Olympic champion Adam Peaty and medallist Duncan Scott are among four swimmers who will be pre-selected for the Tokyo Olympics.
James Wilby and Luke Greenbank are also included following British Swimming’s revision of its selection policy for the postponed Games.
The foursome achieved the required qualifying times for their respective events at the 2019 World Championships.
They will not be required to repeat them at April’s British Olympic trials.
Although they have been pre-selected for Tokyo 2020, the swimmers will not be officially named in the Team GB Olympic squad until June.
National performance director Chris Spice said the coronavirus pandemic had brought challenges “never seen before in an Olympic year”.
“This [creating the selection policy] has not been an easy task,” he said. “However, we have tried to give some certainty to a small number of high-level athletes in the event of even more national lockdowns.”
Peaty claimed gold in the 50m and 100m breaststroke at Gwangju 2019, while Wilby (100m breaststroke silver), Scott (200m freestyle bronze) and Greenbank (200m backstroke bronze) secured their maiden individual world medals in South Korea.
The next batch of qualifiers will be confirmed via the British Championships/Olympic trials in April, after which any remaining places will be decided based on times achieved in four subsequent events – including the 2021 European Championships in Budapest in May.
Head coach Bill Furniss will also have the ability to make discretionary selections with a maximum of 35 swimmers to be taken to the Games.
