International Swimming League

The International Swimming League (ISL) is an annual professional swimming league, established in 2019. It features a team-based competition format with fast-paced race sessions. In 2019, the regular season started in October and the Final Match was held in December.

International Swimming League

Current season, competition or edition: 2019 International Swimming League
Sport	Swimming
Founded	2019
CEO	Ali Khan
President	Konstantin Grigorishin
No. of teams	10
Countries	Worldwide
Official website	https://isl.global/

Athletes previously disqualified for breaking anti-doping rules are banned from ISL.[1]

Format

ISL Season

The season is split into a regular championship and a final. In the regular championship clubs earn points from participating in matches according to the following principles: 4 points for 1st place in the match, 3 for 2nd, 2 for 3rd and 1 for 4th. After all of the championship matches, the 4 clubs with the highest number of points advance to the final, where the winner of the league (the ISL Champions) are determined. Each club can have a maximum roster of 32 athletes. At each match 28 of these are permitted to compete - 12 men and 12 women can swim individual races, while 2 men and 2 women can be used as "relay only" athletes.[2]

ISL Matches

Four clubs take part in a match, an ISL match lasts two days. During the first season, an ISL match consisted of 37(39 in the 2020 season) races: 30(32) individual, 5 team relays and 2 skin races. Each race consists of 2 representatives from each of the clubs. Points are distributed after the race in the following manner: 9 points for 1st, 7 for 2nd, ... 1 for 8th. Points are not awarded to athletes (teams) that fail to finish a race. In addition, points are doubled in relays and are awarded after each of the 3 skin race heats.

The points of the clubs’ representatives are then added together and go towards the total points result of their respective clubs.

A victory in a race does not guarantee maximum club points. As an example, club representatives that finish 1st and 7th in a race will earn less points for their respective clubs than those who finish 2nd and 4th: they will score 11 and 12 total points, respectively.

A match is won by the club that has scored the most points in all of the 37 races. Similarly, the rest of the clubs are distributed through 2nd to 4th place, respective of the points they score during the entire match. Theoretically, a match could be won by a team that has not won a single race.

In the eventuality two or more clubs end up with the same number of points after the match, an extra mixed medley 4x50m relay shall take place, the outcome of which will mirror the final results of the match.[3]

Teams

The 2019 season debuted with ten clubs in total, five from the United States, and five from Europe. In 2020 clubs from Canada and Japan were added to the ISL, increasing the total number of clubs to 10.[4]

Team	City	Joined	General Manager	Head Coach
Americas Conference
DC Trident	Washington, D.C.	2019	Kaitlin Sandeno	Cyndi Gallagher
LA Current	Los Angeles	2019	Lenny Krayzelburg	David Marsh
New York Breakers	New York City	2019	Tina Andrew	Peter Andrew
Cali Condors	San Francisco	2019	Jason Lezak	Gregg Troy
Toronto Titans	Toronto	2020	Robert Kent
European-Asian Conference
Energy Standard	Paris	2019	Jean-Francois Salessy	James Gibson
London Roar	London	2019	Rob Woodhouse	Mel Marshall
Team Iron	Budapest	2019	Dorina Szekeres
Aqua Centurions	Rome	2019	Alessandra Guerra	Matteo Giunta
ISL Tokyo	Tokyo	2020	Kosuke Kitajima

Technical Rules

All the matches are composed of four clubs. and take place on two days, with two two-hour long sessions including two short breaks in each. Each club is comprised of a minimum of 24 and a maximum of 28 athletes, 12 Men and 12 Women are permitted to swim individual events while an additional 2 male & 2 female athletes may be included in a Team roster as Relay only swimmers. In each event, all the clubs competing must line up two athletes (and also two teams in the relays).

A standard ISL match takes place during two days. Each day is comprised of three 30-35 minute sessions, divided by two 10 minute breaks. Each day two adjacent lanes are randomly assigned to each club where the swimmers shall race in the lanes until the end of each competition day. On Day 1 if a club has been assigned outside lanes (7&8 or 1&2), the next day the club shall be guaranteed central lanes (3&4 or 5&6) and vice versa.

Team line-ups are submitted prior to each competition session. These line-ups can be changed and adjusted during the scheduled breaks within the competition. This has to be done 2-minutes after the conclusion of the last event in the previous session.

A match consists of 37 races (In 2020 two additional races are added - 100 Individual Medley for men and women), including 30(32) individual events, 5 Relays and 2 Skin races, which are open only for the 12 swimmers that have participated in individual events. In addition, if two or more clubs tie in points at the end of the match, an additional mixed medley 4x50 relay shall take place between these clubs’ representatives. All athletes are allowed to participate in this relay. The winner of this relay shall stand higher in the final match rankings than the other club that swam in the relay.[5]

Points are awarded to the teams at the end of each match as follows.

Place	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
Points	4	3	2	1

In 2019, the two American and European teams with the highest number of points after the regular championship, qualify for the Final. If two or more clubs are tied after the regular championship, additional criteria is used to determine the winner.

The scoring for each individual event is as follows (relays races score double the points):[5]

Place	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	DNF	DSQ	DNS
Points	9	7	6	5	4	3	2	1	-2		-4

Relay races

A particular points scoring system has been introduced for relay races, which score double points than individual events. In order to force athletes to put their best forward every time they step on the blocks and to avoid a lack of engagement, minimum time standards have been established.

Place 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th Points 18 14 12 10 8 6 4 2

Jackpot / Split Times (2020 season)[6]

If an athlete is ahead of some athletes in his/her race by a margin bigger than the jackpot time, the points of these athletes are awarded to the club of the winner of the race. Theoretically, the winner of the race that out-touches all of his/her opponents by more than the jackpot time, he/she can earn 37 points for his/her club in an individual race (individual jackpot), 74 points in a relay (relay jackpot) and 80 points in a skin race, if he/she manages to win all three stages by more than the jackpot time (triple jackpot). In case of individual or relay jackpot, all three other teams receive 0 points for the race. In case an athlete fails to show up for a race or gets disqualified, the winner of the race will be awarded with his/her points and that swimmer will receive a penalty according to the “penalties” table. The jackpot times are seen in the table below:

JACKPOT TIMES Short course meters Distance Men   Women Freestyle 50 0.85 0.95 100 1.80 2.05 200 4.00 4.50 400 8.50 9.40     Backstroke 50 0.90 1.05 100 2.00 2.20 200 4.30 4.80     Breaststroke 50 1.05 1.15 100 2.25 2.50 200 5.00 5.40     Butterfly 50 0.90 1.05 100 2.00 2.20 200 4.40 4.80     Individual Medley 100 2.05 2.30 200 4.40 4.90 400 9.40 10.40     Freestyle Relay 4x100 9.00 10.00 Medley Relay 4x100 10.00 11.00 Mixed freestyle 4x100 10.00

Penalties (2019 season)

If a relay or swimmer is slower than the times indicated in the table below, it gets a penalty of points A relay slower than the time standard gets 2 points deducted whereas an athlete slower than the respective time indicated gets instead 1 point of penalty.

On the table all of the minimum time standards (SCM) for the events are compared to the world records.

Distance Men World Record   Women World Record Freestyle 50 22.50 20.24 25.50 22.93 100 49.50 44.94 55.00 50.25 200 1:49.50 1:39.37 1:58.50 1:50.43 400 3:50.50 3:32.25 4:10.00 3:53.92     Backstroke 50 25.00 22.22 28.50 25.67 100 54.00 48.88 1:01.00 55.03 200 1:58.00 1:45.63 2:11.00 1:59.23     Breaststroke 50 28.50 25.25 31.50 28.56 100 1:00.00 55.61 1:08.50 1:02.36 200 2:12.00 2:00.16 2:28.50 2:14.57     Butterfly 50 24.00 21.75 26.50 24.38 100 53.00 48.08 58.50 54.61 200 1:59.50 1:48.24 2:12.00 1:59.61     Individual Medley 200 2:01.00 1:49.63 2:13.50 2:01.86 400 4:19.00 3:55.50 4:46.50 4:18.94     Freestyle Relay 4x100 3:17.00 3:03.03 3:39.00 3:26.53 Medley Relay 4x100 3:35.50 3:19.16 4:02.00 3:45.20 Mixed freestyle 4x100 3:28.00

If an athlete (or a relay team) are disqualified or do not finish the race, points are not awarded for his club, while two points (four for relay teams) are subtracted from the club's overall performance. If an athlete (or a relay team) did not appear for a race, points are not awarded for his club, while four points (eight for relay teams) are subtracted from the club's overall performance.

Place	DNS	DNF	DSQ
Points	-4	-2

MVP

A Most Valuable Player (MVP) is determined after each match and at the end of the entire ISL season.

The criteria for an MVP is the number of points the swimmer has accumulated towards the overall team score for;

(1) The match at hand.

(2) The whole season.

After each match, only one MVP is selected out of all participating swimmers in that specific match. (Match MVP)

At the conclusion of the season one MVP is chosen from all the swimmers who took part in that particular season of ISL. (Season MVP).[5]

Skins Race

A skin race is a series of back-to-back-to-back 50 meters (SCM) freestyle races, operating on a knockout basis: In the first round four swimmers are eliminated (out of 8), second round two swimmers are eliminated leaving the 3rd and last round consisting of only two swimmers racing each other in a head-to-head final race. Skin races’ rounds are held every 3 minutes. The athletes can warm down in the pool or can get a short massage from their team's physiotherapist behind the blocks between each round.The athletes knocked out of the race must return to their team's area.

The lanes, that the qualified athletes will use in the following round, are to be determined according to their team's lane assignment for the day. ISL skin races score as follows:[5]

	Place	DNS	DNF	DSQ	8th	7th	6th	5th	4th	3rd	2nd	1st
Round 1	Points	-4	-2		1	2	3	4
Round 2	Points	-4	-2						10	12
Round 3	Points	-4	-2								21	27

Budget

The 2019 season budget was US$20m, with over US$6m of this being appearance and prize money for the athletes.[7]

Results by season

The 2019 season final was hosted in the Mandalay Bay resort, Las Vegas.

Season	Rds	Champion	Second	Third	Fourth
2019	7	Energy Standard	London Roar	Cali Condors	LA Current

Sarah Sjöström was the 2019 season MVP.

History

FINA-ISL dispute

At the start of the 2018 season, the only major annual swimming tournament sanctioned by FINA was FINA Swimming World Cup. In order to ensure swimming greater visibility through a new team-based format, a new organization - founded in 2017 and named International Swimming League - was presented in Anaheim in September 2018, based on the idea of Ukrainian billionaire Konstantin Grigorishin:[8] the inaugural event of the new league would have been the annual meeting Energy for Swim (held for the first time in 2017 and scheduled for 20–21 December in Turin,Italy in that season).[9] In June, FINA sent a letter to all 209 federations, urging them not to cooperate with ISL.[10]

After clarifying the interpretation of a rule included in section 4.5 of FINA general rules,[11] FINA stated that the Energy for swim meet was now classified as an international event for that season, given that "a competition which is conceptually designed to have a majority of foreign participants is not a national competition”, and thus it needed to be approved within the ordinary six-month window.[12]

Since the approval window was already expired, the athletes participating in that meet would have been disqualified from one to two years by FINA and any world records set during the event would not have been recognized.

The negotiations between the parties officially broke down on 15 November 2018, eventually leading to Energy for Swim meet cancellation.[13]

Debut

Despite negotiations failure between FINA, ISL and Energy Standard Group - that would have organized Energy for Swim meet along with FIN - several athletes sustained the new idea of a team-based swimming competition (among which Katinka Hosszu and Adam Peaty). FINA announced in December 2018 the creation of a brand new league, called FINA Champions Swim Series.[14] The first ISL team to be officially announced was German side ONEFlow Aquatics (that wouldn't have taken part to the inaugural season, eventually) in January 2019, after which ISL announced also the remaining three European teams and the four American teams in the following months.[15]
Meanwhile, ISL also presented a newly formed representation company - ISL USA - which would have staged the semifinals and Final Match, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, and assisted the new US clubs in their operations (including scouting talent, signing athletes and running their own swimming meets).[16] A crucial step towards the creation of ISL was made when FINA announced that athletes taking part in Non-FINA sanctioned events wouldn't have been banned and that similar competitions would be allowed, also confirming that all the world records set in the first two stages wouldn't have been considered (because of clashing with World Cup events).[17][18]
In June 2019, ISL released the schedule of the league secondΩ season, that officially started on the first week of the following October.[19]

References

1. "Competition format". ISL. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
2. "ISL 2019 technical information – International Swimming League". Retrieved 2020-04-10.
3. "ISL 2019 technical information – International Swimming League". Retrieved 2020-04-08.
4. ISL League final recap, Toronto and Tokyo added for 2020
5. "ISL 2019 technical information". ISL. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
6. "ISL 2019 technical information". International Swimming League. Retrieved 2020-06-08.
7. "Grigorishin said that between $6 million". www.insidethegames.biz. 7 March 2019. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
8. Making a splash: new big-money competition shakes up swimming, The Guardian (18 June 2019)
9. "International Swimming League Presents At The 2018 ASCA World Clinic". SwimSwam. 8 September 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
10. "Memorandum to all FINA members" (pdf). Inside the games. 5 June 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
11. "FINA General Rules" (pdf). FINA. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
12. "FINA Rule Interpretation Could Outlaw Energy For Swim Meet". SwimSwam. 2 November 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
13. "Rival swimming competition cancelled after FINA threaten action against swimmers". Inside the games. 16 November 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
14. "PR 107 - FINA approves new world-class swimming event". FINA. 13 December 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
15. "ONEFlow Aquatic Announced as Newest Team in ISL". SwimSwam. 10 January 2019. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
16. "The ISL USA is Now Officially Up And Running". ISL. 24 January 2019. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
17. "FINA Provides Clarification on Athlete Participation in International Competitions". Swimming World Magazine. 15 January 2019. Retrieved 10 October 2019.
18. "FINA 'Would Approve League World Records To Avoid Escalation Of Swimmers' Revolution'". Swimming World Magazine. 8 October 2019. Retrieved 21 October 2019.
19. "INTERNATIONAL SWIMMING LEAGUE ANNOUNCES CITIES AND VENUES". ISL. 21 June 2019. Retrieved 10 October 2019.