FINA (french: Fédération internationale de natation, en, International Swimming Federation, link=yes) (to be renamed as World Aquatics by ) is the international federation recognised by the

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...

(IOC) for administering international competitions in

water sports Water (chemical formula ) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a s ...

. It is one of several international federations which administer a given sport or discipline for both the IOC and the international community. It is based in

Lausanne, Switzerland Lausanne ( , , , ) ; it, Losanna; rm, Losanna. is the capital and largest city of the Swiss French speaking canton of Vaud. It is a hilly city situated on the shores of Lake Geneva, about halfway between the Jura Mountains and the Alps, and fac ...

. FINA currently oversees competition in six aquatics sports:

swimming Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...

diving Diving most often refers to: * Diving (sport), the sport of jumping into deep water * Underwater diving, human activity underwater for recreational or occupational purposes Diving or Dive may also refer to: Sports * Dive (American football), a ...

high diving High diving is the act of diving into water from relatively great heights. High diving can be performed as an adventure sport (as with cliff diving), as a performance stunt (as with many records attempts), or competitively during sporting even ...

artistic swimming Synchronized swimming (in British English, synchronised swimming) or artistic swimming is a sport where swimmers perform a synchronized choreographed routine, accompanied by music. The sport is governed internationally by FINA (the ''Fédératio ...

water polo Water polo is a competitive sport, competitive team sport played in water between two teams of seven players each. The game consists of four quarters in which the teams attempt to score goals by throwing the water polo ball, ball into the oppo ...

, and

open water swimming Open water swimming is a swimming discipline which takes place in outdoor bodies of water such as open oceans, lakes, and rivers. The beginning of the modern age of open water swimming is sometimes taken to be May 3, 1810, when Lord Byron swam s ...

. from the FINA website (www.fina.org); retrieved 2013-06-05. FINA also oversees " Masters" competition (for adults) in its disciplines.

History

FINA was founded on 19 July 1908 in the Manchester Hotel in London, UK at the end of the 1908 Summer Olympics by the Belgian,

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

, Danish, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian and

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

Swimming Federations. Number of national federations by year: *1908: 8 *1928: 38 *1958: 75 *1978: 106 *1988: 109 *2000: 174 *2008: 197 *2010: 202 *2012: 203 *2015: 208 *2016: 207 *2017: 209

Members

At the June 2017, FINA Bureau meeting,

Bhutan Bhutan (; dz, འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, Druk Yul ), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan,), is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is situated in the Eastern Himalayas, between China in the north and India in the south. A mountainou ...

became the 208th national federation of FINA. and on 30 November 2017,

Anguilla Anguilla ( ) is a British Overseas Territory in the Caribbean. It is one of the most northerly of the Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles, lying east of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and directly north of Saint Martin. The terr ...

became the 209th national federation of FINA. Members are grouped by continent, and there are 5 continental associations of which they can choose to be a member: World Map FINA

*Africa (52): African Swimming Confederation (CANA) *Americas (45): Swimming Union of the Americas (ASUA) *Asia (45): Asia Swimming Federation (AASF) *Europe (52): European Swimming League (LEN) *Oceania (15): Oceania Swimming Association (OSA) Note: The number following each continental name is the number of FINA members which fall into the given geographical area. It is not necessarily the number of members in the continental association.

Organisation

The FINA membership meets every four years, usually coinciding with the

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

. There are two types of normal or "ordinary" congress: General and Technical. FINA's highest authority is the General Congress. Any technical issues concerning FINA's five aquatic disciplines are decided by the Technical Congress. Each Congress has two voting members from each Member federation, plus the following non-voting members: the 22 members of the Bureau, the Honorary Life President, and all Honorary Members. The Technical Congress has the following additional non-voting members: all members from the respective Technical Committees. "Extraordinary" Congresses are also called from time to time, to deal with a specific topic or area of concern (e.g. an Extraordinary Congress was held with the 2009 World Championships to review the Masters swimming rules; there was a General Congress at the 2009 Worlds). All Congress meetings are chaired by FINA's president. Between Congress meetings of the entire membership, a smaller 22-member representative board, called the FINA Bureau, meets to act in a timely manner on items which cannot wait until the entire body can meet. It is the Bureau that elects the FINA Executive Officers. Various committees and commission also help with the oversight of individual disciplines (e.g. the Technical Open Water Swimming Committee helps with open water), or topic-related issues (e.g. the FINA Doping Panel).

Presidents

Each presidential term is four years, beginning and concluding with the year following the Summer Olympics (i.e., 2018-2021 is the current term). 1954 Honorary President Ing. Ladislav Hauptmann - Czech Republic (Czechoslovakia) - President LEN (1948 - 1950) and FINA official.

Events

FINA organizes one championship involving each of the five disciplines it oversees (the "World Championships"), as well as championships and circuits in each of the disciplines.

World Aquatics Championships

The biggest FINA event is the biennial World Aquatics Championships, currently held every odd year. It features competitions in all five aquatic disciplines. Prior to 2000, the event was held every 4 years, in the even year between (Summer) Olympic Games.

Discipline championships

*Swimming: World Swimming Championships (25m), (a.k.a. "Short Course Worlds"). Biennial event (in even years); swum in 25-meter length pool (Olympic and World Championships are in a 50m pool). *Water Polo: Water Polo World Leagues (men's and women's). *Diving: Diving World Series. *High Diving: High Diving World Series. *Open Water: World Open Water Swimming Championships (a.k.a. "Open Water Worlds"). Even years from 2000 to 2010. *Artistic swimming: Synchro World Trophy. *Masters: World Masters Championships (a.k.a. "Masters Worlds"). Bi-annual, in even years. "Masters" competition is for adults (20 years old and up). This championships features all 5 disciplines.

Discipline world cups

In addition to the championships events listed above, FINA also organizes the following events: *Swimming: Swimming World Cup. *Water Polo: Men's and Women's Water Polo World Cup. Every 4 years. *Diving:

Diving World Cup The FINA Diving World Cup is an international biennial diving competition that was first contested in The Woodlands, Texas in 1979. The 2012 edition served as Diving's test event for the 2012 Olympics, as well as the final qualifying event for ...

. *High Diving: High Diving World Cup. *Open Water: Marathon Swim World Series. *Artistic Swimming: Synchro World Cup. Every 4 years.

Junior championships

World-level championships restricted to a younger age, with the age limit varying by discipline and gender: *Swimming: World Junior Swimming Championships. *Water Polo:

Junior Junior or Juniors may refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * ''Junior'' (Junior Mance album), 1959 * ''Junior'' (Röyksopp album), 2009 * ''Junior'' (Kaki King album), 2010 * ''Junior'' (LaFontaines album), 2019 Films * ''Junior'' (1994 ...

and Youth Water Polo World Championships. *Diving: Junior Diving World Cup. *Open Water: Junior Open Water Swimming World Championships. *Artistic Swimming: World Junior Synchronised Swimming Championships.

Sport name changes

In 2017, FINA officially re-named the sport of synchronised swimming as artistic swimming for its competitions to reflect the expansion in evaluation criteria in the sport to include not only synchronization but other elements such as choreography and artistic expression as well.

Bans

Retired athletes

In relation to anti-doping rule violations, FINA does enact suspensions on athletes who are retired from their respective sport at the time of ban implementation, with examples including Lithuanian Rūta Meilutytė (2019–2021) and Russians Artem Lobuzov (2021–2025), Alexandra Sokolova (2021–2025), and Artem Podyakov (2021–2025).

Russia and Belarus bans

Russian and Belarusian athletes and officials are banned from every FINA event through the end of 2022. FINA also cancelled FINA events in Russia, and banned Russian and Belarusian teams through to the 19th FINA World Championships Budapest 2022. In March 2022, after the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. ...

, FINA banned all Russians and Belarusians from competing at the

2022 World Aquatics Championships The 2022 World Aquatics Championships, the 19th edition of the FINA World Aquatics Championships, were held in Budapest, Hungary, from 17 June to 3 July 2022. In March 2022, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, FINA banned both the Russian an ...

and withdrew the

2022 FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m) The 16th FINA World Swimming Championships (25 m) took place from 13 to 18 December 2022 in Melbourne, Australia at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre.

from being held in Russia. This came after indefinitely banning athletes and officials of both countries from wearing the colours of their country, swimming representing their country with their country's name, and the playing of their country's national anthem in case an athlete from either country won an event. Additionally, times swum by Russians at non-FINA competitions for the April to December 2022 time frame did not count for world rankings nor world records.

Controversies

Soul Cap

In 2021, FINA came under criticism for not approving the use at the Olympics of the Soul Cap, a brand of swimming caps designed for natural Black hair. FINA said the caps did not fit "the natural form of the head" and to their "best knowledge the athletes competing at the international events never used, neither require … caps of such size and configuration." After receiving criticism about racism, FINA announced that they would review their decision. Later in 2022, FINA (World Aquatics) decided to approve the Soul Caps for future FINA events (effective immediately)

Transgender athlete restrictions

On 19 June 2022, FINA "committed to the separation of Aquatics sports into men's and women's categories according to sex" by a 71% vote, adopting a new policy on eligibility for the men's and women's competition categories. This policy effectively bars all transgender women from competing in professional women's swimming, with the exception of athletes who "can establish to FINA's comfortable satisfaction that they have not experienced any part of male puberty beyond Tanner Stage 2 (of puberty) or before age 12, whichever is later". FINA also announced the development of a separate "open" category for some events, to be determined by a working group over the next six months, so that "everybody has the opportunity to compete at an elite level". The decision was criticized as "discriminatory, harmful, unscientific and not in line with the 2021 IOC principles" by LGBT advocacy group

Athlete Ally Athlete Ally is a nonprofit LGBTQ athletic advocacy group based in the United States. They focus on making athletic communities more inclusive and less discriminatory and helping athletes to advocate for LGBTQ equality. History As an athlete i ...

Notes

References

External links

Official website
* {{Authority control Swimming organizations * International sports organizations Sports organizations established in 1908 1908 establishments in England Aquatics IOC-recognised international federations Organisations based in Lausanne