For the first time, Swimming Canada will host its own Trials to select the national open water team.

Beginning in 2019, Swimming Canada is launching the Canadian Open Water Swimming Trials. The event will be held in the Cayman Islands on April 27, with a rain date of April 28, at Governors Beach on Grand Cayman, the same location as the historic Flowers Sea Swim.

In the past, Canada has selected its open water teams based on performances at another country or organization’s event, typically later in the year. The new event will be a full Swimming Canada event held three weeks after the main Canadian Swimming Trials to select the pool team.

“We wanted to hold a Trials at an earlier time so that coaches and athletes have the time to be able to prepare properly and obviously we can’t do that in Canada because of the water temperature,” explained Mark Perry, Swimming Canada’s Distance/Open Water Coach.

The Trials will select the swimmers to represent Canada in July at the FINA World Championships set for Gwangju, Korea, which represents a qualifying opportunity for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, as well as the inaugural World Beach Games. Swimming Canada will also select teams for the Pan American Games and FISU Universiade off the Trials.

“I’m really excited that we’re having the chance to run our own Open Water Trials,” Perry said. “We’re in the position where we’ve got enough athletes that are interested in competing in the event and that want to race to get on teams. It’s going to be a great event hopefully.”

A full technical package has been finalized and posted here: https://www.swimming.ca/en/events-results/events/2019-canadian-open-water-trials/

“It’s great we can partner with the Cayman Islands Aquatic Sports Association to deliver our Open Water Trials,” added Swimming Canada High Performance Director John Atkinson. “It will provide our athletes a great opportunity to race onto our teams.”