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With several significant risk factors associated with COVID-19 ongoing across Australia, Swimming Australia has postponed the 2022 National Flippers and Para Development Camp, stating “the safety of our athletes, coaches and staff was central in our decision making.”

The National Flippers program has been rejuvenated since its initial inception, however its core aim to discover and develop talent remains the same. The tailored program – delivered at state and national level – is designed to prepare and nurture selected athletes who are showing potential, with the hope they can successfully transition to the senior team and represent Australia at major international events within the next four-six years.

The statement advised “over the past 18 months Swimming Australia has adopted COVID-19 protocols to ensure we can keep training and competing and central to these protocols is the ability to access COVID-19 testing to manage risk of spread at activities.

“The most important factor that we took into consideration is the current lack of access and timeliness of results for COVID-19 testing provide by State and Federal Governments. The accessibility of testing and the delay in the results does not allow us to conduct our camp safely and minimise any potential impact of COVID-19 arriving in to camp or being present during our camp.

“Testing is required to manage risk in line with our protocols and to provide a safe environment for all. It is our duty of care is to ensure the health and safety of our athletes, coaches and staff is protected, by abiding by Government (State and Federal) policies and restrictions.

“This decision has not been taken lightly but it is important to note that Swimming Australia’s focus now is to allow our athletes to continue to train uninterrupted in their home training environment to set them up for 2022 and beyond. We were also mindful of prolonging expectations of whether the activity was going ahead and the negative impact this could have on everyone involved.

“We are currently looking at alternative replacement activities, in particular whether it is feasible to postpone the camp to a later date or whether we will host state based activities. Options for alternate dates will be discussed with coaches.”

Image courtesy: Swimming Australia  

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