2020 AUSTRIAN CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Saturday, August 1st – Wednesday, August 5th
- Auster Graz
- 50m (LCM)
- Start Lists
- Live Results
Straight off of the inaugural 4 Nations Meet, which took place in Budapest, Hungary last weekend, Austrian swimmers are headed home to Graz to compete at the Junior & Senior National Championships.
Combining elite talent with age group swimmers, the championships cover 5 days, implementing coronavirus-related protocols all the while. In fact, organizers state that ‘due to the change due to COVID-19, the women’s 1500m free, the men’s 800m free, and all relay competitions have been eliminated from the program.’
Additionally, the competition will be held sans spectators, with only the competitors set to race in those events during the particular sessions able to enter the swimming hall.
Among the elite competitors set to take to the Auster Graz pool include the following: Caroline Pilhatsch, Bernhard Reitshammer, Paul Espernberger, Heiko Gigler, Lena Grabowski, Claudia Hufnagl, Christopher Rothbauer, Marlene Kahler.
Two recent national record breakers are also scheduled to race in the form of breaststroker Valentin Bayer and freestyle ace Felix Auboeck.
The former crushed a new Austrian standard in the men’s 100m breaststroke at last week’s 4 Nations Meet, hitting a lifetime best of 1:00.27. Moving ever so closer to the minute mark, we’ll see if the 20-year-old can break that barrier this weekend.
For Auboeck, the former Michigan Wolverine busted out a big-time 200m free mark of 1:46.64. That checked in as a new national record, as well as the man’s first-ever outing under the 1:47 threshold in the event.
I understand how cutting relays would make sense (more people on the deck at the same time), but how does cutting distance events help? Were they planning on swimming two to a lane for time saving purposes?
Maybe shortening the length of the meet