Melbourne will host the 16th FINA World Swimming Championships (25m) this December in another win for Victoria’s packed calendar of major events – which will help to support local businesses and create jobs.Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events Martin Pakula today joined Swimming Australia to confirm the short course format of the world championships would be staged at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre from Tuesday, 13 to Sunday, 18 December 2022.
“Hosting the FINA World Swimming Championships shows Melbourne is one of the world’s great sporting cities.” Minister Pakula commented “We continue to invest in securing high calibre events because they attract visitors to Melbourne and support local jobs.”
“We are delighted to be able to deliver the 2022 FINA short course championships in Melbourne in December. Melbourne has a great history with large-scale swimming events and it will be great to bring an international world championships back on to Australian soil.” Swimming Australia CEO Eugenie Buckley commented.
The Minister said that the event features the world’s fastest swimmers and is anticipated to draw 2,500 participants, team members and officials from around the world and up to 60,000 attendees to lap up six action packed days in the pool. Originally scheduled for Kazan, Russia, it will be the first FINA event in Australia since Melbourne hosted the 2007 FINA World Swimming Championships.
Buckley said that previous FINA World Swimming Championships (25m) medalists include Australian stars Ariarne Titmus, Emily Seebohm and Mitch Larkin, along with internationals Caeleb Dressel, Daiya Seto and Sarah Sjöström. Buckley went on to explain that Swimming Australia will host a pre-world championship training camp for the Australian Dolphins in a regional Victorian location in December, which will include community engagement and development opportunities as excitement builds towards the 2026 Commonwealth Games.
Minister Pakula went on to explain that the event will further strengthen Melbourne’s international major event and sporting reputation with six days of live broadcast to a forecast audience of over 430 million throughout the world. In addition to the world championships, Melbourne will host international delegates from 180 countries for the FINA Congress and FINA Awards immediately following the conclusion of the competition in the pool. Minister Pakula said that the Andrews Labor Government is backing the return of a packed calendar of major events in 2022, attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors and creating local jobs. In 2019, Victoria’s world-class calendar of major events delivered a $2.5 billion annual economic boost the state.
