i think the winner of such an event will never be truly regarded as a true olympic triathlon champion - therefore such poor planning from the officials is cruel towards all athletes
@@drumedorableheck there isn’t lakes somewhere in France they could use? The surfing is done in Tahiti, no reason they can’t have this somewhere to guarantee the event.
@@frontierlandfrank5314 I don't think the technology really is there to create artifical bodies of water yet, pools are mostly at a concept stage and not feasible at the moment.
@@drumedorable they just put two pools in a NFL stadium for the Olympic trials a couple weeks ago. The video of them putting it all together is pretty wild and worth a look.
You're experiencing what it's like to have the world scrutinize your home based on their standards. They'll rarely praise, just criticise. This happened to me in 1996 Atlanta.
There's also the Parc Interdépartemental des sports which would be perfect for that and it is very close to Paris. I think that whoever organized the Olympics wants to showcase Paris as much as possible. I feel bad for the athletes. Also, spending 1 500 000 000€ to make it "swimmable" and not achieve it just blows my mind. That's one and a half billion Euros, think about how many things could be done with that money.
But but they spent $1.5 billion on basically a large bucket to hold the rain water. That was going to clean the water by just holding it. They didn’t think past what happens when it gets full
@@bighammer3464They did, it's a very legitimate way of avoiding waste water going into a river but it has its limit. Without the Olympic that thing has been in the works forever (am French, been hearing about solutions for years) the Olympics are just a massive excuse as for many projects during such events. The presenters got it right in one sentence "spectacle over practicle".
Completely agree with Mark's considerations. Athletes have been preparing for 3 years for this specific day. I cannot imagine how much stress this situation is putting on the back of the athletes. They are in the middle of the most delicate period of their career and they have no idea what will be done in the following days. In the case of a duathlon, I honestly hope national federations to defect the race
Why not use where the rowing is. Isn't that venue just short of 40km from where the run course is ment to be. Why not swim there bike into Paris. Makes sense to me
☝️☝️Upvoting/ piling on this one. Just do the swim in the rowing venue!! It’s 2k long, has a big bypass/warmup area and with scheduling wouldn’t cause any issues for rowers. France going for hope of spectacle against the health and safety of athletes. Now they have their spectacle: Seine =💩
With all the time the Paris Olympic committee had to rethink the triathlon/OWS venue, it’s disappointing they went ahead with the Seine. It’s not like there aren’t other options, like the entire France coastline.
Exactly, it's not like France don't have Tri venue options. Chantilly is about 40k's away, Vichy, many coastal places, the Alpes etc... How cool would Nice have been?
And even in Paris. I leave there and there is the "Paris triathlon" (amateur event) where we swim on the "Canal de l'Ourcq". It's inside Paris and only a few km away from the current bike course. Organizers could have perfectly make it a second choice and adapt marginally the bike course (do one or two less loops around Paris center, the distance to get to Paris center from the canal)
@@benjamindonnot3902 This, to me, is putting the city’s image and revenue above the health and safety of the athletes. Again, a very disappointing decision which in my opinion, tarnishes the city’s image.
Absolute madness that the risk wasn't just removed entirely by selecting a freshwater lake type swimming venue with an alternative bike course and run course a long time ago.
Eco-friendly to what? Homeless? Try to sleep on the cardboard bed with no air conditioner and eat only food for sick, then you'll know, what kind of a nightmare we're talking about.
Such a shame. I definitely feel for these athletes who worked so hard to race at the Olympics only to have the Olympic committee prioritize media over health and safety. Zero reason this event couldn’t have held elsewhere.
Cleaning the river isn't a bad thing and certainly not "money down the drain". The problem is they didn't start early enough, and don't have a good plan B.
Cleaning is certainly a good thing. Does anyone anticipate that they'll hold any type of budget for ongoing cleanliness? If it was important to them, it wouldn't have started in such poor shape.
The problem is not cleaning itself. The problem is that currently, when there is too much rain, dirty water from Paris is rejected directly in the river because there is not volume to hold it. They made a few "big hole" to contain enough water for average summer. But as you all see weather this is year is far from normal. Way too much rain... That being said, they should have had a plan B and there were dozens of options available. You should not bet on having "good weather" when you organize the Olympics
@@benjamindonnot3902 Well, of course. It's a fast flowing river in a major city. You don't clean it by filtering out dirt, bacteria etc manually. You clean it by upgrading the sewer and stormwater systems. That's also what I wrote in the other reply and that's why it's also a good long term investment regardless of the triathlon.
@@jaunedroite and a much welcome one for sure. However the emphasis will be on the bad organization of triathlon and the swim in open water and not on the fact that the Seine is almost clean.
There are so many beautiful locations in France to host a triathlon. If you can spend 1.4 billion on a river, surely some of that money can be allocated to an alternative venue.
No, the 1.4 billion are not down the drain. Even a cleaner Seine that's just not clean enough yet is still a cleaner Seine and reaching further targets might actually not be that expensive once the project focuses on dirty inflows that are outside the dense Paris centre. Don't they have any clear lakes nearby? Why not reroute the cycling and running to catch a different swimming location?
yes as if the cleaning was only for the Olympic Triathlon. thats a bit entitled GTN... its bad its not taking place but this event is not the centre of the world :D so a bit less populism would also work
@@lwittrock1He's right though. I live here, and a much cleaner (but still not perfect river) is a huge improvement. Stop peering over fences and clean up your own damn yard.
@@StevenSkoczen The condition of the Seine is on them, and they fought to host these Olympics, it's not peering over fences. They brought this on and I'm simply pointing to the fact that their Gov. should have been dealing with a long time ago.
Watched the windsurfing that is based from Marseille this morning instead. They made a very poor choice for the triathlon start, removing the swim completely will compound the error further.
This is the triathlon event I most look forward to as a spectator and fan. It will be incredibly disappointing if the event is cancelled or turned into a duathlon due to pure incompetence.
How the hell could IOC allow the organisers for such a mess. They should have said it clearly that unless the quality of the water is above the minimums throughout let’s say a week prior to the event, the swimming will be held elsewhere 🤬
The money wasn't wasted. The river is MUCH cleaner. Is it clean enough for an olympic event after a rain? We'll see. But it's cleaner for Parisians year-round, and since you only watch on TV, and don't live here, you don't care. Typical keyboard warrior.
I don’t share your negativity about the Seine clean-up project. The spending for the Olympics should not only be about the Olympics, it should leave a legacy for people living in the city in the future. This infrastructure will do that, even if the swim part of the triathlon is canceled. On hot summer days, the Seine will become a massive swimming pool. So good on the organizers for taking the risk, even if the immediate objective of hosting the triathlon is a failure.
The fact that , it was a huge , current that they swam against, it the even because of the rain... the organisers not haveing a second venue ... the difficulty swimming against current was difficult.
The pollution levels in the Seine River remain a significant concern, especially as Paris prepares to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. Recent tests have shown variable water quality, largely influenced by weather conditions. Heavy rainfall often increases pollution levels by causing runoff that carries contaminants into the river. In June 2024, samples from the Seine revealed high concentrations of E. coli and enterococci bacteria, exceeding safe levels for swimming (euronews). These bacterial levels indicate the presence of fecal contamination, making the water unsafe for recreational activities. Consequently, several pre-Olympic swimming events have been canceled due to these pollution issues (RNZ). However, there have been periods when the water quality has improved, meeting the standards required for swimming. For instance, data from late June to early July 2024 showed that the river met the legal thresholds for bacterial contamination on six out of nine days (RNZ). This improvement is attributed to ongoing efforts to clean the river, including a $1.5 billion cleanup project aimed at reducing pollution sources such as sewage overflows and agricultural runoff (euronews) (RNZ). Overall, while the Seine has shown signs of improvement, pollution levels remain inconsistent, and the water quality can quickly degrade following adverse weather conditions. The situation highlights the ongoing challenges in ensuring the river remains safe for swimming during the Olympic events and beyond.
You know that rivers are drainage points for the surrounding land, right? And that (current, modern) cities are hard, non-porous surfaces like concrete and asphalt? What "policies" are you hoping to change? Roads? Gravity?
i would have thought the flow is the more immediate problem (both the inequity of the start position relative to the flow plus the added weight it gives the swim leg) .
Hey GTN what do you think of this idea, it should resolve this issue: do the swim in a pool. Measure how many seconds each athlete finished behind the first out of the swim. Move the athletes to wherever the original T1 is and let them start in the order and time difference as they finished in the pool. I’m sure athletes much rather do that than a duathlon.
60% chance is a probably a PR spin, so maybe more like 50/50? Read somewhere the Marathon swim can be switched to the rowing lake, could've surely planned a a contingency course based there too!? Also pretty sure I'm remembering this right, there was an ITU world cup that swam in the Seine in the 90s. Obviously they didn't worry too much about the water then!
They have have been holding a Long Beach “legacy” triathlon for years now, so at least the triathlon will go off without a hitch. They were poking fun calling it a legacy race before the Olympics ever happened.
LA has hosted many summer Olympics over the past century. In fact, they are one of the few cities that actually makes money with the Olympics because the infrastructure is firmly established and has the economic capacity to absorb the expense while waiting for the resulting benefits. IMHO, the only threat to the Olympics would be from the seasonal canyon fires.
i just completed a triathlon at the london T100 and the swim portion of that is in the river thames, that river is a disgusting mess as well, almost threw up after swallowing water, and to think the river seine is 15-20x more polluted than the thames is mind boggling.
There aren’t words to describe this debacle. The organisers should be held to account for this. Perhaps the athletes should refuse to participate and have an alternative Olympic triathlon somewhere else organised by people that actually know what they are doing! - I know this would,don’t be the same and not really possible but it would be two fingers up to the Olympic committee
#GTNCoachesCorner I've been watching replays of previous Tris at Olympics and now watching Paris, and noticed that all the athletes are using road bikes, even on the relatively flat course this time out... Should I be ditching my TT bike or is there some rule specific to the Olympics that specifies only road bikes?
It's not like they are doing surfing in Tahiti, or canoeing in Vaires Sur Marne, or sailing in Marseille, or Nice is a super well established tri location..., so you know, what could they have done…? is not like these are the olympics or anything important
If they had opened their eyes 2 months ago and would not show childish behavior about their politics and admit it failed, they would have had a look at the map, found a lake in 20 km around Paris and set up the triathlon there. But nowadays everything must contain a political / social message the athletes and the fans are just annoyed of. In this case "look at me, I have cleaned the Seine". Just have a look at the messages in the opening. With sports events in China, Arab countries or Russia the German media (and I guess most Western media) is all about how bad their morals are and how they place their political messages and it's like: they use the platform for their party and not for the sports, blabla. But to be honest, the West is way worse with it's wokeness and politics in these events. It should be about the competition and for the fans to have a good time. Nothing more, nothing less.
Best bet is that the bacteria levels will decrease slightly below acceptable levels. Would you still want to swim in water at that level? Ridiculous they tried to clean up the Seine. Should've been held in Nice and all would be good.
I'm in Paris, and it's frankly the news I was hoping to hear. I've been here every summer for the last 10 years, and this year has been bizarrely rainy. UK-level rainy. Normally it's 30c and dry as a bone. And in the last few days - it seems the rain has finally broken. We'll have better luck down the road a bit - the rain is the biggest contributor to water quality in the Seine.
Sadly this is the reality for triathletes in a lot of places... Here in Washington D.C. basically all the available triathlons within a couple of hours drive are held in water of dubious quality.... rivers, lakes, ponds, marinas, all with marginal quality water that you would never swim in in normal circumstances. They will often do the tests day/days before and there will be rain etc and at best you might be offered the choice of a duathlon.
Aaaaandd what did I say a few days ago?!?!?! YUCK!!!! "... 5-zillion e-coli traveling worldwide discarding waste from above and beyond all dumping into a river smaller than the Ganges" (Valse Mélancolique: Historian, Newscaster, Composer, Critic, Organist, Pianist, Athlete, Transcendentalist, Clairvoyant, Chef, Martial Artists, Cyclist, Mechanic, Ancient-Astronaut Theorist, Inventor)
It is good money spent because a lot of it was on upgrading centuries old sewage systems and such, though on an idealised timeline. The part that is not acceptable is having no backup venue to host the swim. There should not be a triathlon medal handed out for what is itself a different event.
Incentives are fucked in this sport as well if no national association will remove their athletes from the competition of the event is turned into a duathlon.
mmm duathlon is the only option in the current scene ,apart from bad water , making swimmers go against the river flow just places the advantage in the hands of the strong swimmers. Thats not fair play at all. The top possible medallists will not be disadvantged by a duathlon they can all run and bike well.
I got up this morning to watch the race. Dissapointed to see the cancellation. Even worse for the atheletes or people who went there to watch it live. They spendt a ton of cash to clean the river, and this happend. The french dissapoint again. Why not have a backup plan?
@yesitis1395 Do you understand how rivers, cities, wastewater systems, and rain work? Do you think about things you write, or just always assume you're right? Cities are non-porous. When it rains, water goes into drainage systems, which can handle a certain volume of water (one of the big upgrades here is the volume Paris can handle). If there's more than that, it goes into the local body of water. (This is true in your city, too before you get too pompous.) Paris has the added challenge of urban waste from dogs and occasionally people that has a downhill path to the seine with no drainage to catch it. Closing the restaurants will mean that people go to grocery stores. Or are you proposing a mass starvation? Oy. Reality is complex and hard to manage. Being an idiot on the internet is easy. Every one of us is doing our best. Choose how you want to contribute to our shared world. ✌️
It’s a joke and I live in France (am English) and love triathlon but there many many places that this could have been held. If Tahiti can hold the surfing then there is no obligation to hold the triathlon in Paris it is absurd, embarrassing and the clean up was an egregious waste of public money. Additionally if you were an athlete would you really want to swim in the Seine? I wouldn’t. My long term health would be much more important to me.
Well can't they find a roofless large swimming pool like the old days or a lake/pond?... The Oly distance is short it will be just a few laps if there's no wall-turn only zig-zag a full 1500m it should still be recognized as "open water" right? It should not be that hard to find such water. 😂
Triathlon beeing an individual sport, where you are supposed to do the work yourself, using a domestique for the bike leg of the race must really be classified as *Pathetic*? #matchfixing #unfairadvantage
Goes to show you what France thinks about triathlon and the Olympics. "Go swim in our 💩 water, you'll love it!" - IM should yank WC's from Nice and move it somewhere that appreciates the sport.
How is the Olympic comitee suprised that any river in a major city, let slone the Seine, isn't suitable for swimming. The fact that there's no plan B for something this predictable is unacceptable
@nevillemurray5602 absolutely lol I always said there's really no perk to bring a great swimmer in triathlon. Maybe with the exception of sprints. Hehe. Maybe that's why I ONLY do well I'm sprints and Olympics. But when you tack on the distance, strong cyclists (I think) have the greatest advantage because there's so much ground to cover. However, there is an argument to make for strong runners.
This is the most disinterested I’ve ever been in the Olympics and that’s sad. How they ever thought this was a good idea is beyond me. Without the swim this isn’t a triathlon, how there is no backup option is beyond me.
Do you think the Olympic triathlon will turn into a duathlon? 🚴🏃
i think the winner of such an event will never be truly regarded as a true olympic triathlon champion - therefore such poor planning from the officials is cruel towards all athletes
@@gabouel I think that if they can't do it at the Seine they will do it at the place where the kayak events are happening as well as the marathon swim
@@Giovanni.Fonsecathey should, but they won't
Paris is a disaster from the start. So, whatever would make sense is clearly off the table.
Well, the answer is, do you wanna swim in Seine river, which still the most polluted river in the world?
Not having an alternative swimming venue is just not acceptable for such a large scale event...
Where on earth would they be able to find a *checks notes* .... body of water, they don't grow on trees.
@@drumedorablehaving a pool swim would be better than no swim.
@@drumedorableheck there isn’t lakes somewhere in France they could use? The surfing is done in Tahiti, no reason they can’t have this somewhere to guarantee the event.
@@frontierlandfrank5314 I don't think the technology really is there to create artifical bodies of water yet, pools are mostly at a concept stage and not feasible at the moment.
@@drumedorable they just put two pools in a NFL stadium for the Olympic trials a couple weeks ago. The video of them putting it all together is pretty wild and worth a look.
as a parisian i have no idea why they chose such a dirty place as the seine, in France we got multiple beautiful lake, for example the Annecy lake
You're experiencing what it's like to have the world scrutinize your home based on their standards. They'll rarely praise, just criticise. This happened to me in 1996 Atlanta.
There's also the Parc Interdépartemental des sports which would be perfect for that and it is very close to Paris.
I think that whoever organized the Olympics wants to showcase Paris as much as possible. I feel bad for the athletes.
Also, spending 1 500 000 000€ to make it "swimmable" and not achieve it just blows my mind.
That's one and a half billion Euros, think about how many things could be done with that money.
Even 10 min from Paris, there are lakes that are perfectly fine.
Think everyone other than the Olympic committees saw this coming.
They knew am sure but the scenic aspects of things overtook all logical thinking ...
But but they spent $1.5 billion on basically a large bucket to hold the rain water. That was going to clean the water by just holding it. They didn’t think past what happens when it gets full
Just close the restaurants so their Seine Sewer System wouldn't have as many people pooping into it.
@@bighammer3464They did, it's a very legitimate way of avoiding waste water going into a river but it has its limit.
Without the Olympic that thing has been in the works forever (am French, been hearing about solutions for years) the Olympics are just a massive excuse as for many projects during such events.
The presenters got it right in one sentence "spectacle over practicle".
Completely agree with Mark's considerations. Athletes have been preparing for 3 years for this specific day. I cannot imagine how much stress this situation is putting on the back of the athletes. They are in the middle of the most delicate period of their career and they have no idea what will be done in the following days.
In the case of a duathlon, I honestly hope national federations to defect the race
Why not use where the rowing is. Isn't that venue just short of 40km from where the run course is ment to be. Why not swim there bike into Paris. Makes sense to me
☝️☝️Upvoting/ piling on this one. Just do the swim in the rowing venue!! It’s 2k long, has a big bypass/warmup area and with scheduling wouldn’t cause any issues for rowers.
France going for hope of spectacle against the health and safety of athletes. Now they have their spectacle: Seine =💩
Agree, this should have always been the plan B or even the preferred course.
I was there a few days ago. Wouldn't call the water quality stellar.
With all the time the Paris Olympic committee had to rethink the triathlon/OWS venue, it’s disappointing they went ahead with the Seine. It’s not like there aren’t other options, like the entire France coastline.
Exactly, it's not like France don't have Tri venue options.
Chantilly is about 40k's away, Vichy, many coastal places, the Alpes etc...
How cool would Nice have been?
And even in Paris. I leave there and there is the "Paris triathlon" (amateur event) where we swim on the "Canal de l'Ourcq". It's inside Paris and only a few km away from the current bike course.
Organizers could have perfectly make it a second choice and adapt marginally the bike course (do one or two less loops around Paris center, the distance to get to Paris center from the canal)
@@benjamindonnot3902 This, to me, is putting the city’s image and revenue above the health and safety of the athletes. Again, a very disappointing decision which in my opinion, tarnishes the city’s image.
@@PureNRG2 I could not agree more.
They had tons of "plan B" but decided to bet on the weather...
They don’t care about the athletes; their objective is to show that bridge… is everything about showing how beautiful LA FRANCE 🇫🇷 is 😏
Knew this was going to happen when they raised the Olympic flag upside down, that was a bad omen!
We knew triathlon was going to be a shit show. We didn't know the entire Olympics were in the same shape.
Bad omen was when they desacret our Lord's supper!
Absolute madness that the risk wasn't just removed entirely by selecting a freshwater lake type swimming venue with an alternative bike course and run course a long time ago.
The river Seine is too dirty for the swimmers, but the dormitories are eco-friendly and the food is kind to animals. Good job, Paris.
Eco-friendly to what? Homeless? Try to sleep on the cardboard bed with no air conditioner and eat only food for sick, then you'll know, what kind of a nightmare we're talking about.
@@user-tm3si7pw3u Way to miss the point.
Such a shame. I definitely feel for these athletes who worked so hard to race at the Olympics only to have the Olympic committee prioritize media over health and safety. Zero reason this event couldn’t have held elsewhere.
Yeah, I pur this down in my schedule to watch months ago. Let's hope we get a start tomorrow for both men and women. Im hoping for Tilda!
If they have a duathlon, then in LA they should have a triathlon and a duathlon!!!!
Or a Quadathon!
Cleaning the river isn't a bad thing and certainly not "money down the drain". The problem is they didn't start early enough, and don't have a good plan B.
Cleaning is certainly a good thing. Does anyone anticipate that they'll hold any type of budget for ongoing cleanliness? If it was important to them, it wouldn't have started in such poor shape.
@@yesitis1395 The additional reservoir they built and also other upgrades to the sewer systems are definitely permanent.
The problem is not cleaning itself. The problem is that currently, when there is too much rain, dirty water from Paris is rejected directly in the river because there is not volume to hold it.
They made a few "big hole" to contain enough water for average summer. But as you all see weather this is year is far from normal. Way too much rain...
That being said, they should have had a plan B and there were dozens of options available. You should not bet on having "good weather" when you organize the Olympics
@@benjamindonnot3902 Well, of course. It's a fast flowing river in a major city. You don't clean it by filtering out dirt, bacteria etc manually. You clean it by upgrading the sewer and stormwater systems. That's also what I wrote in the other reply and that's why it's also a good long term investment regardless of the triathlon.
@@jaunedroite and a much welcome one for sure. However the emphasis will be on the bad organization of triathlon and the swim in open water and not on the fact that the Seine is almost clean.
Unacceptable, what was France thinking, hosting a neighbourhood event😠
They were thinking only about that ceremony they've put on. But as usual, not all that glitters, is gold.
There are so many beautiful locations in France to host a triathlon. If you can spend 1.4 billion on a river, surely some of that money can be allocated to an alternative venue.
No, the 1.4 billion are not down the drain. Even a cleaner Seine that's just not clean enough yet is still a cleaner Seine and reaching further targets might actually not be that expensive once the project focuses on dirty inflows that are outside the dense Paris centre.
Don't they have any clear lakes nearby? Why not reroute the cycling and running to catch a different swimming location?
yes as if the cleaning was only for the Olympic Triathlon. thats a bit entitled GTN... its bad its not taking place but this event is not the centre of the world :D so a bit less populism would also work
@@BanJSify keep thinking that if it makes feel better but your being extremely naive.
@@lwittrock1He's right though. I live here, and a much cleaner (but still not perfect river) is a huge improvement. Stop peering over fences and clean up your own damn yard.
@@StevenSkoczen The condition of the Seine is on them, and they fought to host these Olympics, it's not peering over fences. They brought this on and I'm simply pointing to the fact that their Gov. should have been dealing with a long time ago.
That there wasn't even a plan B on the table , alternative swimming location / part bike parcourd
Watched the windsurfing that is based from Marseille this morning instead. They made a very poor choice for the triathlon start, removing the swim completely will compound the error further.
Why it can't be done in the rowing venue.
This is the triathlon event I most look forward to as a spectator and fan. It will be incredibly disappointing if the event is cancelled or turned into a duathlon due to pure incompetence.
Expectations are pre-planned disappointments, my friend.
“Get some gels out for 2 back2back races” 😂😂😂
How the hell could IOC allow the organisers for such a mess. They should have said it clearly that unless the quality of the water is above the minimums throughout let’s say a week prior to the event, the swimming will be held elsewhere 🤬
Talk about screwing things up. I've got my fingers crossed that conditions hold up for tomorrow. The amount of money wasted here is absurd.
The money wasn't wasted. The river is MUCH cleaner. Is it clean enough for an olympic event after a rain? We'll see. But it's cleaner for Parisians year-round, and since you only watch on TV, and don't live here, you don't care. Typical keyboard warrior.
I don’t share your negativity about the Seine clean-up project. The spending for the Olympics should not only be about the Olympics, it should leave a legacy for people living in the city in the future. This infrastructure will do that, even if the swim part of the triathlon is canceled. On hot summer days, the Seine will become a massive swimming pool.
So good on the organizers for taking the risk, even if the immediate objective of hosting the triathlon is a failure.
How will it be cleaner tomorrow?
Do you know how rivers work?
The fact that , it was a huge , current that they swam against, it the even because of the rain... the organisers not haveing a second venue ... the difficulty swimming against current was difficult.
The pollution levels in the Seine River remain a significant concern, especially as Paris prepares to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. Recent tests have shown variable water quality, largely influenced by weather conditions. Heavy rainfall often increases pollution levels by causing runoff that carries contaminants into the river.
In June 2024, samples from the Seine revealed high concentrations of E. coli and enterococci bacteria, exceeding safe levels for swimming (euronews). These bacterial levels indicate the presence of fecal contamination, making the water unsafe for recreational activities. Consequently, several pre-Olympic swimming events have been canceled due to these pollution issues (RNZ).
However, there have been periods when the water quality has improved, meeting the standards required for swimming. For instance, data from late June to early July 2024 showed that the river met the legal thresholds for bacterial contamination on six out of nine days (RNZ). This improvement is attributed to ongoing efforts to clean the river, including a $1.5 billion cleanup project aimed at reducing pollution sources such as sewage overflows and agricultural runoff (euronews) (RNZ).
Overall, while the Seine has shown signs of improvement, pollution levels remain inconsistent, and the water quality can quickly degrade following adverse weather conditions. The situation highlights the ongoing challenges in ensuring the river remains safe for swimming during the Olympic events and beyond.
it's not like any river should be dirty in the first place. at least this debacle may change policies for a cleaner local environment.
You know that rivers are drainage points for the surrounding land, right? And that (current, modern) cities are hard, non-porous surfaces like concrete and asphalt? What "policies" are you hoping to change? Roads? Gravity?
That’s a shame 😢
Would have thought they'd hold open water events and triathlon on the French Riviera. After all, the surfing is in Tahiti.
Why not in Nice? Theres already a big race there…hmm whats the name? Lol Ironman?!?
Triathlon replaced with a duathlon is like switching Rugby to American Football.
i would have thought the flow is the more immediate problem (both the inequity of the start position relative to the flow plus the added weight it gives the swim leg) .
Swimming on the river was band since 1923, and all of sudden, you think you can clean it? These Olympics are a joke
Why wasn’t the backup plan to have the swim in the lake where the rowing is as that’s at least 2000m long???
Incredible incompetence and disrespect to the athletes by the French organizers.
Hey GTN what do you think of this idea, it should resolve this issue: do the swim in a pool. Measure how many seconds each athlete finished behind the first out of the swim. Move the athletes to wherever the original T1 is and let them start in the order and time difference as they finished in the pool.
I’m sure athletes much rather do that than a duathlon.
With thunderstorms planned for Paris area for tonight, it will get dirtier before it get cleans again
and it will be a duathlon; don’t know why they didn’t did it another place
in another place sorry
60% chance is a probably a PR spin, so maybe more like 50/50? Read somewhere the Marathon swim can be switched to the rowing lake, could've surely planned a a contingency course based there too!?
Also pretty sure I'm remembering this right, there was an ITU world cup that swam in the Seine in the 90s. Obviously they didn't worry too much about the water then!
Re the waves, oh I hope Munich will do it again and we see an event on the famous Eisbach.
I hope in LA olimpic games will be more organized!
They have have been holding a Long Beach “legacy” triathlon for years now, so at least the triathlon will go off without a hitch. They were poking fun calling it a legacy race before the Olympics ever happened.
LA has hosted many summer Olympics over the past century. In fact, they are one of the few cities that actually makes money with the Olympics because the infrastructure is firmly established and has the economic capacity to absorb the expense while waiting for the resulting benefits. IMHO, the only threat to the Olympics would be from the seasonal canyon fires.
i just completed a triathlon at the london T100 and the swim portion of that is in the river thames, that river is a disgusting mess as well, almost threw up after swallowing water, and to think the river seine is 15-20x more polluted than the thames is mind boggling.
There aren’t words to describe this debacle. The organisers should be held to account for this. Perhaps the athletes should refuse to participate and have an alternative Olympic triathlon somewhere else organised by people that actually know what they are doing! - I know this would,don’t be the same and not really possible but it would be two fingers up to the Olympic committee
Maybe don’t put 94 boats on the Seine for the opening ceremony.
Your argument is the equivalent of adding a grain of sand to a desert.
@@trepidati0n533 I get that that choice isn't the only reason, but the optics don't look good now.
#GTNCoachesCorner I've been watching replays of previous Tris at Olympics and now watching Paris, and noticed that all the athletes are using road bikes, even on the relatively flat course this time out... Should I be ditching my TT bike or is there some rule specific to the Olympics that specifies only road bikes?
We are left to question why the water venue wasn’t some where else from the get go.
Why swim in a river? Did they swim with the current? Or against it? MAKES ZERO SENSE TO ME.
FRENCH BEING FRENCH
well....."no shit!" Why wouldn't they have an indoor pool as a backup?
How can they do the triathlon swim in this disgusting river?
Disgusting! 🤢🤮
It's not like they are doing surfing in Tahiti, or canoeing in Vaires Sur Marne, or sailing in Marseille, or Nice is a super well established tri location..., so you know, what could they have done…? is not like these are the olympics or anything important
Whoa! 1:10 pace to 2:40 due to flow! Ugh
If they had opened their eyes 2 months ago and would not show childish behavior about their politics and admit it failed, they would have had a look at the map, found a lake in 20 km around Paris and set up the triathlon there.
But nowadays everything must contain a political / social message the athletes and the fans are just annoyed of. In this case "look at me, I have cleaned the Seine".
Just have a look at the messages in the opening.
With sports events in China, Arab countries or Russia the German media (and I guess most Western media) is all about how bad their morals are and how they place their political messages and it's like: they use the platform for their party and not for the sports, blabla.
But to be honest, the West is way worse with it's wokeness and politics in these events.
It should be about the competition and for the fans to have a good time. Nothing more, nothing less.
10000% you nailed it.
Why not have a back up plan??
Can the IOC fine them?
Best bet is that the bacteria levels will decrease slightly below acceptable levels. Would you still want to swim in water at that level? Ridiculous they tried to clean up the Seine. Should've been held in Nice and all would be good.
Let,s hear it for the French! They could have set up an alternative swim vence months ago, but did not! Making it a duathlon is wrong, wrong, wrong!
watching it now happening.
What is the story with the women’s Tri? Is it also in the same situation or are they going ahead for the women?
I'm in Paris, and it's frankly the news I was hoping to hear. I've been here every summer for the last 10 years, and this year has been bizarrely rainy. UK-level rainy. Normally it's 30c and dry as a bone. And in the last few days - it seems the rain has finally broken. We'll have better luck down the road a bit - the rain is the biggest contributor to water quality in the Seine.
Sadly this is the reality for triathletes in a lot of places... Here in Washington D.C. basically all the available triathlons within a couple of hours drive are held in water of dubious quality.... rivers, lakes, ponds, marinas, all with marginal quality water that you would never swim in in normal circumstances. They will often do the tests day/days before and there will be rain etc and at best you might be offered the choice of a duathlon.
Aaaaandd what did I say a few days ago?!?!?! YUCK!!!! "... 5-zillion e-coli traveling worldwide discarding waste from above and beyond all dumping into a river smaller than the Ganges" (Valse Mélancolique: Historian, Newscaster, Composer, Critic, Organist, Pianist, Athlete, Transcendentalist, Clairvoyant, Chef, Martial Artists, Cyclist, Mechanic, Ancient-Astronaut Theorist, Inventor)
It is good money spent because a lot of it was on upgrading centuries old sewage systems and such, though on an idealised timeline. The part that is not acceptable is having no backup venue to host the swim. There should not be a triathlon medal handed out for what is itself a different event.
Martin nailed it. They've had years to come up with a contingency to move the swim. Embarrassing.
hopefully not canceled but it think it’s gonna be
Either that, or you'll be swimming in the worst gunk in history.
Moving your starting position is not in the spirit of the Olympic games but swimming in shit is.
Why not just do it in a pool if all goes wrong, stillt better than a duathlon for the “triathlon” medals
How do they go from the pool to t1?
@@michaelbauer8778 on feet
@@michaelbauer8778bus?
@@michaelbauer8778just have to move the course. I’ve done several triathlons that start in the pool.
@@jimjamthebananaman1 decent short distance triathlon ;)
swim, Paris metro, bike, run :D
Incentives are fucked in this sport as well if no national association will remove their athletes from the competition of the event is turned into a duathlon.
mmm duathlon is the only option in the current scene ,apart from bad water , making swimmers go against the river flow just places the advantage in the hands of the strong swimmers. Thats not fair play at all. The top possible medallists will not be disadvantged by a duathlon they can all run and bike well.
how can the quality of the water improve in one day? like just barely get it into the numbers of swimmable water
Some incredibly stubborn Olympic officials got their way 🤯
Could the federations have been a bit cheeky and nominated a duathlete instead of a triathlete f it would've boosted their chance of winning?
it's not down the drain, if it will keep the water cleaner than it used to be. there's life after the olympics.
Duathlon would be much better than a complete cancellation!
I got up this morning to watch the race. Dissapointed to see the cancellation. Even worse for the atheletes or people who went there to watch it live. They spendt a ton of cash to clean the river, and this happend. The french dissapoint again. Why not have a backup plan?
Forget cleaning up the rivers, just close all the restaurants for 3 days. The sewer system/river will be nice and clean then.
@yesitis1395 Do you understand how rivers, cities, wastewater systems, and rain work? Do you think about things you write, or just always assume you're right? Cities are non-porous. When it rains, water goes into drainage systems, which can handle a certain volume of water (one of the big upgrades here is the volume Paris can handle). If there's more than that, it goes into the local body of water. (This is true in your city, too before you get too pompous.) Paris has the added challenge of urban waste from dogs and occasionally people that has a downhill path to the seine with no drainage to catch it. Closing the restaurants will mean that people go to grocery stores. Or are you proposing a mass starvation? Oy.
Reality is complex and hard to manage. Being an idiot on the internet is easy. Every one of us is doing our best. Choose how you want to contribute to our shared world. ✌️
Making it a duathlon is a joke. It's a different sport.
The fact there is no backup course is straight up unacceptable and a complete failure on behalf of the Olympic organizers.
It’s a joke and I live in France (am English) and love triathlon but there many many places that this could have been held. If Tahiti can hold the surfing then there is no obligation to hold the triathlon in Paris it is absurd, embarrassing and the clean up was an egregious waste of public money.
Additionally if you were an athlete would you really want to swim in the Seine? I wouldn’t. My long term health would be much more important to me.
Even if they claim the water conditions improved, would you really want to swim in that? 🤢
How come Heather is not on the video but she is doing the commentating of the Olympics?? Good job for her though ;)
Que lo hagan en la Rviera Maya y tan tan
Optimized training by swimming in the toilet, before flushing.
Water quality is shit ( 🤨 ) but it makes for warmer water. Just don't drink it 😁
Well can't they find a roofless large swimming pool like the old days or a lake/pond?... The Oly distance is short it will be just a few laps if there's no wall-turn only zig-zag a full 1500m it should still be recognized as "open water" right? It should not be that hard to find such water. 😂
Triathlon beeing an individual sport, where you are supposed to do the work yourself, using a domestique for the bike leg of the race must really be classified as *Pathetic*? #matchfixing #unfairadvantage
Metaphorical and literal 💩 show, from the organisers.
What a suprise, or not ...
Why not embark on tradition and bring back Canoeing to the Triathlon?
Goes to show you what France thinks about triathlon and the Olympics. "Go swim in our 💩 water, you'll love it!" - IM should yank WC's from Nice and move it somewhere that appreciates the sport.
1.5 billion. Let that sink in. The venue should have never been held there in the first place.
Did this actually happen? I hear people saying that it did. Where are the videos?
Yes the women's and men's races took place Wednesday. And the videos are all over whichever host broadcaster it is for your country.
So we had a cesspool opening ceremony and now a cesspool swim venue for the triathlon?
You got it.
They could have made Nice the venue and maybe moved the ironman world champs some where else this year.
How did you not say 1.4 billion euros down the Seine? 😂 0:47
At least the Seine is much cleaner now, seems like the right choice to me.
How MUCH cleaner?
@@user-tm3si7pw3uDo basic research. These are not hard answers to find.
How is the Olympic comitee suprised that any river in a major city, let slone the Seine, isn't suitable for swimming. The fact that there's no plan B for something this predictable is unacceptable
As a strong swimmer, I see those currents as an absolute win
yeh so you get an advantage , do you really need one.
@nevillemurray5602 absolutely lol I always said there's really no perk to bring a great swimmer in triathlon. Maybe with the exception of sprints. Hehe. Maybe that's why I ONLY do well I'm sprints and Olympics. But when you tack on the distance, strong cyclists (I think) have the greatest advantage because there's so much ground to cover. However, there is an argument to make for strong runners.
Not swimming through shit so I'm not upset at all
Of course it was going to be dirty if they put 1.4 billion Euros down the drain! The drain went into the Seine!
This is the most disinterested I’ve ever been in the Olympics and that’s sad. How they ever thought this was a good idea is beyond me. Without the swim this isn’t a triathlon, how there is no backup option is beyond me.
When you don’t know nothing about sports 3 years of preparation for one specific day dump in trash container.