Swimmer's Daily

  • WOWT 6 News Live at 5

  • Creatures as small as a bottle cap moving through the waters off New Jersey sent a swimmer to the hospital for two days and sparked warnings to beachgoers looking to celebrate the summer on the shore.

    https://youtu.be/n5hDGQIzcyg

  • Rami Anis braved the bombs of Aleppo, then was forced to leave his Syrian home for Turkey five years ago — all the while refusing to give up on an elusive dream of swimming in the Olympics.

    He trained at the prestigious Galatasaray sports club in Istanbul, putting in lap after lap after lap, month after month. But soon, frustration set in because he was a refugee. That short window when a good athlete can truly become elite was closing fast. And he knew it.

    “I could not swim for the club. I was just training without taking part. All the while, the war was lasting longer. And I was losing my best years as an athlete,” he said in an interview with the Associated Press.

    So last year, at age 24 already, he took a different dive into the water, and crossed on a rubber boat from Turkey into Greece — a stretch of Aegean Sea that has become the tomb of all too many refugees — before setting off a 2,000-mile (3,000 kilometers) trek through the Balkans and onwards to Germany and eventually Belgium.

    Now, as part of the first official refugee team at the Games, Anis will be going to Rio — having lost some of his edge and many illusions along the way. Still, he clings to one.

    “I wish from my heart that there will be no more refugees and we can go back and participate for our country,” Anis said.

    Read NBC Olympics

  • Members of the Stanford University women’s swim team are saying they were not surprised by Brock Turner’s arrest, according to a report.

    One swimmer was quoted as calling Turner “very, very odd” and claims he made crude comments to her teammates about their bodies, according to InTouch Magazine.

    “Brock’s arrest wasn’t surprising to anyone on the team,” one woman told the magazine.

    Turner, 20, was a member of the Stanford men’s team until his rape conviction earlier this month, when he was removed from the team. He has also been banned for life by USA Swimming.

    Meanwhile, the powerful letter written by Brock’s unidentified 23-year-old victim was read aloud in congress Wednesday.

    An hour passed as the 19 members of congress, Democrats and Republicans, took turns reading the entire 7,000 word plea.

    Turner got just six months after being convicted of sexual assault. He’s expected to be released three months early, on September 2. The sentence has led to outrage.

    See Inside Edition

  • Disney has announced they will be adding signs around their beaches and waterways to warn guests about alligators and they have closed all beaches on their Florida properties as they conduct a review of their protocols. A medical examiner has ruled the cause of death for 2-year-old Lane Graves as drowning and traumatic injuries due to the alligator attack at the Grand Floridian Resort lagoon in Orlando, Florida. NBC’s Gabe Gutierrez reports for TODAY.

  • Rio de Janeiro’s governor declared a state of financial emergency Friday and requested federal funds to help fulfill obligations for public services during the Olympics that start Aug. 5.

    Emergency measures are needed to avoid “a total collapse in public security, health, education, transport and environmental management,” a decree in the state’s Official Gazette said.

    The state’s revenue, largely tied to the petroleum industry, slumped in the last two years as global oil prices collapsed.

    The announcement followed this week’s visit to Rio by Brazil’s Interim President Michel Temer, who said the federal government would ensure all obligations are met for a successful Games.

    Rio is expecting about 500,000 foreign visitors during the Olympics, which has coincided with Brazil’s worst recession since the 1930s and a political crisis that last month led to the suspension of President Dilma Rousseff.

    “The state’s financial emergency in no way delays the delivery of Olympic projects and the promises assumed by the city of Rio,” Mayor Eduardo Paes said on Twitter.

    Read euronews

  • Hotel Terme Millepini, a 100-room four-star hotel in Padua, Italy, is recognized for having the world’s deepest swimming pool, the Y-40, which put it in the Guinness World Records.

    The swimming pool is built over thermal sources bringing after cooling down a water at 32-34 degrees Celsius.

    Y-40, with its depth of 42mt, is officially awarded the “Deepest Swimming Pool for Diving” by the Guinness World Records.

    Designed by architect Emanuele Boaretto, Y-40 “The Deep Joy” pool first opened on 5 June 2014. It’s 40 metres (131 ft) deep, making it the deepest pool in the world and contains 4,300 cubic metres (1,136,000 US gal) of thermal water kept at a temperature of 32–34 °C (90–93 °F).

    Underwater caves, a suspended, transparent, underwater tunnel for guests to walk through are some of the striking features of the pool.

    Read mid-day

  • Winning the Olympic gold medal in a world-record time of 58.46 seconds had been the greatest high in Cameron van der Burgh’s illustrious swimming career.

    Reaching the pinnacle of his sport had been the result of years of hard work winning South Africa’s first medal of the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

    Van der Burgh found the ascension from cloud nine hard to deal with as he suffered a bit of post-Olympic depression.

    This was evident in his swimming, and one could sense the passion he had once exuded had been drained in the two years following the Games.

    Despite the reduced enthusiasm, Van der Burgh still won the 50m breaststroke gold medal and finishing second in the 100m event at the 2013 Fina World Championships.

    A niggling shoulder injury compounded his woes in 2014 which also see the emergence of Van der Burgh’s bête noire.

    It was the year British teenager Adam Peaty would rise to prominence sparking one of the great swimming rivalries of the last few years.

    Read IOL

  • Brazil is in crisis. The economy has sunk into its biggest slump in a century and political instability surrounding President Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment is paralyzing the country. Bloomberg QuickTakes explains how it’s been a slow unraveling for the world’s fifth largest country.