16 neutral athletes have entered next week’s Short Course World Swimming Championships in Budapest, Hungary. 14 of those athletes were accepted under World Aquatics’ new guidelines for athlete participation during periods of conflict, while the other two are from the suspended Mexican federation.
While in the past, neutral athletes have been grouped into a single designation, at this meet, they have been given different country codes depending on where they’re from: NAA are athletes from Belarus, NAB are athletes from Russia, and NAC are athletes from Mexico.
This was done because neutral athletes holding a passport from the same country can now participate in relays together. Previously, they were limited to only individual events.
While World Aquatics has still not released a full entries list for the meet, they have published a list of participating athletes and for some of those athletes, their profiles show their event lineups. Others don’t.
The large Russian lineup fulfills the country’s rumored plan to send a ‘full roster’ to the meet after years of being suspended from international competition. While Belarusian athletes have remained relatively-involved in World Championship and Olympic meets, Russian swimmers under neutral flags have been fairly-sparse, limited to mostly athletes trained abroad in the United States.
At the Paris Olympics, for example, there were three Belarusian swimmers: Ilya Shymanovich, Anastasiya Shkurdai, and Alina Zmushka, but only one Russian, Evgenii Somov.
All four of those athletes are also scheduled to participate in this meet.
While Russian and Belarusian federations are officially suspended because of the ongoing war in Ukraine and Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian sporting organizations, Mexico was expelled for internal reasons. Two weeks ago, World Aquatics expelled the Mexican Swimming Federation to “assist in the establishment of a new federation in Mexico.”
Mexican athletes were able to compete under the banner of Mexico at the 2024 World Aquatics Championship in February and the Paris 2024 Olympic Games in July. They also competed under the banner of Mexico at the most recent AQUA event – the 2024 World Junior Diving Championships that ended less than a week ago in Brazil.
Neutral Athletes Competing at the 2024 World Short Course Swimming Championships
Swimmer
Country
Entries
Anastasiya Kuliashova
Belarus
Grigori Pekarski
Belarus
Anastasiya Shkurdai
Belarus
50 back, 100 back, 200 back
Ilya Shymanovich
Belarus
Alina Zmushka
Belarus
50 breast, 100 breast, 200 breast
Elizaveta Agapitova
Russia
Ilia Borodin
Russia
Alina Gaifutdinova
Russia
Daria Klepikova
Russia
Miron Lifintsev
Russia
Andrei Minakov
Russia
100 fly, 200 fly
Kiril Prigoda
Russia
50 breast, 100 breast, 200 breast
Arina Surkova
Russia
Daria Trofimova
Russia
Miranda Grana Perez
Mexico
Maria Jose Mata Cocco
Mexico