In the Olympic 10K Marathon Swim, the 5 km, 5 km team time trial, 10 km, and 25 km races at the World Swimming Championships, the FINA Open Water Swimming Grand Prix professional circuit, the FINA 10K Marathon Swimming World Cup professional circuit, and many other open water swimming competitions, a finish chute created out of lane lines and anchored with the help of buoys are set up to help guide swimmers to the finish.

The lane lines of the finish chute are angled towards the finish.

The angled lane lines helps funnel the swimmers usually to a vertical finish board, or occasionally up the shoreline to an on-the-beach finish (or triathletes to a T1 transition). Under FINA and most race rules, swimmers must swim within the inside of the finish chute lane ropes – a rule that came about due to a frantic finish by Fran Crippen during the 2009 World Swimming Championships in Rome.

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