swimming, in recreation and sports, is the propulsion of the body through water by combined arm and

leg motions and the natural flotation of the body. Swimming as an exercise is popular as an all-around
body developer and is particularly useful in therapy and as exercise for physically handicapped persons.
It is also taught for lifesaving purposes. For activities that involve swimming, see also diving, lifesaving,
surfing, synchronized swimming, underwater diving, and water polo.

History

Archaeological and other evidence shows swimming to have been practiced as early as 2500 BCE in
Egypt and thereafter in Assyrian, Greek, and Roman civilizations. In Greece and Rome swimming was a
part of martial training and was, with the alphabet, also part of elementary education for males. In the
Orient swimming dates back at least to the 1st century BCE, there being some evidence of swimming
races then in Japan. By the 17th century an imperial edict had made the teaching of swimming
compulsory in the schools. Organized swimming events were held in the 19th century before Japan was
opened to the Western world. Among the preliterate maritime peoples of the Pacific, swimming was
evidently learned by children about the time they walked, or even before. Among the ancient Greeks
there is note of occasional races, and a famous boxer swam as part of his training. The Romans built
swimming pools, distinct from their baths. In the 1st century BCE the Roman Gaius Maecenas is said to
have built the first heated swimming pool.

The lack of swimming in Europe during the Middle Ages is explained by some authorities as having been
caused by a fear that swimming spread infection and caused epidemics. There is some evidence of
swimming at seashore resorts of Great Britain in the late 17th century, evidently in conjunction with
water therapy. Not until the 19th century, however, did the popularity of swimming as both recreation
and sport begin in earnest. When the first swimming organization was formed there in 1837, London
had six indoor pools with diving boards. The first swimming championship was a 440-yard (400-metre)
race, held in Australia in 1846 and annually thereafter. The Metropolitan Swimming Clubs of London,
founded in 1869, ultimately became the Amateur Swimming Association, the governing body of British
amateur swimming. National swimming federations were formed in several European countries from
1882 to 1889. In the United States swimming was first nationally organized as a sport by the Amateur
Athletic Union (AAU) on its founding in 1888. The Fédération Internationale de Natation Amateur (FINA)
was founded in 1909.

Competitive swimming

Internationally, competitive swimming came into prominence with its inclusion in the modern Olympic
Games from their inception in 1896. Olympic events were originally only for men, but women’s events
were added in 1912. Before the formation of FINA, the Games included some unusual events. In 1900,
for instance, when the Games’ swimming events were held on the Seine River in France, a 200-metre
obstacle race involved climbing over a pole and a line of boats and swimming under them. Such oddities
disappeared after FINA took charge. Under FINA regulations, for both Olympic and other world
competition, race lengths came increasingly to be measured in metres, and in 1969 world records for
yard-measured races were abolished. The kinds of strokes allowed were reduced to freestyle (crawl),
backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly. All four strokes were used in individual medley races. Many
nations have at one time or another dominated Olympic and world competition, including Hungary,
Denmark, Australia, Germany, France, Great Britain, Canada, Japan, and the United States.

Instruction and training

The earliest instruction programs were in Great Britain in the 19th century, both for sport and for
lifesaving. Those programs were copied in the rest of Europe. In the United States swimming instruction
for lifesaving purposes began under the auspices of the American Red Cross in 1916. Instructional work
done by the various branches of the armed forces during both World Wars I and II was very effective in
promoting swimming. Courses taught by community organizations and schools, extending ultimately to
very young infants, became common.

The early practice of simply swimming as much as possible at every workout was replaced by interval
training and repeat training by the late 1950s. Interval training consists of a series of swims of the same
distance with controlled rest periods. In slow interval training, used primarily to develop endurance, the
rest period is always shorter than the time taken to swim the prescribed distance. Fast interval training,
used primarily to develop speed, permits rest periods long enough to allow almost complete recovery of
the heart and breathing rate.

The increased emphasis on international competition led to the growing availability of 50-metre (164-
foot) pools. Other adjuncts that improved both training and performance included wave-killing gutters
for pools, racing lane markers that also reduce turbulence, cameras for underwater study of strokes,
large clocks visible to swimmers, and electrically operated touch and timing devices. Since 1972 all world
records have been expressed in hundredths of a second. Advances in swimsuit technology reached a
head at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, where swimmers—wearing high-tech bodysuits that
increased buoyancy and decreased water resistance—broke 25 world records. After another round of
record-shattering times at the 2009 world championships, FINA banned such bodysuits, for fear that
they augmented a competitor’s true ability.

Strokes

The earliest strokes to be used were the sidestroke and the breaststroke. The sidestroke was originally
used with both arms submerged. That practice was modified toward the end of the 19th century by
bringing forward first one arm above the water, then the other, and then each in turn. The sidestroke
was supplanted in competitive swimming by the crawl (see below) but is still used in lifesaving and
recreational swimming. The body stays on its side and the arms propel alternately. The leg motion used
in sidestroke is called the scissors kick, in which the legs open slowly, under leg backward, upper leg
forward, both knees slightly bent, and toes pointed. The scissoring action of the legs coming smartly
together after opening creates the forward propulsion of the kick.
The breaststroke is believed to be the oldest of strokes and is much used in lifesaving and recreational
swimming as well as in competitive swimming. The stroke is especially effective in rough water. As early
as the end of the 17th century, the stroke was described as consisting of a wide pull of the arms
combined with a symmetrical action of the legs and simulating the movement of a swimming frog,
hence the usual term frog kick. The stroke is performed lying face down in the water, the arms always
remaining underwater. The early breaststroke featured a momentary glide at the completion of the frog
kick. Later the competitive breaststroke eliminated the glide. In the old breaststroke, breath was taken
in at the beginning of the arm stroke, but in the later style, breath was taken in near the end of the arm
pull.

The butterfly stroke, used only in competition, differs from the breaststroke in arm action. In the
butterfly the arms are brought forward above the water. The stroke was brought to the attention of U.S.
officials in 1933 during a race involving Henry Myers, who used the stroke. He insisted that his stroke
conformed to the rules of breaststroke as then defined. After a period of controversy, the butterfly was
recognized as a distinct competitive stroke in 1953. The frog kick originally used was abandoned for a
fishtail (dolphin) kick, depending only on up-and-down movement of the legs. Later swimmers used two
dolphin kicks to one arm pull. Breathing is done in sprint competition by raising the head every second
or third stroke.

The backstroke began to develop early in the 20th century. In that stroke, the swimmer’s body position
is supine, the body being held as flat and streamlined as possible. The arms reach alternately above the
head and enter the water directly in line with the shoulders, palm outward with the little finger entering
the water first. The arm is pulled back to the thigh. There is a slight body roll. The kick was originally the
frog kick, but it subsequently involved up-and-down leg movements as in the crawl. The backstroke is a
competition stroke, but it is also used in recreational swimming as a rest from other strokes, frequently
with minimum arm motion and only enough kick to maintain forward motion.

The crawl, the stroke used in competitive freestyle swimming, has become the fastest of all strokes. It is
also the almost unanimous choice of stroke for covering any considerable distance. The stroke was in
use in the Pacific at the end of the 19th century and was taken up by the Australian swimmer Henry
Wickham about 1893. The brothers Syd and Charles Cavill of Australia popularized the stroke in Europe
in 1902 and in the United States in 1903. The crawl was like the old sidestroke in its arm action, but it
had a fluttering up-and-down leg action performed twice for each arm stroke. Early American imitators
added an extra pair of leg actions, and later as many as six kicks were used. The kicks also varied in kind.
In the crawl, the body lies prone, flat on the surface of the water, with the legs kept slightly under the
water. The arms move alternately, timed so that one will start pulling just before the other has finished
its pull, thus making propulsion continuous. Breathing is done by turning the head to either side during
recovery of the arm from that side. Since 1896 the crawl has been used in more races than any other
stroke.

Races
In competition there are freestyle races at distances of 50, 100, 200, 400, 800, and 1,500 metres;
backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly races at 100 metres and 200 metres; individual medley races at
200 metres and 400 metres; the freestyle relays, 4 × 100 metres and 4 × 200 metres; and the medley
relay, 4 × 100 metres.

Starts are all (with the exception of the backstroke) from a standing or forward-leaning position, the
object being to get the longest possible glide before the stroke begins. All races are in multiples of the
pool length, so that the touch before turning, which is varied for different stroke races, is important for
success. In relay races, a swimmer finishes his leg of the relay by touching the starting edge of the pool,
upon which his next teammate dives into the water to begin his leg.

Distance swimming

Any swimming competition longer than 1,500 metres (1,640 yards) is considered distance swimming.
Most long-distance races are in the 24- to 59-km (15- to 37-mile) range, though some, such as the Lake
George marathon (67 km [41.5 miles]) and the Lake Michigan Endurance Swim (80 km [50 miles]), both
in the United States, have been longer. FINA governs distance swimming for 5-km, 10-km, and 25-km
(3.1-mile, 6.2-mile, and 15.5-mile) races. In 1954 a group of amateur and professional marathon
swimmers formed the Fédération Internationale de Natation Longue Distance; and in 1963, after
dissension between amateur and professional swimmers, the World Professional Marathon Swimming
Federation was founded. Throughout the 1960s the latter group sanctioned about eight professional
marathons annually, the countries most frequently involved being Canada, Egypt, Italy, Argentina, and
the United States. The British Long Distance Swimming Association has sponsored races on inland
waters of from 16.5 to 35.4 km (10.25 to 22 miles).

The first type of distance swimming to be regulated by FINA was English Channel swimming, which
captured the popular imagination in the second half of the 19th century. Captain Matthew Webb of
Great Britain was the first to make the crossing from Dover, England, to Calais, France, in 1875; his time
was 21 hours 45 minutes. The map distance was 17.75 nautical miles (33 km), but the actual distance of
a Channel Swim is frequently lengthened by tides and winds. No one matched Webb’s feat until 1911,
when another Englishman, T.W. Burgess, made the crossing. In 1926 the American swimmer Gertrude
Ederle became the first woman to swim the Channel, crossing from Cap Gris-Nez, France, to Dover in a
record-setting time for man or woman of 14 hours 31 minutes. Since then, except for the World War II
years, crossing swims have been made annually. Several swimmers have made 10 or more crossings. The
Channel Swimming Association was formed in 1927 to control swims and verify times. By 1978 the
record had been lowered to 7 hours 40 minutes by Penny Dean of the United States, and by the 1990s
successful crossings had been made by swimmers as young as 12 and as old as 65. Various swimmers
had crossed both ways with only brief rests between the swims. Open-water distance swimming events
of 10 km (for men and women) were added to the Olympic program in 2008.
MANAGEMENT IN KENYA

Kenya Swimming Federation

KSF

The Kenya Swimming Federation (KSF) is a non-profit making organization run by volunteers and
affiliated CANA (Conferation Afrique De Natation) (The Africa body that runs and controls Aquatic
disciples) and FINA (Federation Internationale De Natation) the World Aquatic body. The Federation is
the umbrella body charged with the responsibility of administering and running the Aquatic disciplines
in Kenya. It has also established Provincial/County Associations which operate under the parent body
with one constitution. The Federation organizes local competitions and enters our swimmers in
International Championships. It also conducts courses for our coaches and administrators as well as
officials. In the near past we have successfully hosted two continental Championships.

Despite the constraints that the Federation goes through just like all other Federations and sports
bodies, KSF has endeavored to promote the sport by holding swimming championships for the different
levels of the sports disciplines each calendar year, with the support of parents, schools, clubs and
sponsors. However, there is still enormous amount of untapped talent which if harnessed would add
very significantly to its recognition within our sporting nation, alongside other excelling such as athletics
and soccer. It’s the Federation’s aspiration to seek relevant funding to expand its swimming fraternity by
the creation of a suitable atmosphere for the majority of the youth in Kenya, including provision of the
required facilities for the realization of our goals.

KSF has made a huge contribution to swimming by producing swimmers for international level e.g. The
Dunford brothers who represented Kenya in various international championships including the Olympics
in Beijing as well as Common wealth Games, World Championships, African Senior championships, and
various regional swimming championships just to mention a few. KSF is run entirely by volunteers who
can confidently say, that we are among the best run sports organization in Kenya. We hold regular free
and fair elections every four years and our accounts are audited and presented every year during the
Annual General Meeting to the members.

MANAGEMENT INTERNATIONALLY

World Aquatics, formerly known as FINA (French: Fédération internationale de natation; English:
International Swimming Federation) is the international federation recognised by the International
Olympic Committee (IOC) for administering international competitions in water sports. It is one of
several international federations which administer a given sport or discipline for both the IOC and the
international community. It is based in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Founded as FINA (Fédération internationale de natation; International Swimming Federation) in 1908,

the federation was officially renamed World Aquatics in January 2023.
World Aquatics currently oversees competition in six aquatics sports: swimming, diving, high diving,
artistic swimming, water polo, and open water swimming. World Aquatics also oversees "Masters"
competition (for adults) in its disciplines.

EQUIPMENTS

When you start swimming, the question of what swimming equipment you need also usually arises.

1. Swimsuit.

For men, these are usually swim briefs, swim trunks or jammers. Boardshorts aren’t recommended for
swimming as they create too much drag. Furthermore, they are forbidden in certain pools for sanitary
reasons.For women, the best choice for swimming is the one-piece swimsuit.As for the brand and
material, Speedo Endurance swimsuits are recommended. The material is designed for people who
swim several times per week. It is durable and resists the chlorine well.

2. Swim Cap

A swim cap is often mandatory when swimming in a public pool, unless you are bald. A swim cap also
comes in handy if you have long hair and want to avoid that it gets into your face while swimming. A
swim cap protects your hair from the chlorine.

3. Swimming Goggles

A good pair of swimming goggles is also must if you are serious about learning to swim. Swimming
goggles allow you to submerge your head without having to fear of getting water in your eyes. You will
be more relaxed and able to streamline your body better.

4. Nose Clip

A nose clip is nice to have, as it keeps water out of your nose. So it’s one thing less to worry about during
the initial learning phase. A nose clip helps especially while learning front crawl, as it takes quite a bit of
technique and coordination to be able to breathe on the side and keep your arms and legs moving.

5. Swim Fins

Swim fins dramatically improve the efficiency of your flutter kick in front crawl and backstroke and the
efficiency of your dolphin kick in the butterfly stroke. The legs are much better supported in the water,
and hence you can focus on learning the arm stroke movements.

6. Pull Buoy
The pull buoys is a figure-eight shaped flotation device made of solid foam and which you squeeze
between your thighs. A pull buoy also supports your legs so you can focus on the arm stroke
movements. It makes the most sense to use them when swimming front crawl. However, you should
take care not to become dependent on them, as they can mask balance problems.

7. Swimming Noodle

Swimming noodles (also called water noodles) are those long colored flexible cylinders made of solid
foam. Children like them a lot, as they are great pool toys. But they can also be used as flotation devices
to support the upper body while learning the leg movements of the different swimming strokes.

8. Kickboard

A kickboard can be used to isolate and learn the leg movements, especially the flutter kick and the
breaststroke kick. A kickboard makes less sense to learn the dolphin kick used in butterfly, as the
kickboard limits the body undulation that is essential in that stroke. Please note that holding the
kickboard in front of you at arm’s length while flutter kicking can put some strain on your shoulders.

9. Headphones

Swimming headphones are waterproof headphones that stay in a swimmer’s ears while they are
swimming. They are not able to be worn at the same time as swimming earplugs. Swimming
headphones are usually Bluetooth, which allows the phone playing music to sit nearby, outside of the
pool. Swimming headphones vary in cost, depending on the quality but tend to be very expensive.

10. Mesh bags

A swimming mesh bag is a storage bag that is usually a little smaller than a backpack, and it tends to
have a drawstring. A mesh bag is usually brought around by swimmers to carry their stuff so that even
when it gets wet, it will dry out. People will put their swimming suits, goggles, towels etc.

11. Swim snorkels

Snorkels are used to breathe underwater so that the swimmer can focus on other parts of the stroke
without an above-water breath breaking up their rhythm. They can also be used for breath control
purposes if a cap is put on the breathing tube. Snorkels are also used for swimmers in a lake or ocean.
With snorkels, swimmers are able to keep their attention on what is below them, which could be a
gorgeous ocean floor.

12. Towels

A swimming towel is used by swimmers to dry off when they get out of the water. Swimming towels
tend to be thinner than home towels used after a shower. This is so that they are able to be packed
better and transported more frequently.

13. Water bottles.

A swimming water bottle is like any other water bottle used for hydration before, during and after
swimming. While you may be swimming in water, you don’t want to drink chlorinated pool water or
untreated water in a lake or the ocean.

14. Lap counters

A swimming lap counter helps to count a swimmer’s laps. There are personal swimming lap counters
that a swimmer could wear on their wrist like a watch to keep track of their laps. There are also larger
swimming lap counters that are manual and electronic. A manual swimming lap counter is flipped every
lap by someone not swimming to keep track of the swimmers lap for them. An electronic swimming lap
counter does the same thing but someone will push a button to keep track of laps. They are usually used
during competitive swimming.

15. Pools

A swimming pool is where many swimmers will swim. There are different -sized swimming pools. The
most common is an Olympic -sized swimming pool which is about 50m in length, meaning that one lap is
100m. the width is about 25m, and the depth of the pool is about 2m. an Olympic pool has about
660,000 gal of water in it.

16. Starter Blocks

Swimming starter blocks are used by swimmers to start a race. Swimmers will start on these starting
blocks, and when the starting gun goes off, they will dive into the water and continue swimming
forward. These starting blocks are at most pools and at every Olympic-sized pool, as swimmers must
practice diving off of these often to become more efficient in their dives. Starter blocks are very
expensive, and are usually purchased and cared for by pools and athletic centers.

17. Arm Floaties

Arm floaties are flotation devices that go around your arms. They are usually worn by kids or beginner
swimmers for safety and to help those swimmers get used to being in the water. The reason they are
meant for kids is that they are able to hold their weight up and keep the kids' heads above water while
they learn how to swim.

CONTROVERSIES

The NCAA Swimming Championship Was a National Scandal

At this year’s NCAA swimming championships, organizers allowed a biological male, Lia Thomas, to
compete against female athletes on the basis of transgender status. And so, what should have been a
moment of sporting pride — a celebration of some of the best female swimmers in the country —
became a scandal.

Thomas, a fifth-year senior at the University of Pennsylvania, went by his given name of Will and swam
for the men’s team until 2019 without issue. When competing against men, Thomas was a top-tier
swimmer, though far from a national champion. But since Thomas underwent hormone-replacement
therapy during the pandemic and was allowed to join the women’s team in the 2021–2022 season, the
swimmer has dominated the female competition. At the NCAA swim championships last week, Thomas
reached the podium in every event the swimmer competed in, an honor bestowed on the top eight
finishers in the nation. Thomas finished first in the 500-yard freestyle (beating two Olympic medalists),
fifth in the 200-yard freestyle, and eighth in the 100-yard freestyle.

The NCAA’s reasoning is that Thomas, having taken testosterone suppressants, is now biologically
equivalent to the championship’s female athletes. It requires nothing short of magical thinking to come
to such a conclusion. Menopausal women do not cease to be women after their estrogen levels drop.
And neither do biological men cease to be biological men after their testosterone levels have been
chemically manipulated. The sex-based advantages conferred on Thomas during puberty are as
irreversible as they are obvious. It is literally impossible to change sex.

Thomas’s defenders emphasize that no rules have been broken. But the rule-makers have abdicated
responsibility. In January, the NCAA’s response to the Lia Thomas controversy was to punt and defer to
the rules set by each sport’s governing body, in this case, USA swimming. But this change wouldn’t
happen until 2023. USA swimming’s own policy was similarly evasive. It decided to lengthen the
required hormone-replacement-therapy period (effectively tripling the twelve months that the NCAA
has been requiring) and defer to a panel of experts to review “evidence that the prior physical
development of the athlete as male, as mitigated by any medical intervention, does not give the athlete
a competitive advantage over the athlete’s cisgender female competitors.”

Even if Thomas had finished last in every race, the effect would still have been to deprive female
athletes of their hard-earned opportunities to compete. Reka Gyorgy, a Virginia Tech swimmer, wrote in
an open letter to the NCAA that she was bumped out of the competition because of the organization’s
decision to allow “someone who is not a biological female to compete.” One father told National Review
how the same thing happened to his daughter. And a mother, whose daughter had also been displaced
in an event with Thomas, spoke of how “heartbreaking” it was to watch her daughter sacrifice so much
only to be beaten by a male.

The trouble is that most people know that the emperor is naked but are too intimidated to say so. Inside
the McAuley Aquatic Center, cheers and applause for Thomas were relatively muted compared with that
for the female athletes. Some crowd members even booed Thomas, and one women’s-rights protester
shouted, “He’s a man!” If the reaction to Thomas seems unsporting, consider how the female athletes
feel. Parents report that their daughters have been instructed by their coaches to smile, stay silent, and
step aside. So much for Title IX, which was supposed to protect women from this kind of discrimination.

Instead of allowing, indeed actively encouraging, this fiasco, adults should have taken a hand from the
beginning and politely but firmly said “no” to a biological male competing in a women’s sport.

Thomas’s college swim career is now over. And for the female swimmers at this year’s NCAA
championships, the damage is done. Yet, whether or not the embarrassment continues at the Olympic
level, this scandal has far graver consequences than even the injustices endured by individual female
athletes. It is not only the female achievements that are under attack but the very definition of female.

2. Swimming Australia releases findings of report on treatment of women and girls

Swimming Australia has released the findings of a report commissioned in June 2021 after explosive
allegations by Olympic silver medallist Maddie Groves of the sport's "misogynistic" culture.

Swimming Australia said the "open and frank" feedback it received was "difficult to read". The report
contains 46 recommendations aimed at improving the treatment of women and girls in the sport. These
include calls to improve the gender balance in coaching, and to do away with skinfold testing

At the time, Groves announced she was withdrawing from Tokyo Olympic trials as a "lesson to all
misogynistic perverts in sport and their bootlickers." It led to the establishment of an independent panel
to investigate the treatment of women and girls in the sport. The panel spoke to 150 participants
including former and current athletes, parents, coaches, technical officials, volunteers and
administrators.

In a media release, Swimming Australia said the "open and frank" feedback it received was "difficult to
read". "We want to reassure those who have come forward that the sport is committed to change to
ensure these negative experiences are not repeated and apologise unreservedly to those impacted."The
report contains a total of 46 recommendations.

Some of the key recommendations include that the sport should do away with the use of skinfolds "as a
measure of body composition at any stage of a swimmer's career". This includes amending language in
current coaching materials to be "more respectful towards women (for example remove existing
descriptions such as "large thighs" when describing the bodies of female swimmers)".

It also calls for a task force to promote gender equality within the sport, "to address areas such as
"leadership opportunities for women as coaches, officials, administrators and executives".Olympian
Maddie Groves says she was abused as a teenage swimmerAustralian Olympic swimmer Madeline
Groves says she was sexually abused by a man who still works in swimming and says there is a culture of
"misogyny" and "perversion" in the sport.

It commits to establishing quotas for the representation of women amongst advanced and performance
coaches, while also pledging to "never again select an all-male team for national and international
competitions". Perhaps more controversially, the report also calls on male coaches in particular "to
understand the impacts of bullying and exclusion of female coaches and enhance opportunities for
creating meaningful change for gender equity."

Coaches will also be required to undertake specific education on "female-specific health concerns" such
as medical conditions impacting female athletes, managing puberty, assessing body composition,
preventing disordered eating and "using understanding and empathy to engage in sensitive topics".