An Olympic Swim-off In The Open Water (Male)

SETUBAL BAY, Portugal. June 1. A swim-off is the ultimate head-to-head battle in swimming.

In an unusual situation in Portugal's Setubal Bay next week, the 2012 FINA Olympic 10km Marathon Swimming Qualifier will essentially be a swim-off between teammates from each country.

The award? A spot in the Olympic 10km Marathon Swim finals in London.

So while a typical swim-off is a short-distance race (50m or 100m) between two swimmers in a pool with the carrot of being able to swim in a finals, this swim-off in Setubal Bay is a number of 10,000-meter mano-a-mano contests held simultaneously between athletes from numerous countries. Fifteen hard-working athletes will earn the right to represent themselves and their country in the Olympic finals in front of tens of thousands of fans in the Serpentine in London – the rest will go home. Such is the competitive and cruel world of sports.

So while they are swimming against their fellow teammate, they are also competing against the world and must finish in the top 15 to go to the Olympics.

The following 62 men are entered and ready to enter this battle: no lanes, no lines, no walls…no mercy.

Damian Blaum vs. Luciano Sales Rubio (ARG)
Matthias Schweinzer (AUT)
Sergiy Fesenko (AZE)
Allan Do Carmo vs. Lucas Kanieski (BRA)
Petar Stoychev vs. Ventsislav Aydarski (BUL)
Richard Weinberger vs. Francois Xavier Desharnais (CAN)
Lijun Zu vs. Yuanpeng Lang (CHN)
Kurt Niehaus (CRC)
Tomislav Soldo vs. Josip Culina (CRO)
Iacovos Hadjiconstantinou (CYP)
Rostislav V?tek vs. Jan Po?mourn? (CZE)
Santiago Enderica Salgado vs. Ivan Enderica Ochoa (ECU)
Mazen Aziz vs. Ahmed Gad (EGY)
David Davies vs. Daniel Fogg (GBR)
Benjamin Schulte (GUM)
Tin Yu Ling vs. Yeung Lee (HKG)
Csaba Gercsak vs. Gergely Gyurta (HUN)
Divase Mandar Anadarao (IND)
Chris Bryan (IRL)
Michael Dmitriev vs. Yuval Safra (ISR)
Nicola Bolzonello vs. Valerio Cleri (ITA)
Yasunari Hirai vs. Yuto Kobayashi (JPN)
Yuriy Kudinov (KAZ)
Said Saber vs. Mohammed El Mehdi Essadiq (MAR)
Ivan De Jesus Lopez Ramos vs. Luis Ricardo Escobar Torres (MEX)
Marcel Schouten vs. Ferry Weertman (NED)
Kane Radford vs. Jonathan Pullon (NZL)
Ahmed Gebrel (PLE)
Arseniy Lavrentyev vs. Vasco Gaspar (POR)
Gabriel Moldoveanu (ROU)
Troyden Prinsloo vs. Chad Ho (RSA)
Stefan Sigrist vs. Jovan Mitrovic (SUI)
Saleh Mohammad (SYR)
Oussama Mellouli (TUN)
Igor Snitko vs. Igor Chervynskiy (UKR)
Erwin Maldonado vs. Johndry Segovia (VEN)

Courtesy of Open Water Source

Name*

Email*

Welcome to our community. We invite you to join our discussion. Our community guidelines are simple: be respectful and constructive, keep on topic, and support your fellow commenters. Commenting signifies that you agree to our Terms of Use