Sri Lanka is sending two swimmers, Kyle Abeysinghe and Ganga Seneviratne, to the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics. The Sri Lanka Aquatic Sports Union (SLASU) made this announcement yesterday.
Both Kyle and Ganga are from Killer Whale Aquatics, where Manoj Abeysinghe is the Head Coach. Kyle, who is 24 years old, is the younger brother of Matthew Abeysinghe, who represented Sri Lanka in the 2016 Rio Olympics and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Matthew Abeysinghe is a top swimmer in Sri Lanka, but he can’t go to the Paris Games because of new rules from the World Aquatics. These rules say that a swimmer can only go to the Olympics twice. Matthew has already been to two Olympics.
SLASU said that if no swimmers qualify for the Paris Games, they will pick the swimmers from those who participate in the World Aquatic Championships Doha 2024. The swimmers with the highest points in an Olympic event at these championships will go to Paris.
Kyle Abeysinghe made an amazing comeback after being injured for four years. He swam the men’s 100m freestyle in 50.99 seconds, earning 776 FINA points as the second best after Matthew. As the highest in the female category for the country, Ganga Seneviratne also did well, timing 1:04.97 in the women’s 100m backstroke and earning 686 FINA points in the Doha
World Championship held in February this year.
SLASU said that if they get two wildcard entries for the Olympics, they will choose the swimmers with the highest points in each gender from the World Championships to represent Sri Lanka in Paris.
Sajeewa Jayakody