By Hideki Mochizuki, Swimming World Japanese correspondent
TOKYO, Japan, May 24. THE Japanese Swimming Federation held a press conference yesterday to confirm that the Federation will ratify Ryosuke Irie's world record as a Japanese record even if FINA does not recognize it.
The Federation said that they will not change their stance regarding Irie's record and other Japanese records marked at last month's Japanese National Championships, where most of the national records were broken in non-approved suits.
However, the Federation said that it WILL NOT ratify any Japanese records going forward after June 1, 2009, if the swimmers are not wearing FINA-approved suits.
"This [decision] is to make sure that there are no more discrepancies between Japanese records and world records," Federation general manager Kazuo Sano said.
Furthermore, the Federation stated that it WILL allow swimmers to race in non-approved suits in domestic competition until March 31, 2010. The reason the Federation has come out with this ruling is that many of the swimmers impacted may not be able to obtain approved suits easily. While the Federation WILL NOT ratify any Japanese records in non-approved suits starting June 1, the Federation WILL consider the results of these swims as far as the selection process for international meets. But, the times will not be ratified for Japanese records.
The quirk, however, is that the Japanese Federation will still continue to ratify other records such as national high school and junior high school records, even in non-approved suits until March 31, 2010. The Federation said that as of April 1, 2010, its swimmers will be required to swim only in approved suits during domestic competitions.
The discrepancy between FINA's timing of January 1, 2010 being the start of non-permeability testing and Japan's April 1 designation comes from Japan's administrative new year beginning in April.
The Federation has not answered the question regarding how it would cope with a situation where a national high school record could be faster than a Japanese record.