By: Elaine Zhang

Shana Ferguson, USA Swimming’s chief commercial officer, transformed the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis into a swimming pool for the U.S., 2024 Olympic Trials.

A Dream
Shana Ferguson participated in the U.S. Olympic Trials 3 years ago. There, she asked the 12,000 people, “What would this look like in a football stadium?” And in 2024, 3 years later, construction to turn a football stadium into a swimming pool had commenced. Starting from June 15th to the 23rd, this pool will house the U.S. Olympic Trials for 2024’s Summer Olympics.

Mark Dodd, the president of Dodd Technologies said, “This is the first time this has ever been attempted in the world.” They’d set an example for others with similar aspirations.

Construction
On the surface, the pool looks like it’s an in-ground pool. It’s not. The pool is built on the ground, with a deck covering the surrounding area giving it a more finished look. There will now be enough room to fit 3 pools, each of different length and purposes. There’s a 50 meter long, 3-meter-deep pool for competitions, and two warm- up pools, which will hide behind a curtain for swimmers to prepare before the competition starts. There will also be a video board behind the swimming pool and a scoreboard to keep track of each swimmer’s times.

Benefits
There are multiple benefits to putting swimming pools in arenas. First off, there’s plenty of space for spectators to watch the races now because of the size of the arena. Coach Bob Bowman said, “The thing I’m most looking forward to is actually having space.” Another coach, Todd DeSorbo said, “The more people, the better. And I think the kids will feed off the energy of the crowd.”