Load-shedding is 'worse than Covid' for stressed swimming coaches

Local swimming coaches are warning that load-shedding, once winter hits, could cripple their sport and decimate the country’s poolside medal prospects at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Swimming, South Africa’s most successful Olympic code since readmission, is riding the crest of a wave led by what could be this nation’s greatest aquatic generation.

But not with the electricity crisis.

“Load-shedding will basically be the end of swimming,” said coach Dean Price, also Swimming SA’s high performance manager.

With autumn around the corner and stage 6 a common feature, the two coaches in charge of most of South Africa’s medal hopes, both working at open-air pools in Pretoria, are worried.

Water temperature ideally needed to be 27°C, but no lower than 24°C, and any load-shedding level above stage 2 made it impossible to maintain that temperature, they said. 

“I have no plan yet,” said Rocco Meiring, the head coach at Tuks who trained Tatjana Schoenmaker for the 200m breaststroke Olympic gold and 100m breaststroke silver.

Also in his group are Commonwealth Games medallists Kaylene Corbett, Pieter Coetzé and Erin Gallagher as well as short-course world champion Matthew Sates, visiting from Pietermaritzburg.

Lara van Niekerk, the 50m and 100m breaststroke queen, trains under Eugene da Ponte at a school pool.

This group of swimmers, along with Germany-based veteran Chad le Clos and US student Aimee Canny, pack the potential to surpass South African swimming’s three-medal hauls of 1996, 2004, 2012 and 2016.

We all have no idea whether we’ll be working or not in the next two, three months … It threatens everyone’s livelihood. This is worse than Covid for us   

—  Dean Price, swimming coach

Swimming has bagged 16 Olympic medals for the country since Barcelona 1992, more than any other sport. Athletics has 15.

They could be aiming for as many as 10 medals before relays and, with athletics looking thin and rugby sevens, triathlon and rowing not likely to win more than one medal each, they could have been South Africa’s bedrock at Paris 2024.

“Load-shedding is definitely influencing our chances of medals come the Olympic Games next year and world champs this year,” warned Da Ponte.

“If you can’t keep your water warm, you can’t train the way you need to train. It’s as simple as that.”

Both the 2023 world championships in Japan and the Paris Olympics will kick off in the dead of winter in late July.

Meiring and Da Ponte said swimmers needed to swim fast in training to replicate race pace the closer they got to competition. That phase of training required many rest periods between sets, but cold water made muscles contract, impeding performance.

Options, such as shifting training camps abroad, were either too expensive or not feasible, they said.

The University of Pretoria, already spending R3m a day to run generators across campus during stage 6, couldn’t afford a generator for the pool, Meiring said.

Virgin Active said it expected to keep its 150 pools around the country going through winter. But Meiring said they were too small for elite swimmers training for global galas in Olympic-sized pools.

Pietermaritzburg-based coach Wayne Riddin, who is confident he can keep his pool heated through a boiler system requiring only a small generator, expected load-shedding to force swimming talent abroad. “It’ll push people overseas again.”

South Africa relied on swimmers at US colleges for Olympic medals until Terence Parkin, Cameron van der Burgh, Le Clos and Schoenmaker appeared.

For many coaches, age-group classes are their bread and butter.

“If my pool water is 20°C, the rest of my clients can’t train,” said Da Ponte. “So for me, getting Lara ready for the Olympics is only a small part of my headache.

“The biggest part of my headache is [maybe] I can’t keep my business going.”

Price agreed. “We all have no idea whether we’ll be working or not in the next two, three months … It threatens everyone’s livelihood. This is worse than Covid for us.”