BUDAPEST, May 31 (Xinhua) -- The International Swimming Federation (FINA) has significantly modified the regulations of the 2017 edition of the FINA Swimming World Cup on Tuesday, and the new measures were harshly criticized by the best performing swimmer of last years, the Hungarian Katinka Hosszu.
"Innovative idea from FINA??! Max 4 starts per swimmer per leg of World Cup??! Congrats FINA, you made sure I can't swim and win more this year.... But nothing else," Hosszu wrote on her Facebook page.
The three-time Olympic champion complained that the swimming organization did not ask for the opinion of the concerned swimmers: "The changes received favourable feedback from athletes and coaches - only they never asked us..."
FINA said that the modifications concerning the 2017 World Cup would incorporate a series of innovations, aiming at attracting more stars and improving the exposure and visibility of this top-level event.
Held between August and November, this year's competition (in 25m-pool) will comprise nine legs in venues such as Moscow, Doha, Beijing, Berlin etc..
One of the most important modification is that a swimmer will be able to compete in only four individual races, whereas Hosszu, who won all of the previous World Cups since 2012, was used to compete in as many as 10 races per event.
Cornel Marculescu, the General Manager of FINA was in Budapest on Wednesday, where he told commercial television ATV that the new regulations were made upon the proposals of the Technical Committee of the FINA, who will examine the results of the new regulations after one year following its implementation.
