USA Diving to Not Send Athletes to 2020 FINA World Juniors At End of November

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Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

USA Diving announced today that they will not be sending a team to the 2020 FINA Junior World Championships and consequently will not hold a Junior World Trials in 2020 due to the ever-changing landscape of the COVID-19 crisis.

USA Diving’s decision was made after examining several factors.

  • USA Diving is not willing to put the coach’s and athletes’ health in harm’s way.
  • Many of USA Diving’s clubs are not able to get back in the water.
  • U.S. Citizens are largely not allowed to travel internationally.
  • Other national federations will also be forgoing this year’s competition.

The 2020 FINA World Junior Championships are still on for the time being, set for November 29 – December 6 of this year in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused sporting events all over the world to be cancelled, and with strict social distancing guidelines in place in many parts of the world, sports as we know it may look completely different for some time.

The Olympic Games, which were supposed to be held eight days from now, have been pushed back an extra 52 weeks in hopes that the virus will be contained by then. According to data compiled from Johns Hopkins University, the countries where new COVID cases are rising have been the United States, Brazil, India and South Africa, while Russia’s numbers, a neighboring country to the Ukraine, have gone down.

The Ukraine as of today has had over 57,000 COVID cases and nearly 1500 deaths. 29,769 have been confirmed recovered from the virus. As of yesterday, the country recorded 848 new cases.

USA Diving contributed to this post.

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