28, 2024
As Bushnell and several others have pointed out, World Aquatics recommends that pools be three meters deep in Olympic events. The pools at Paris La Défense Arena (the venue for swimming events at the 2024 Summer Olympics) are significantly shallower, with 2.15-meter depths.
What would the Olympics be without another conspiracy theory that is quickly making waves around social media?
2024 Summer Olympics Are Off To A Thrilling Start
Even if folks have been disappointed by the surprisingly slow times of Olympic swimmers, it’s hard to complain about how the rest of the games up to this point.
The men’s and women’s soccer and basketball tournaments are off to exciting starts, for example. We also saw tennis legends Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic deliver a thrilling second-round performance in what is expected to be the last showdown between the two icons. There, Djokovic awaits the winner of Dominik Koepfer vs. Matteo Arnaldi.
