Germany Takes Europe's Open Water Crown With Team Victory - & Gold No3 From 4 For Wellbrock
Germany, Italy and Hungary have dominated the Open Water events in Paris, the Team event reinforcing Germany's winning edge in a three-horse race with hosts France closest to the big three after four days of racing in the River Seine
Florian Wellbrock did not quite match his historic quad of gold from Singapore 2025 Worlds here in Paris, but after missing the medals in the 3km knockout 'sprint' on Friday, he made it three titles with his Germany mates in the 6km Team event in the Seine this morning.
Germany's Julia Ackerman, Isabel Gose, the knockout champion in the women's race yesterday, Oliver Klemet, bronze medalist in the 10km on day 1 last Tuesday, and Wellbrock - champion in the 5km, 10km, and Mixed team with mates, kept Italy and Hungary at bay.
Those three nations the powerhouses of Open Water swimming, with France the closest outside the top 3. Italy topped the open water medals table in 2022 and 2024 - but not here in Paris. Here's are the podiums in full and final medals table from the Seine over the past five days:
THE THREE-HORSE RACE & THE HOSTS
Germany topped the overall table on gold count, with Wellbrock (2) and Isabel Gose (1), training partners at the Magdeburg Performance Centre where Bernd Berkhahn is head coach, and a team with both of those solo haulers in the fray, taking the lion's share of the top honours in Paris. Gose, knockout champion on Friday, praised Berkhahn for the specific guidance he gave her on navigating the challenge of a multiple-round event (see knockout section below).
Italy and Hungary both had seven medals each, two more than Germany, while Italy's Ginevra Taddeucci matched Wellbrock's double in the 10km and then the 5km events, while Hungary's David Betlehem was the only non-German man to claim gold (see knockout below), his country's five silver linings including his two second-place finishes behind Wellbrock and the full set of second-place results in the women's events.
WELLBROCK'S 2025-2026 WAVE
Florian Wellbrock, who arrived in Paris thinking he might struggle - given the season of training-disruptive illness behind him - has now filed up seven major international titles in the past two seasons:
The one gap in Wellbrock's run is the 3 km knockout sprint - with Betlehem, and Frenchmen Marc-Antoine Olivier and Logan Fontaine locking him out of the medals.
"Wellbrock: It's Crazy!"
His third gold win the bag, Wellbrock emerged from the fray to say:
"It’s crazy; I really didn't expect this. I never would have dreamed of winning three titles here. I am incredibly grateful to have experienced something like this again."
In the opening leg, each swimmer going 1500m, Ackermann, 19, kept her female opponents at bay, but, for obvious reasons now written into the rule book specifically top preserve the women's category for females, Turkey's Emir Batur Albayrak, was way ahead. Ackerman handed over to the champion of yesterday's knockout, Gose, with a 35-second deficit.
Just three minutes later, the German ace had chased down the early leader. But the close of the leg, Gose has placed Germany in an excellent position to hunt down the title, with Italy ahead by 1.20 seconds. Klemet was in next, and handed over to Wellkbrock with an 8.15-second lead over Hungary.
The last lap was a boiling battle of big beasts: David Betlehem (Hungary), knockout champion yesterday and Olympic marathon bronze medalist in the same river two years ago, and Gregorio Paltrinieri (Italy), the Rio 2016 Olympic 1500m free champion and multiple winner of World and European titles in the pool on his way to a successful transition to podium-winning efforts in open water, had a hare: Wellbrock.
They caught him, too, but Wellbrock know.what he was doing, and just as the chasers would have needed that extra push to the finish line after all that hunting, the hare bolted once more and the third gold of the four-gold hero of Singapore was in the bag with the crown for him and his Germany mates.
No pool events in the coming week this time for Wellbrock, 28, but his sites are set on the LA2028 Olympics, which will unfold seven years after he lifted the marathon title at the Covid-delayed Tokyo Games, and four years after disappointment at Paris 2024.
The results:
MIXED TEAMS:
The Line-Ups:
The Knockout Report follows for subscribers and readers registered for the SOS Newsletter service:
