By Steve Keating
PARIS (Reuters) – The first heat of the men’s 50 metres freestyle at the Paris Olympic pool provided a glimpse of what swimming hopes it’s future looks like.
Or more accurately what swimming needs to look like if it is to grow and open up new markets and revenue streams.
Standing on the blocks for that heat at the La Defense Arena on Thursday was a field made up entirely of Black swimmers and while that was just three athletes the image was nonetheless a powerful one.
There were more signs of progress in the women’s 50m free on Saturday where the first six heats were largely – some entirely – made up of swimmers of colour.
In between those two scenes, and on the other side of Paris on Friday, former-U.S. Olympian Cullen Jones, one of the most successful Black swimmers ever with four Olympic medals, including two gold, was moderating a panel on diversity and described those kind of moments as small but significant steps.
“It was an extremely powerful message,” Jones told Reuters. “There is a movement but it’s going to be a slow process.
“For over 400 years of a culture we have been told this is something you don’t do and so it’s going to take hopefully not that long for it to change, but it’s going to take some time.”
For years swimming has appeared to tread water when it comes to diversity.
The Olympics have reached gender equality in Paris, but on the pool deck swimming looks stuck in the past.
High-tech swimsuits aside, the finals of every event at the La Defense Arena look little different than they might have 64 years ago at the Rome Olympics, with the starting blocks occupied by mostly white swimmers.
Swimming has been on the programme for every modern Games but it wasn’t until the 1988 Seoul Olympics that Suriname’s Anthony Nesty, coach of the U.S. men’s swim team in Paris, became the first swimmer of African descent to win a gold.
It would be nearly another three decades before a Black woman would finally take the top step on an Olympic swim podium in an individual event when the United States’ Simone Manuel won the 100 metres freestyle at the 2016 Rio Games.
Swimming powerhouse the United States brought 46 swimmers to Paris but only two, Shaine Casas and Manuel, are Black.
Manuel, competing in her third Olympics, continues to be the standard bearer for diversity in the sport, her two relay silvers at the Paris Games bringing her haul to seven medals but the sport continues to wait for that crossover star to surface.
Golf has had Tiger Woods, gymnastics Simone Biles, tennis Serena and Venus Williams, but swimming has yet to produce that “it” swimmer who can become a cultural bridge bringing in new diverse fans.
The chances of that athlete emerging would increase if more Black people learned to swim says Jones, who only took up the sport himself after a near-drowning experience as a young boy.
USA Swimming says less than 5% of those registered with the federation are Black or Latino and to change that, says Jones, means undoing 400 years of being told swimming is not something Blacks do and removing cultural stigmas and stereotypes.
“If you’re saying an ‘it’ swimmer like a Leon Marchand or Michael Phelps level it is going to take time,” conceded Jones. “I think we’ve had some great athletes that have made it through, but to get to the level of a Leon Marchand or a Phelps takes a lot.
“I did well and Simone these Olympics surpassed me in medal count so that means we are seeing progress.
“My own career I looked at it as baby steps, and when it comes to this we are going to have to take it step-by-step.”
(Reporting by Steve Keating in Paris; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
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