Rafa Maciel

So if that was the final team, who would be the 4x100 relay? Hopkin/Hope/Wood/Anderson? There's not a lot of relay cover there for the women.

2024 PanAmerican Track Cycling Championships Women's Team Pursuit: 1.) USA 2.) Canada 3.) Mexico -------------------- 4.) Chile 5.) Colombia 6.) Brazil Adjusted Olympic Rankings: 1.) New Zealand - 10650 (Q) 2.) Great Britain -8220 (Q) 3.) Australia - 7720 (Q) 4.) Ireland - 6850 (Q) 5.) Italy - 6340 (Q) 6.) Japan - 6130 (Q) 7.) Germany - 6120 (Q) 8.) France - 6115 (Q) 9.) Canada - 6070 (Q) 10.) USA (possibly with some adopted Belgians for good measure ) - 5950 (Q) ------------------------------------ 11.) China - 5630 Nothing to see here.... the field for Paris is set. The only question now is what the starting order will be.

Litchfield is guaranteed a spot on the team even though he missed the BST and OQT

At least this time they just had the apology running at the side of the screen - in previous matches they actually cut the feed and put the full apology test card up.

Normal service resumed in the women's 200m back with Osrin and Shanahan getting the qualifying times as expected.

Yeah - we're going to take 2 fly swimmers and it would be a shame if they aren't both able to do the individual. Situation could become even more complicated if James Guy gets top 4 in the 200 free and is on the squad as a relay swimmer in which case we could end up with 3 fly swimmers and only 1 in the individual event which would be just nuts.

I'd agree it makes sense to take Peters - they need the relay cover. But in that scenario, would Peters be allowed to swim the individual ahead of the British Champion? For me, Litchfield has to be encouraged to go and get the OQT before the end of the qualifying window

Added complication is that I don't think Litchfield has the OQT so if he goes, we can't enter a second swimmer in the 100 fly..

Wow. That 100 butterfly is going to lead to some interesting discussions - both here and with the selectors.

Quick heads up for Brits in action over the weekend: Miramar Invitational: Andrew Pozzi - 110m Hurdles Jacob Fincham-Dukes Cindy Sember - 100m Hurdles Finette Agyapong - 100m Arkansas Spring Invitational: Amber Anning - 200m Likely to be more - just not gone through all the start lists yet

Judo switches can go through pretty much instantaneously if the federations agree. It was the same situation for Acelya Toprak when she switched from GBR to AZE towards the end of last year. any change would still need to be ratified by the IOC I think but that's unlikely to be a problem.

2024 PanAmerican Track Cycling Championships Men's Team Pursuit: 1.) USA 2.) Colombia 3.) Canada -------------------- 4.) Chile 5.) Mexico 6.) Argentina Adjusted Olympic Rankings: 1.) Denmark - 9285 (Q) 2.) New Zealand - 9230 (Q) 3.) Australia - 9000 (Q) 4.) Italy - 8800 (Q) 5.) Japan - 7770 (Q) 6.) Germany - 7300 (Q) 7.) Great Britain - 7233 (Q) 8.) France - 7050 (Q) 9.) Canada - 6690 (Q) 10.) Belgium - 6395 (Q) ------------------------------------ 11.) China - 5450 12.) USA - 4824 Technically, China could catch Belgium but in order to do that, China need to finish at least 7th in Milton and Belgium finish no better than 10th. It's not impossible for that to happen as the field in Milton for this event is one of the weaker ones with no Denmark, New Zealand, Australia or Germany (according to the provisional entry lists at least). If the weaker field can benefit China, it could do the same for Belgium - these teams are pretty closely matched with the head to head tied at 2-2. I fully expect Belgium to finish higher than their current discard score of 10th - not exactly a bold prediction given there are only 11 nations competing! - so in order for China to get the last quota, I think they will need to finish at least 2 places higher than Belgium.

2nd gripe of the meeting. Andy Jamieson has been talking about the selection policies this morning for the juniors and the Olympics. He was full of praise for the new crop of juniors that we've got coming through and highlighted that we've already got something like 40+ swimmers who had achieved the consideration time but at no point did he question why the selection policy was going to limit the team to 30. Likewise with the Olympic policy, he's just blindly accepted the policy without questioning the team limit. At least when it came to the Paralympic policy the team size was explained.

Whilst we're (kind of) on the topic of young swimmers. Performance of the day has to go to Kourosh Khodakhah. He went 15:52.51 in the heats of the 1500m to finish 10th overall. Within an hour and a half, he was back in the pool for the heats of the 400m Individual Medley and then back in the evening to swim in the 400 IM junior final. All that after he won the junior 400 free on day 1 and just missed out on the junior final form 200 butterfly and he still has the 800 free and 200IM to come.

I am working on the assumption that Anderson will be back for the 100m and will ultimately get the nod for the individual in Paris. That's why I think it could be smart for Okaro to be trying to get the OWT for the 50.

That would be my take on it - at least let her try. There has been so much talk about the young swimmers coming through this week at the champs. OK, they're not going to medal in Paris but some could definitely be in the mix when we get to LA and being able to go to a fairly local Olympics ahead of that could be hugely beneficial for them. After all, I don't think sending Tom Daley to Beijing as a 14 year old did him any harm.

I agree - I don't think they'd push any athlete to go and chase a time. But the question was more would they give her the option to say that if she can get the OQT between now and the end of June, she can go in the individual event? Technically, it would still be within the letter of the selection policy.

I don't see Dawson getting a spot in 200 - she doesn't tend to as well in it as she does in the 100. Even when she was getting the European record in the 100 back, she wasn't in the squad for the 200.

Question for the sane and reasonable members of the group - you know who you are. If Eva Okaro gets selected for the squad - either in the 100m free individual or, as a member of the 4x100 free relay squad, would the selectors nominate her to swim the 50 free at the Europeans to see if she can get the OQT of 24.70? She was only 0.26 seconds short this evening, dropping her PB from 25.18 set earlier in the year. The champs are in Belgrade so not exactly a taxing journey and I don't think racing that one event would impede her Olympic prep in any way. The selection policy does say that anyone selected for Paris will not be nominated for Belgrade, but I can't see what they would have to lose by giving her the chance to go for a qualifying time for the 50.

So, at the half-way stage of the champs, I reckon we're at 18 tickets allocated with 2 more likely (Cox/Wilby) and 2 sitting on the cusp (Hanlon/Bird). Tomorrow, I think we will allocate another 3 quotas - 2 in the 100m Butterfly (Peters & Guy) and 1 in the 200m Backstroke (Osrin). Shanahan (200 back), Dean (200 IM) and Scott (200 IM) should also get the times for their respective events but already have spots on the team.

Just to be clear on the point I was making with this was the suggestion that Foster (and others have made) was that by finishing in the top 6 in this event, you would likely be selected as relay cover but I don't think that will be the case - for example I can't see Cumberlidge being selected. At the moment, I think it is looking very unlikely that we will be taking anyone purely as relay cover - they will rely instead on the people who have qualified for the individual events.

Robinson is already on the team through his open water quota so unlike the other swimmers in the list, he isn't relying on the selectors discretion to make the actual team. Only question is whether he will be doubling up in pool/open water.

Thinking of the relay - does anyone know if GB Aquatics do relay training? I think the athletics squads have specific training sessions dedicated to the relays but can't recall them ever being mentioned in relation to swimming

"They're going to take 5 or 6 people for the relay" Mark Foster must know that's just not going to happen under the current selection policy.

First major complaint about these champs - I am getting a little bit sick of the whole "you've put yourself in a great position in front of those selectors" chat from the presenter. Really hope that before the end of the champs, one of the swimmers breaks ranks and responds by saying "well I've done the time they asked for, so they bloody well better select me!"