Mumbai: Even in a Commonwealth Games (CWG) of strapped sports and shoestring budgets, Glasgow 2026 featured the largest swimming programme of any edition. Truncated or full-fledged, the pool still rewards a huge chunk of medals at the CWG (of toppers Australia’s 171 medals and 70 gold, swimmers contributed 76 and 37).
The pool remains India’s major area for improvement for a bigger push in multi-sport events. The country’s able-bodied swimmers were by no means expected to challenge for medals at the Glasgow CWG. However, their below-par timings and performances compelled the national federation to look at “reinventing the training system” in the hope of Indian swimmers being more competitive when the country hosts the next CWG in four years.
At the 2022 CWG, Indians qualified for the final from heats in four events, with Srihari Nataraj also breaking a national record apart from making two finals. There was no such individual brilliance in Glasgow, with only Sajan Prakash (200m butterfly) and the 4x200m men’s freestyle relay team advancing from the heats to the final (Aryan Nehra’s 800m and 1500m freestyle events did not have a heat).
Timing-wise too, most swimmers had done better. Sajan, 32, finished last in the 200m butterfly final with a timing of 1:58.05. He had clocked 1:57.09 in March in Singapore. Srihari, 25, clocked 25.29 in the semi-final of 50m backstroke, his primary event now where his personal best is 25.18. Fresh off going sub-8 in June, Nehra, 22, clocked 8:07.26 in 800m freestyle.
{{/usCountry}}Timing-wise too, most swimmers had done better. Sajan, 32, finished last in the 200m butterfly final with a timing of 1:58.05. He had clocked 1:57.09 in March in Singapore. Srihari, 25, clocked 25.29 in the semi-final of 50m backstroke, his primary event now where his personal best is 25.18. Fresh off going sub-8 in June, Nehra, 22, clocked 8:07.26 in 800m freestyle.
{{/usCountry}}“The CWG was not a good outcome. It could have been better,” said Monal Chokshi, general secretary of Swimming Federation of India (SFI).
The calendar, however, didn’t help. With the senior nationals in June – from where a majority qualified for the CWG and Asian Games – the CWG in July-August and the Asian Games in September-October, the swimmers could not taper for the CWG. Most also prioritised the Asian Games over the CWG.
“More importance was given to the Asian Games. That was an individual decision that some swimmers took,” said Dronacharya awardee Nihar Ameen, the contingent’s coach in Glasgow. “We’re hoping for a better performance at the Asian Games, where the swimmers will be more prepared, rested, and will perform better in terms of at least bringing national records and doing better than the CWG.”
The likes of Nehra and Rishabh Das are training abroad, while Srihari now prefers a high-intensity, low-volume programme, said Ameen. A 45-day camp is currently on in Ahmedabad for which SFI has roped in Sean Kelly, who has been in high-performance roles with Spain and Great Britain.
“45 days is too short a period, but we are doing what is best possible post CWG,” said Chokshi.
For the next CWG in Ahmedabad, where India will seek a more competitive show in the pool at home, an overhaul of training systems and assistance from foreign expertise might be planned. Many Indian swimmers are currently scattered and follow their own programmes.
“A lot needs to be done. The way we’re doing it right now, it’s not going to cut it. Maybe we have to reinvent the system, review it, and do it differently,” said Chokshi.
“The current training methodologies need to be revisited. Performances at the top level are eluding us so far. For that, foreign expertise and camps have to be more frequent. We need that expertise to train all potential candidates as an India squad, and not have these isolated training centres where people are doing their own stuff. And eventually we see what has been happening so far.”
The SFI has had “serious conversations” with the sports ministry and Sports Authority of India to work towards creating a proper training centre in India. For the next four years, with the Ahmedabad CWG as “priority number one,” said Chokshi, the focus will have to be on grooming the next batch in the 17-21 age group and promising female swimmers.
“If the emerging pack of junior swimmers are handled right, they will be in good shape in four years time,” said Ameen.
“That’s the only way forward in the next cycle,” said Chokshi.
“And we’ll have to get tougher on what is really required. Then the swimmers would have to fall into that framework. Because otherwise, a four-year window is still short, but if you’re looking at 2032 and 2036, the same old same old is clearly not going to work.”