While this COVID business is being sorted out swimming in New Zealand is a bit dire. Occasional swims in the sea are not ideal preparation for national pool swimming. All we can do is wait and see.

The lunatic fringe of swimming in New Zealand has another report on the “NZ Swim” Facebook page. I’ve read it but have no idea what it says. Something about when Level 69 becomes a purple traffic light we can put on Speedos and dance down Queen Street singing “Hare Krishna”. Swimmers in Wellington are asked to burn their traffic light pink fins at the top of Mt. Victoria. I think “NZ Swim” said water from Freyberg Pool, blessed by Lewis Clareburt, would be pumped up the hill to extinguish the blaze.  

Do not trust the rubbish published on that page. It is as reliable as a car I used to own called the “Blue Beast”. Fully loaded sheep trucks used to pass us going uphill on the Napier/Taupo road. As I have said before, when the Swimming New Zealand or Millennium websites says, “The pool opens at 6.00am on Monday the something or other,” I will be there.

There is no mileage in writing about swimming. So, what else is there to talk about? The “News Talk ZB” radio station is always fertile ground for sarcasm. Certainly, their relationship with the truth is about as distant as the “Blue Beast” was to reliable motoring. Today I heard them advertise themselves with a jingle that said something like, “All the views”. The inference was that their programmes would provide the listener with views from the political right, the middle and the left. Now that is simply not true.

The key six hours every day are dominated by two right-wing nutters, Hosking and du Plessis-Allan. They set the tone for much of the talk-back that follows. The Prime Minister did not abandon their radio station for no reason. She left because her plea for an end to child labour in Westport coal mines was being depicted as robbing pre-teens of their lunch money. If Mother Terresa voted Labour, “News Talk ZB” would find a way of linking her to the Pablo Escobar drug empire.

Last night du Plessis-Allan said that she would have to ask her boss about some outlandish right-wing opinion she was masquerading as news. Doesn’t she know we are well aware she is married to and sleeps with her boss. He’s a right-wing bigot as well. At least he is in my opinion. The suggestion that asking him is consulting some independent source is pathetic.

Finally in this week of little swimming news, I hear on tonight’s TV One sport’s news that a 400m hurdles athlete called French has been recruited by Cycling New Zealand’s (CNZ) centralised training organisation to join their sprint team. One of New Zealand’s best sports reporters, Abby Wilson, asked the CYC Head Coach why was a runner selected? Wasn’t their talent available within cycling?

“Not really,” said the coach. “We could not find the talent here, so we went out to athletics, rowing and bobsleigh.” I expected him to widen the search by adding chess, darts and ten pin bowling. But what a put-down of cycling. Last year Sport New Zealand spent $5,394,298 on cycling. Sponsorships coughed up another $1,143,797. That is money that indirectly came from you and me.

$6.5million and CNZ’s centralised program can’t find a cyclist for the national team without looting any other sport they can find. It is swimming’s centralised problems all over again. My guess is no one will see it as a problem before it is too late. And when the new recruit plucked from a Las Vegas poker table fails to fire in the Birmingham Commonwealth Games’ men’s sprint, Sport New Zealand will blame the athletes. Or perhaps they were delt a bad hand. When Sport New Zealand’s money was the root cause all along. Just as it was in the tragic decision made by Olivia Podmore. But what are the odds of that ever being said by the current investigation into her death?

Just as swimming was a mess before it ditched the whole Sport New Zealand circus, cycling is being lured into the same dark, deep hole. Deaths and bizarre recruitments are just the beginning. It will not end well.

And, on an uplifting note, I am off with Eyad and Alex for a swim at Takapuna Beach tomorrow morning. The weather forecast is good. A takeaway coffee and donut from the Takapuna Café should start the day off well. Especially now that Jacinda has said that by mid-December we might be starting to climb out of this COVID mess. Fingers crossed.