European Swimming Championships in Rome
Furious finale: Gose and Märtens shine with freestyle gold
European champion over 400 meters freestyle: Lukas Märtens celebrates his victory. photo
© Gregorio Borgia/AP/dpa
Isabel Gose and Lukas Märtens will never forget this Roman evening. Within ten minutes, the freestyle swimmer wins gold, followed by her boyfriend.
Isabel Gose wanted to jump straight into the pool with her friend Lukas Märtens at the golden end of the European Championship. “But they didn’t let me through,” said the freestyle swimmer after her European title over 400 meters and laughed.
Only ten minutes after Gose’s greatest career success in 4:04.13 minutes, her partner also struck gold and in his race was even on track for a long time with Paul Biedermann’s world record. “I’m just happy,” said Gose and added with a view to the award ceremony: “It will be such a great feeling when the anthem plays first for me and then for Lukas.”
Olympic champion Florian Wellbrock and his Magdeburg teammates were happy in the grandstand. After his corona infection, the 24-year-old will not be doing the open water races in the coming days and will fly back home on August 18th. Before the extremely atmospheric final act of the pool aces, the German water jumpers celebrated gold and bronze.
Märtens: “Something’s definitely going to happen today!”
“I let the crowd carry me and pretended that they were all cheering for me. That worked,” said Gose. With her start-to-finish victory, she gave Märtens an additional boost. “I saw how solidly she did it and I followed that example,” said the 20-year-old after his triumph in 3:42.50 minutes. In contrast to his girlfriend, who was still cautious about the celebration plans, he announced: “Today something will definitely happen!” In his race over 400 meters freestyle, Henning Mühlleitner won bronze and additionally improved the German medal haul. The Swiss Antonio Djakovic lay between him and Märtens.
The German pool swimmers won two gold, two silver and four bronze medals in Rome. There had not been two gold medals in individual races at an EM in the pool since 2012 and the times of Biedermann and Britta Steffen. At that time there were even five individual gold medals. In addition to Gose, who won a complete set of medals, and Märtens with gold and silver, breaststroke swimmers Lucas Matzerath with bronze over 50 meters, Ole Braunschweig with third place over 50 meters backstroke and Mühlleitner also contributed to the overall result.
Wellbrock did not deliver as usual
The European Championship was dominated by the Italians in the magnificent open-air pool. Cheered on by the cheerful and party-loving audience, the hosts won an outstanding 13 gold medals. The 17-year-old Romanian David Popovici also set a highlight with his world record over 100 meters freestyle in 46.86 seconds.
Wellbrock did not deliver as usual. The consequences of his Covid-19 illness in July, harsh weather conditions and a slight cold led to the decision not to go medal hunting in the sea off Lido di Ostia. “Now physical and mental health comes first,” Wellbrock said.
At the highlight of the season, the World Championships in June, he had won five medals in five starts. The European Championship without a podium was therefore easy to get over.
“But the national coach also saw negative points”
All in all, national coach Bernd Berkhahn was satisfied with his top swimmers even before the glittering final evening session. The 51-year-old specifically emphasized Gose’s performance. “She had the opportunity to swim a bit freely here and was able to make up for the disappointment at the World Cup a bit. That’s very good,” said the Magdeburg coach. The other participants in the world championships, where Gose missed out on the precious metal he had hoped for, would have done well.
But Berkhahn also saw negative points. “You can’t be satisfied with a lot of individual performances – definitely not,” he said. “There are some athletes who have only prepared for this European Championship in the long term. You have to say: That was mostly not good.” The second row in particular did not deliver as desired.
Wassen: “Hopefully the knot has now burst”
While most of his athletes are now leaving, things are only just getting started for the water jumpers. Tina Punzel happily fell into the arms of her dubbing partner Lou Massenberg after winning the European Championship title in the mixed competition from the three-meter board. “It was a huge relief,” said Massenberg at the moment he saw the “1” on the scoreboard at the Foro Italico. Shortly thereafter, Christina Wassen won bronze in high diving. “Hopefully the knot has burst now,” said the 23-year-old after two disappointing days of competition for the German team without precious metal.