We see a recurring issue every four years at the Summer Olympic Games – and it involves poo (excrement from animals and humans).

Firstly, it was reports of accumulated duck poo in the Serpentine before the 2012 London Olympic Games. The Serpentine, which is supplied with water from the Thames, hosted the 10 km marathon swim won by Eva Risztov and Oussama Mellouli.

But as the Serpentine Swimming Club cheekily reported in a counter to negative articles about the scale and context of the number of sewage leaks in English waterways, “Swim in the poo is that all we do.”

Then, there were reports of dead fish and possible disaster for the marathon swimmers in Copacabana Beach at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games that was ultimately won by Sharon van Rouwendaal and Ferry Weertman.

But most of the world’s media and commentators confused Copacabana Beach where the Olympic marathon swimmers and triathletes competed with Guanabara Bay where Olympic sailors launched their boats and where massive amounts of sewage and trash streams into the bay water.

But the marathon swims and triathlons were held in Copacabana Beach where the water quality was not an issue and the men and women raced to exciting finishes.

Then, there were reports of dirty bay water that “smelled like a toilet” for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games where Ana Marcela Cunha and Florian Wellbrock won in Tokyo Bay. The Japanese tested and completed all kinds of preventive and corrective measures to improve the water quality to reach acceptable standards by race day.

London 2012. Rio 2016. Tokyo 2020. Now it is Paris’ turn to host the Olympic 10K Marathon Swim.

And the articles about poor or unacceptable water quality have resurfaced on their quadrennial cycle.

The reports are consistently negative and critical. See here, here, and here for a small sampling of the perspectives of the problems with water quality in the Seine where the Olympic marathon swims and triathlons will be held.

But like their counterparts in London, Rio de Janeiro, and Tokyo, the local and national French governments are working to clean up the waterways and invest in improve their wastewater and sewage systems in a massive effort to elevate the venues to swimability and counteract the damaging and negative images.

The collective efforts and investments worked in 2012, 2016, and 2021. We believe the efforts and investment will also work in 2024. There is simply too much to lose as one of the world’s great cities and a proud country if the marathon swims are cancelled and the triathlon events become a duathlon due to too much faecal matter in the Seine.

As Olympic champion and a medal favorite in the 10 km marathon swim Gregorio Paltrinieri of Italy said, “The swimmers will race no matter what.”   But fellow gold medalist Ana Marcela Cunha of Brazil is rightly worried. “It is a concern. We need a plan B in case it’s not possible to swim in the Seine.”

In August 2023, the marathon swimming test events were cancelled because the water was too dirty. Similarly, the swim legs on two of the four days of triathlon and para-triathlon test events were also cancelled due to too much faecal matter in the water. Heavy rains led to high E. coli readings that lead to the cancellation.

But there is no Plan B for Paris – other than delaying the marathon swims a few days if heavy rains overwhelm the improved waste water systems.

There were similarly no Plan B for the 2016 and 2020 Olympic Games. And all those races worked out very well after government officials, bureaucrats, and contractors worked quietly behind the scenes to ensure swimability.

For the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games, we foresee the same issue returning as the chosen marathon swimming site is very close to the largest harbor in the Americas and behind a breakwater that limits natural tidal flows.

While the French government, the Paris Olympic Organizing Committee, swimmers, and coaches expect the Olympic marathon swimming events will go on as planned, the issue of whether or not the Seine will be ready for the August 8th and 9th races brings up several other important points:

• At what point do athletes place their health over the possibility of winning medals and competing in the Olympics?
• At what point do the Olympic Committees representing the athletes steps in and either prevent their athletes from competing or take them positive actions to help the situation?
• At what point do government leaders, bureaucrats, municipalities, and societies decide to make investments to maintain sufficiently high water quality levels?
• At what point does the IOC and World Aquatics become so frustrated with marathon swimming that they decide to replace the marathon swimming events with less controversial athletic competitions?
• At what point does the global open water swimming community come together and join forces (perhaps with the surfing and diving communities) to campaign for improved water quality and preservation of the marine environment?
• Can media attention to local water quality issues – repeated every four years at the Olympic Games – be a catalyst for some improvements accomplished locally and globally?

© Daily News of Open Water Swimming

“to educate, enthuse, and entertain all those who venture beyond the shoreline“