2023 BERLIN SWIM OPEN
- Friday, April 21st – Sunday, April 23rd
- Berlin, Germany
- LCM (50m)
- World Championships Qualifier
- Day 1 Recap
- Results
While competing on day two of the 2023 Berlin Swim Open, 21-year-old Lukas Martens put up the best time of his career en route to winning the men’s 800m freestyle.
Hitting the wall in a time of 7:42.14, Martens beat out last night’s 1500m freestyle champion and Olympic gold medalist Florian Wellbrock. Wellbrock settled for silver in 7:42.99 while Sven Schwarz bagged bronze in 7:43.43.
The top 3 finishers all easily cleared the World Aquatics ‘A’ standard if 7:53.11 needed for this summer’s World Championships.
As for Martens, his 7:42.14 this evening was just off his lifetime best of 7:41.43 from April last year.
Martens now takes over the top spot in the worldwide rankings for this season, beating out Russian Aleksandr Stepanov’s previous world-leading 7:42.47 from earlier this week. Martens is the 16th fastest man ever in this event.
2022-2023 LCM Men 800 Free
Hafnaoui
7:37.00
| 2 | Samuel Short | AUS | 7:37.76 | 07/26 |
| 3 | Bobby Finke | USA | 7:38.67 | 07/26 |
| 4 | Daniel Wiffen | IRL | 7:39.19 | 07/26 |
| 5 | Lukas Martens | GER | 7:39.48 | 07/26 |
David Thomasberger got it done for 200m fly gold this evening, punching a time of 1:56.60. That gave him a healthy advantage over the next-closest swimmer Ramon Klenz who settled for silver in 1:58.29.
Thomasberger owns the national record in this event with the 1:55.04 he produced in 2021. He was a ways off that mark here, however, he did dip under the World Aquatics ‘A’ standard of 1:56.71 needed for Fukuoka.
Following up on his 50m back natal record from day one, Ole Braunschweig struck gold in the men’s 100m back in a time of 53.81.
Splitting 25.63/28.28, Braunschweig dipped under the ‘A’ cut of 54.03 needed for Fukuoka, producing the 2nd fastest time of his career in the process.
Additional Winners
- Alina Baievych posted a time of 2:11.05 to clinch a new German Junior Record en route to the women’s 200m fly gold.
- Poland’s Adela Piskorska reaped gold in the women’s 100m back, posting a time of 1:00.16 for her best-ever.
- The men’s 50m breast saw Melvin Imouda hit 27.12 for Fukuoka qualification, while runner-up Lucas Matzerath also hit the Fukuoka time in 27.27.
- Last night’s 200m free champion Rafael Miroslaw fell just short of World Championships qualification in the 100m free tonight. The 22-year-old touched in 48.52 while the standard rests at 48.51.
- Isabel Gose reaped gold in the women’s 800m free in 8:19.65 for Fukuoka qualification.
Germans have depth in this event
Awesome! It is too bad the WR in this event is an untouchable combo of supersuit and PEDs.
First time I’ve ever heard an accusation of Zhang Lin using PED’s. Put up or shut up.
What is going on in men’s distance free? Feels like this is the strongest it’s been in a decade suddenly
I feel like Paltrinieri’s daring attempt to beat Sun Yang’s WR in Rome was a tipping point for men’s long distance, especially for the euro lads
Finke winning in Tokyo was a big upset and that might also have contributed
Norvy clontz Or luka mijatovic the saviours?
Martens has been quicker than 7:48 before, I think 7:41.43 from last years Stockholm open is his PB
Correct
He went 7:42 not 7:48
Yes but the point is the article claims his previous PB was 7:58.62 and that is incorrect.
That was probably a typo and the author intended to say 7:48.
Yes, the article says his PB was 7:58 which it isn’t. Ironically, I made a typo in the comment putting 7:48 instead of 7:58
Yes, corrected, thanks!. I looked up Martens instead of Maartens.
It’s Märtens (Maertens) though…
Thank you madam
A 2:11.0 200 fly is really impressive for a 13 year old girl (that isn’t on the tall side). The fact that she is coached by the former coach of Hannah Stockbauer gives hope, but the 200 fly is known as an event where pretty much no teenage phenoms make it at senior level, so it is too early to make predictions. If she wants to become elite, she will have to improve her 100 fly PB (1:00.9) dramatically (to at least 58 low).
Pretty unfortunate that either Schwarz (14:49 in the 1500 free + 7:43 in the 800 free) or Klemet (14:45 in the 1500 free) will miss the world championships (since only one of them can qualify in… Read more »
I don’t know about Alina Baievych. Her coach doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to sprinters and shorter distance swimmers. The program in Erlangen is high, high volume with little substance (esp. when it comes to dryland and starts/turns – I still cringe every time I see an old video of Stockbauer’s turns. They were awful!). Böller is like a (verly low) budget Ron Aitken. Stuck in a ’90s philsophy with no way of convincing him that quality is sometimes better than quantity. But he’s not alone in Germany. Sadly, many many coaches still coach that way. That’s why we have an embarrassement of riches when it comes to 1500m swimmers and practically nobody (at least nobody… Read more »
They recognized the problem, but of course that doesn’t mean that they know how to solve it. I think without help from foreign experts, nothing will change. The fact that the IMs are Germany’s weakest events also is a clear sign in my opinion. In my opinion one of the reasons why the US keeps producing tons of elite athletes in the IMs (super versatile athletes) is that those athletes have the most value in college swimming, so youth/junior coaches focus on it from an early age. Even international swimmers like Liendo, Marchand, González or Kos didn’t have that versatility before going to the US. In Germany on the other hand pretty much only your best time in your best… Read more »
I don’t disagree… although I’m not so sure you can put Franziska Hentke’s success entirely in Berkhan’s hands. As much as I HATE giving former GDR coaches any credit whatsoever, Bernd Henneberg had a lot to do with getting her to compete at the top.
Ultimately, the coaches in Germany are traditionally very uncooperative. They don’t really like to educate themselves beyond what they had to do to get their coaching licences (which don’t need to be renewed – you get it once and then you have it forever. And the licence is not even necessary to coach anyway), they like to take and keep control over every aspect of training (even if they don’t know anything about weight… Read more »
Coaches definitely should have to have a certificate in order to train athletes and they also should have to renew it regularly. I think it all starts with good coaches, probably the youngest athletes should have the best coaches. I understand that coaches don’t want to go through all of this when the salary is this low, but it would be in the federation‘s best interest to not allow unqualified coaches to work with kids. You need to improve the coaching standards and you need to increase the salaries. I think if you would have fewer, but better qualified coaches, you could get better results without even spending more money. You could probably get the coaches to focus more on… Read more »
Don’t even get me started on the money issue… there is zero money in German swimming. It’s really sad.
Looking at the skills of Florian and lukas over some videos. For a high volume group they have great skills. 800 free at euro champs lukas had two fly kicks off each wall. Plus it’s now known that the reason Florian got the record 1500 scm is better turns. Keen for you guys who know a lot about German swimming to keep posting and sharing! Thanks
“no teenage phenoms?”… Meagher, Morales, Hyman, Phelps? Just to name American ones
Sven Schwarz posting some of the top times in the world while being the third countryman… does he train with Wellbrock and Märtens?
No, but Klemet does.
German’s are swimming pretty well, and the men could have a decent 400 medley relay. Their 4×2 could be competitive, idk about their 4th guy tho, and could Welbrock pop off a 1:46?
Germany medley relay is 53.4 (Braunschweig) – 59.5 (Matzerath, was already qualified, so possibly wasn’t at his best here) – 51.7 (Friese) and 48.5 (Miroslaw). The goal should be to make the final.
Men’s 400 free relay is 48.5 (Miroslaw) – 48.6 (Salchow) – 2 guys at 49.0/49.1. Don’t See them making the final.
Men’s 800 free relay is 1:45.7 (Märtens) – 1:45.8 (Miroslaw) – 1:47.9 (Salchow) – 1.48.0 (Sorgius). They should make the final, but won’t be anywhere near South Korea or even Australia.
Of all those guys Braunschweig (born in 1997) is clearly the oldest, all other guys were born in 1999 or later, so there definitely is potential. Sadly multiple important relay guys (Vogel,… Read more »
I dont know if they would final 4×200
GBR, USA, australia, italy, brazil, south korea, japan, maybe france and hungary
Switzerland also in the mix for a final
Germany is clearly better than France, probably also better than Hungary and roughly on the same level as Brazil/Japan/Possibly Italy. If they replicate their times, they will definitely make the final. If you add up the times and substract 1.5 seconds (3 flying starts) you get 7:06.0. Not sure if 7:06.0 ever missed a world championships/Olympics final, but at the last Olympics/world championships 7:06.0 easily would have made the final.
– Japan: I don’t think anyone except Matsumoto went faster than 1:47 mid this season.
– Italy: I think their two fastest guys this season are Ceccon at 1:46.5 (not even sure if he will compete in this event at worlds) and De Tullio (1:47.1).
– France: I… Read more »
2022 results
USA 7:00
Australia 7:03
Gbr can easily go for WR
Brazil 7:04
Hungary 7:05
south korea italy france 7:06
If everyone swims well it will take a sub 7:07 to final
How exactly is this relevant? I clearly argued with times from this year. Why exactly should we believe that all those nations will repeat those times when many of those nations (Hungary, Italy, France, Brazil) have one guy at most sub 1:47 right now? As far as I can tell Italy and France never even went 7:06.0 last year, so even if they would repeat their best times from last year, they wouldn’t beat Germany if all German guys repeat their seasons bests. In addition to that France and Italy didn’t even post those times at worlds last year (but at the European championships). I still haven’t seen when it last took sub 7:07 to final.
It is relevant, because while germans notably swim fast in season (Martens and Wellbrock for example are known for adding time at big summer meets compared to their in season swims), other nations don’t. Last April for example Milak was 1:47.7 at Hungarian nationals – a second slower than this year, and went on to split 1.44 two times that year. The french didn’t even have their nationals yet this year so who knows what form they are in.
Germany certainly is capable of making the final but it’s not going to be easy.
1) Still not relevant. My argument was that they will (almost certainly) make the final IF they repeat their times. I didn’t say that they will repeat their times.
2) Please post a statistic that proves that German 200 free swimmers are less likely to repeat their times compared to 200 free swimmers from Italy/Hungary/France. Otherwise what you said is just anecdotal and therefore not relevant.
1, I said that germans – in general – tend to swim fast in season, not that the 200 freestylers do, although if you look at the german 4×200 relay last year, neither member’s (Zellmann, Mühlleitner, Martens and Sorgius) personal best in the 200 free was swum at worlds, euros or in the relay at worlds/euros/olympics, but some random german meet in season. Miroslaw’s PB so far also comes from an in season swim. That is certainly a pattern.
2, I don’t know where this “last year’s times are irrelevant” argument is coming from. They are clearly more relevant when it comes to this year’s world championships than the in season times this spring, because they were swum during… Read more »
1) My whole point was that German men (in my opinion) will definitely make the 800 free relay final IF they repeat their times. If you don’t think that they will repeat their times (meaning that they will go around 7:06.0) then that is a fair point (I have no idea whether they will repeat their times or not), but if you disagree that 7:06.0 will make the final, then we will have to agree to disagree for now (we will find out soon enough whether 7:06.0 will make the final).
2) We will have to agree to disagree. I consider times from this year more relevant than times from last year.
Brazil have 1 1:44 1:45 guy (scheffer) then some 1:46 guys
(Costa, Murilo, altamir, Breno, Vinicius)
When did they swim those times? If they swam them last year, then those times are, as I said before, not relevant. Before this weekend I could have said that Germany has a 1:46 guy (Zellmann) and a 1:47 guy (Mühlleitner), but both of them didn’t repeat those times this year and therefore aren’t relevant for the German relay. Right now it is pretty much impossible to say where Brazil is at. They might be as fast as you predicted or they might as well be faster/slower (Same is true for France).
Australia always the favourites but somehow always find a way to lose
Where aussies are the favorite? Gbr for win on 4×200
These german swims recently are wild. Can’t wait for the summer
They could steal the gold medal from clutches of sam short