Athletes dive into the Seine River from the Alexander III bridge on the start of the first leg of the women's triathlon test event for the 2024 Paris Olympics in Paris, Aug. 17, 2023.Michel Euler/The Associated Press
Of all the dates Olympic officials in Paris had circled on their calendar, July 30 was likely at the top of their list: the first triathlon competition and the first test of the Seine’s cleanliness.
The men’s event begins at 8 a.m. local time Tuesday, when 55 athletes will line up on a floating pontoon near the Pont Alexandre III in central Paris and plunge into the Seine for the 1,500-metre swim leg. The women’s competition is on Wednesday, and the river is also supposed to be the site of the marathon swim and the paratriathlon.
Just how safe the water will be remains an open question – and the athletes won’t know until four hours before Tuesday’s race if the swimming leg will go ahead.
The quality of the water has been a concern for months, and that worry has only increased after the cancellation of practice sessions in the river on Sunday and Monday. Games organizers said the health of the athletes is their main priority and that pollution had been above acceptable levels on both days. However, they remain confident that improved weather conditions will bring the pollution down and that the races will go ahead as planned. But no one is certain.
“Well, you know, we have to wait, and we don’t do fiction scenarios,” said Étienne Thobois, the chief executive officer of Paris 2024. “We’re still optimistic that we can hold the competition within the Seine River. We have contingency plans, so we hope that tomorrow morning they’ll be able to participate,” he added during a news conference Monday.
Organizers have been at pains for months to prove that the Seine will be clean enough for the Games, and city officials remain committed to opening three sites for public swimming next summer.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo took a much-publicized swim in the river a couple of weeks ago to help alleviate concerns about the water. “It was magnificent,” Hidalgo said after her swim. “The water is very, very good – a little bit cool but not that much.”
Water testing has shown that levels of E. coli and enterococci, an intestinal bacteria, have fluctuated wildly in recent months and soared as high as 10 times above the allowable limits some days this spring.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo swims in the Seine river, Wednesday, July 17, 2024 in Paris. After months of anticipation, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo took a dip in the Seine River on Wednesday, fulfilling a promise she made months ago to show the river is clean enough to host open-swimming competitions during the 2024 Olympics.JOEL SAGET/The Associated Press
The main problem has been wet weather in May and June and the steady rainfall last Friday and Saturday. Excessive rain can overwhelm treatment centres and cause contaminated rainwater to run off from farm fields and other areas along the riverbank.
French authorities have invested €1.4-billion ($2.1-billion) on a variety of clean-up initiatives. One of the biggest is a new rainwater-retention basin that’s capable of collecting 50,000 cubic metres of water, the equivalent of roughly 20 Olympic-sized swimming pools. The basin opened a few weeks ago and is designed to collect excess rainwater so it can go to the treatment centre directly rather than spill over into the river.
The weather has turned hot and sunny since Sunday, giving organizers hope that the bacteria levels will drop. Thobois said testing was being done throughout the day Monday at various points along the river. Officials are also using an instrument that anticipates bacteria levels, and it has been tracking downward, he added. “So that’s why we say that we are optimistic for tomorrow.”
Canada has two athletes competing Tuesday: Tyler Mislawchuk and Charles Paquet. Emy Legault will take part in the women’s event Wednesday.
Chris Dornan, a spokesman for Triathlon Canada, said the cancellation of the practice sessions on Sunday and Monday had not been a major disruption for the athletes.
“We had planned for this in our preparation with off-site swim training until race day,” he said Monday. “We also know World Triathlon also has contingencies in place should we not be able to race tomorrow, so it is business and preparation as normal for us today.”
Those contingencies include delaying the races until the water improves or cancelling the swim legs as a last resort.
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