When Athens won the right to stage the 2004 Olympics back in 1997, supporters of the Cape Town bid groaned with dismay. However, just nine years on and the state of decay in the city's swimming pools is alarming.
Swimming, let us not forget, is one of the big two sports at an Olympic Games - the other being athletics - and South African swimmers have won gold medals at two of the last three Olympics.
This downfall of a one-time swimming powerhouse of the country has been long coming, as not only has the province lost swimmers to other provinces and overseas institutions, but the ones left behind cannot produce the world-challenging times.
This weekend, as the swimming programme gets into full swing with the national short-course championships in Pietermaritzburg, WP swimmers could be the least prepared at the meeting.
Only last month one of the longest-running galas in the province, the Strand winter gala had to be cancelled because the water at the Strand indoor pool was not compliant with the standards set by world governing body Fina.
At the time, the coach of hosts Strand Aquatics, Santa van Jaarsveld, said this was the third straight year that they had faced the prospect of hosting the competition in water that has not complied with Fina standards.
"Each year we have been promised by pool management that the water will be right, but we have been let down when it is too late to cancel. Apart from the general air of neglect in the building, the low water temperatures meant that none of the swimmers could produce their best times."
Van Jaarsveld said: "Not only are our local Olympic hopefuls unable to do their work, but the youth and ratepayers cannot use the pool as a recreational facility as the water is too cold. It is hardly surprising that the four SA swimmers who achieved sporting's highest accolade at the last Olympics in Athens did their preparation in the US where they were assured good facilities."
For the past few years, international events in the country have been held in Durban's King's Park swimming pool with Cape Town losing out as hosts.
One of WP's elite swimmers, Wendy Trott, trains at Newlands pool with her club Vineyard. But she has access to the facility in the mornings - in the afternoon she's at Voortrekker High school in Wynberg.
Trott also trains at the national swimming federation's (SSA) Regional Training Centre at the University of the Western Cape three times a week.
She said although the UWC pool had heating, the water could be very cold, sometimes leading to the cancellation of training sessions. As an elite athlete Trott can also swim in winter at the Sports Science Institute (SSI), where her membership is paid for. "At SSI, facilities are world-class but swimmers can only be accommodated at 5am and have to be out of the water by 6.30am," she said.
WP Aquatics president Briane Reynolds acknowledged that the pools swimmers used were often not adequate for competitive swimming.
"The Western Cape does not have any facility that meets the national and international requirements."
Reynolds said Western Province had 80 pools that are managed by local councils or municipalities which were designed for recreational purposes. "They are old and often the wrong size and depth and not only unsuitable for competitive swimming, but can only be used during summer," he said.
"Our vision is to provide the necessary training and competitions with the goal of participaing at the Olympics. Considering the competitive side of our sport, we need to have all-year-round training and competition facilities and this is our major challenge."
Reynolds said there were two indoor heated facilities - the 50m Strand pool and the 25m Long Street pool which was recently refurbished. "Strand is the predominant one where we host inter-club events and provincial championships." He added that the water temperature at that pool had been below minimum requirements for the past few years and pool managers did not have the money for the heating equipment.
1: The Retreat 25m pool which will make this an indoor heated facility. But that is a four-year project which can only be expected to be ready in 2009/2010.
2: The University of the Western Cape's 50m pool has been heated and covered, making it the only other pool swimmers can use for training and local competitions although it cannot host national competitions due to lack of seating and a second swim-down pool.
The same problem applied to the Strand pool which hosted the national short-course championships in 2004 where a "bridge" was placed dividing the pool into a 25m competition pool and a 10m swim-down pool at a cost of R80,000.
WP has lost 20 to 30 top swimmers in the last three to four years to overseas institutions and Reynolds says this is as a result of the inadequate facilities and a lack of financial support and scholarships from tertiary institutions.
He called on the tertiary institutions in the province to be "more proactive". "UWC have become proactive with scholarships and hopefully other universities will follow,"
Reynolds said King's Park was the only pool in the country that met international standards and attributed this to local government investing in the facility.