Germany's open water team remains without a medal in the World Cup The foursome relay swims to fourth place

At the conclusion of the open water competitions, the German team achieved fourth place, its best result so far in Doha. Italy and Australia had an exciting race at the top.

German open water swimmers remained without a World Cup medal for the first time since 2017. In the final relay in Doha (Qatar) over 4 x 1500 metres, Leonie Beck, Selin Raeder, Oliver Klimt and Arne Schubert came in fourth place. Without Florian Willbrock, who is already preparing for the World Championship races in the pool, the DSV team had no stake in the final for first and second places.

The race at the front was exciting even without German participation. Domenico Aserenza of Italy and the final Australian swimmer, Kyle Lee, engaged in a bitter battle, the outcome of which could only be made clear by the evaluation of the photo finish. In the end, it was 0.2 seconds that separated the athletes in the official time and gave the team from Down Under World Championship gold ahead of Italy (1:03:28.2 hours) after 1:03:28.0 hours.

The 10km world champion puts Germany in fourth place

Team Hungary completed the podium. Final swimmer and 10K world champion Krzysztof Rasowski moved into fifth place and began to catch the undulating water. The last German swimmer, Schubert, had little to oppose the Hungarian. The 17-year-old, who traveled to Doha specifically to participate in the relay race, took over from Klimt in third place and set out on the competition track alone, approximately 20 seconds behind the leading duo. Magdeburger maintained this position for a long time until Rasovszky finally overtook the German and reached the finish line five seconds ahead of him. “I only had the American on my screen and suddenly Rasovski came shooting after the third buoy. It was very difficult to commit to because I was just focused on the American and hopefully I can run my own race here,” Schubert said after the race. It's unfortunate that it wasn't enough in the end, but I did my best and I can be proud of myself. I think performance is something you can build on very well.

“We are unhappy as a team and have questions.”

The German open water team, which has enjoyed recent success, leaves Doha without any precious metal. At the 2019, 2022 and 2023 World Championships, Team DSV athletes reached the podium at least four times each. In total, open water swimmers won 14 medals in these competitions (8 x gold, 3 x silver, 3 x bronze). “This is a special case, this is the first time we have a World Cup and matches so close to each other. We used this World Cup as an intermediary step, while the others prepared for it properly,” says Konstantin Diepmaier, coach of the national open water team, describing the result. “I think we cannot judge the World Cup until we see the matches.” The coach is confident that the German athletes will have a say in Paris. “Of course we cannot say that we are satisfied or that we planned it this way. But different paths are taken. The national coach said: “We are not satisfied as a team and we have questions, but we are not worried.”