World Swimming Championships in Shanghai, China

The 14th FINA World Championships will be held in Shanghai commencing on Saturday the 16th July and will finish on 31 July 2011.More than 2,200 swimmers, divers and water polo players from 181 countries around the world will converge on Shanghai this week for the world aquatic championships.

This is the first of its kind ever hosted by China and will be held at the Shanghai Oriental Sports Center.. The Championships is China's largest single discipline sporting event in 2011 in terms of participation level and number of athlete.

The 14th FINA Championships features 4 disciplines, which are divided into 66 sub-categories. These are:

• 47 for swimming (including the 7 for open water);
• 10 for diving;
• 2 for water polo and
• 7 for synchronized swimming.

The first event on Saturday is the women's three-metres springboard synchro, so this will be the the first medal of many medals to be decided.

The Championships were held in Australia in 1998 and 2007. Since the event was first held in 1973 the five countries that have won the most medals are USA, Germany, China, Australia, and Russia.

China is expected to dominate the diving program, and the Russians are expected to dominate the synchronised swimming program which begins on Sunday.