Admin June 12, 2024
The Colts, a professional American football team, and their opponents do not exactly make ripples on the gridiron, so the stadium needed a lot of work to ready it for all of the spectacular swimmers hoping to make a splash at the trials.
USA Swimming shared a timelapse video on X, the social site formerly known as Twitter, demonstrating how workers transformed an NFL stadium more accustomed to turf into a water-filled utopia suited for the Olympics.
Olympic qualifiers start next week
The 2024 Olympic Games in Paris are rapidly approaching, and prospective Olympians from all over the world are preparing for not just the games in Paris, but also qualifying trials around the nation.
One such qualification will take place next weekend in Indianapolis, where people with aquatic expertise will battle to determine who will make this year’s U.S. Olympic Swim Team. The tryouts will take place from June 15 to June 23 at Lucas Oil Stadium, the home of the Indianapolis Colts.
Several Florida Olympic aspirants, including two Tampa locals, will be in Indianapolis hoping to punch their tickets to Paris. The U.S. Olympic Team Trials will air on News Channel 8 at 8 p.m. on Saturday, June 15. For complete Olympic coverage, go to wfla.com/2024-olympics.
26 men and 26 women on both sides to qualify for the Olympics
Olympic gold medalists Katie Ledecky and Caeleb Dressel will battle for more medals, while teenage swimmers Gretchen Walsh and Dare Rose will try to make their first Olympic team.
The selection process for USA Swimming is rather easy. If a swimmer finishes in the top two of a race and has an Olympic qualifying time, they will be selected (pending federation approval). Swimmers for freestyle relays are also picked based on their timings during trials. The maximum size of the US Olympic swim squad is 26 women and 26 men, including relay swimmers.