History of Competitive Swimming!

Swimming was known to be originated in England. I actually had no idea of this until I researched a little about it. I was very interested to find out that competitions were started in the late 1830's with only six "pools". It was organized by the National Swimming Society. By the 1880's, as swimming continued to gain popularity, over 300 member clubs formed! I am still surprised that this sport emerged so late in society. In 1896, swimming became an Olympic sport for men only! Oddly, the only events were the 100 meters and 1500 meters freestyle, which was in open water (ocean) Soon, more strokes were added like more freestyle events, followed by the backstroke, butterfly, breaststroke, and the last was the IM (individual medley).More than anything, I was shocked about the fact that women were not included in the 1896 and 1906 Olympics! By the time of the 1912 Olympics, women's swimming emerged, which in effect formed the International Olympic Committee.

Another thing that stunned me about the first Olympics was that there were only 4 events, which 3 out of the 4 were freestyle? I cannot even begin to fathom how short of a meet that must have been! It also must have been boring only swimming that 1 stroke. At the second Olympics I found out that the competitions consisted of 3 very different types of "competition". One of them consisted of an " underwater obstacle course? " Nowadays, that tactic is not used. Swim meets now have 32 swim races, which means 16 for women and 16 for men. That is a heck of jump from the beginning, which only consisted of 4. I was super surprised about the transformation, and how competitive swimming has evolved.