2024 Short Course World Championships
- December 10-15, 2024
- Duna Arena, Budapest, Hungary
- SCM (25m)
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There have been a handful of noteworthy scratches out of events for Day 3 of the 2024 World Short Course Swimming Championship, including an Olympic Champion scratching out of his best event.
Germany’s Lukas Maertens has dropped out of the 400 free, the event in which he won an Olympic gold medal over the summer. The German Swimming Federation says he came down with a “cold” after arriving in Budapest.
“I had a sore throat all night, had to cough and then woke up with aching limbs,” said the Magdeburg native. In consultation with team doctor Dr. Barbara Gellrich and national coach Bernd Berkhahn, it was decided that he would return home immediately.
Maertens had planned the World Championships as “just as a training competition.” After Paris, the Olympic champion took a vacation, then had a nose operation and made a lot of media appearances. As a result, he entered the meet lacking fitness, but he still wanted to compete.
“I’m someone who’s always up for it and sometimes starts with aches and pains. But in this condition, it just doesn’t make sense to swim a competition,” said Maertens before his early return home.
Maertens was entered in the meet as the 10th seed, but that’s because he had to use his long course time to enter the meet – he hasn’t raced in short course meters since 2022, and his best long course time is more than three seconds better than his best short course time.
American Kieran Smith is the top seed in 3:36.97.
The 400 free was one of just two entries for Maertens in the meet, with the other being the 200 free.
The other two notable scratches are:
- Sweden’s Louise Hansson dropped the 50 back, where she was the 7th seed, to focus on the 50 fly, where she’s the 12th seed. She has World SC Championship medals in both strokes, and was the 2021 bronze medalist in the 50 back.
- Czech Republic’s Ondrej Gemov scratched the men’s 200 fly as the 10th seed. That was the first of four scheduled entries for him and his highest seed coming into the meet. His social media posts show that he is in Budapest and has been making preparations to race.
