This data was compiled prior to the start of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games and does not include results from that meet.
Before the Olympics, we posed the question of whether the women’s Olympic qualifying times were harder than the men’s. A 50-50 split between the men’s and women’s events is the goal, but the Paris entries fell slightly short: 45.8% of swimmers will compete at the Olympics in women’s events.
In the comments, another question was brought up: are elite female athletes more concentrated in certain countries? If true, this could mean that even if there were a similar distribution in athletes who achieved the women’s and men’s cuts, more top women were left at home due to the two athlete per nation limit.
For this approach, we took a look at the top 14 athletes per event in the Paris qualifying period. Then, we found the percentage of athletes from each country within those rankings. Finally, we summed the percentages for the top five nations, separated by gender.
In the women’s events, these countries ended up being the United States, Australia, China, Canada, and Japan. It was a similar list for the men: U.S.A., Australia, Japan, China, and Great Britain.
In the women’s events, these five countries accounted for 69.8% of the top 14 rankings. For the men, it was only 47.9%. If you narrow it to the top three countries, this disparity gets even larger: 58.6% for the women and 34.4% for the men.
This implies that there are more top 14 entries “lost” in the women’s side than the men’s, and could account for the disparity between events.
This method does not account for unique athletes in the rankings.
Quick Hits:
- The U.S. is the only nation to have had six athletes within the top 14 of multiple events across the qualifying period, all in women’s events: 100/200 back, 100 fly, and 800 free.
- Australia had five athletes in the top 14 in the women’s 100 freestyle.
- Germany was the only country with multiple top 14 athletes in the 1500 freestyle with four. Every other nation had one apiece.
- The women’s 100 backstroke had the fewest nations represented with five: USA, Australia, Canada, China, and France. In the Olympic final, only four nations were represented.
Statistics aside, how many Matt Vogels could there have been in the last 11 Olympics? Now that there’s more parity among nations in swimming since the 70’s, shouldn’t we consider going back to 3 entrants per nation? After the 1980 boycott, FINA adopted the “Olympic Entry Limit” reducing each nation’s entries from 3 to 2 per event, allegedly due to dominance at prior Olympics by US Men and East German “women” that swept many events, and maybe due to the US led boycott that did not allow the US and other countries to vote. Track & Field still has 3 entrants per event per nation. Someone could be the 3rd fastest swimmer in the world (same country), but not get… Read more »
By that logic, why stop at 3? Why not just have a QT and anyone who beats it, gets in?
Personally, I think the 2 swimmer rule gives the Olympics its whole character and distinction.
Yes, I’m sure someone that got 4th, 5th or 6th at Trials and still made the QT would like another shot. But they do need to draw the line somewhere due to team size, funding, housing, etc., and the original character and distinction of the modern Olympics was up to 3 entrants per country, with 3 medals awarded. It would be good to get back to that tradition just as Track & Field currently does.
I don’t see why a country could sweep the podium in track but it is forbidden in swimming. I don’t understand that rule difference.
What event was someone going to sweep at the games?
Women’s 100 fly potentially
at what cost to the rest of Regans program. Many US fans claim 1 single relay heat ruined Dressels 100 fly chances. After 3 extra 100 flys, we can’t guarantee Regan would have performed as well in the 200 fly or 200 back.
thats…not the point.
I would prefer only 2 per country in track too, rather than increasing to 3 in swimming.
We can see the might of big, established, well-funded nations in other events, rankings etc. Part of the appeal of the Olympics, for me, is the range of countries.
I’ve never understood why less participation was viewed as preferred or better. And the caps on team size are silly.
Wow! Australia with 37 top 14 qualifiers when the US has 40! Well done! By the way, why top 14 instead of top 10 or top 16 or top 20? Seems like a random number choice.
I had the exact same thought, it’s probably one that makes the US look good
I think it originated with the fact that the qualifying standards are based on the 14th place from the previous Olympics.
I actually didn’t know that! That does make sense
Biggest consequence of this rule was Regan in the 100 fly
A 1, 2, 3 podium would have been sweet.
Its not like missing that event ruined her Olympic experience. Supporters here are disappointed that a relay heat ruined Dressels plans in the 100 fly but think that 3 more 100 fly races would have helped Regan. It may have been a clean sweep. It may also have ruined her 200 fly and 200 back.
Leave it as it is.
One thing to take into account is that the Top 14 time selected for the Olympics is based in prior championship results, not world rankings. This means that the max of 2 per country was part of the development of the time standards. With this in mind it is not surprising that a few large countries with a lot of swimmers have more than 2 swimmers faster than the q-time.
I would guess that if we did a similar evaluation of the 1992 Olympics it would be even fewer countries with a lot of extra swimmers and those countries with extra swimmers might have had even more or a larger share percentage base.
The reason I choose 1992… Read more »
1988 was also 2 per, and after the boycotts of 80 and 84.
Yes, exactly and that is why 1988 would be the base year for establishing qualifying times to use as a comparison for the 1992 results.Otherwise it would have established qualifying times based on an Olympics that were missing a lot of top level swimmers. It would be like saying that we are going to establish the Olympic qualifying times based on the results from Pan-Pacs.
There should absolutely be an avenue that allows a top 10-15 world athlete to go even if they aren’t top 3 in their nation.
Would just have to stay within (for America) the 26 or 28 athlete limit(forgot which)
So some playing around with the prelim relay strategies could help out. Why not?
I do not think there is a single sport at the Olympics that allows for more than 3 athletes per event for a single country. There are actually a few sports that only allow 1 athlete per country. Several sports have a maximum number of athletes per event, including Track and Field so the automatic qualifying times would need to be much faster. So if I combine taking top 15 with the maximum number of athletes per event, the USA would have had 1 (maybe 2) runners in the men’s 5000m, but on the other hand a lot more than 3 in the men’s 100m.
There is always a give-and-take
3 looks to be the cutoff for individual sports, but I think that it would be fine to apply to NOCs as well. Get top 2 at trials, you’re in. If you’re within x in the world rankings and get 3rd, you’re somewhere above relay persons 5-6 on the priority list.
In an applicable race, you’re basically looking for a podium finish at trials to get your olympic berth.
3 is not the cutoff for individual sports at all. It is sport based. Rowing, kayaking etc is 1 per country. Leave it as it is.I don’t car about 1 athlete from US in 100 Fly maybe (or maybe not) picking up another medal (and some years 1 Aussie in W 100 free) at the expense of another athlere missing a spot at the Olympics due to overall caps on the pool entries.
Certain countries get 4 entries in the cycling road race.
road cycling is a totally different beast. It is a team event with individual medals. Many riders are enetered to help someone else win.
Skiing has the possibility of 4
there are sports where you can´t even have qualifiers on all possible weights (Tae Kwon do for instance)
I’ve always wished that FINA would create a World Championship meet where the top 32 swimmers in each event, irrespective of what country they represent, would qualify to swim. I think that would be a really interesting meet.
But if they won’t do that then I like your idea of allowing extra swimmers from a country if they rank in the Top 10.
A different meet, yes, Olympics no
Yes…a true world “professional” champs
For worlds at least expand in to somehow include most in the top16 so you have really competitive semi finals at least.
Some options:
* Rankings as you mentioned
* A stiffer top8/12 standard for 3+ athletes
* Auto entry in the individual event for top4 relay 100 Freestylers and top medley stroke swimmer
* Bonus entry, ie golf style: winner of SC champs, and/or Commonwealth, Euros, Asian Games etc gets an auto berth.
one way that could work is like European champs. You can enter more swimmers but only 2 can progress.
Your framing of this statistical anomaly is interesting. I expect this trend results largely from a significant part of the world still holding regressive views about women participating in sport whatsoever, let alone being willing to invest financially into developing women athletes to compete at high levels. So then the concentration of higher ranking women athletes in a few progressive countries is due to a shallower global talent pool in women’s sport generally as compared to men’s.
This is a really interesting point. Even beyond financial support, like culturally are there differing extents that women see high-performance sport as a socially acceptable thing to try to pursue depending on how much traditional family values are emphasized in the country? Like if a Harrison Butker type was elected into power, how is that country fairing in women’s sports for the foreseeable future?
You are right on- See: Why is USA women’s soccer a perennial powerhouse in the world and men are middle of the road.
In the USA, there is not an equivalent to the NFL and MLB for women’s professional sports. The only relevant women’s professional leagues are basketball (WNBA) and soccer (NWSL).
In addition, the NFL and MLB are far more popular than MLS on the men’s side which is why the male athletic talent gravitates toward football and baseball not soccer.
My completely untested hypothosis on that is that, for the most part, the best male athletes in the US go into the sports that pay the most in the US—so football, basketball, baseball, and hockey. With women, the top professional leagues don’t pay that well, so the top female athletes are less likely to gravitate toward the money sports, and the talent gets more spread out. This could explain why US women have a greater diversity of success across sports.