European champion Isabel Gose won silver in the 800 m freestyle at the World Swimming Championships in Qatar. Despite a good time, Angelina Köhler remained without a medal in the 50 meter butterfly. Florian Wellbrock confidently reached the final of the 1,500 meter freestyle.
European champion Gose won her third medal on her third course on Saturday (February 17, 2024) in a personal best time of 8:17.53 minutes in the 800 m freestyle. The 21-year-old from Magdeburg secured another ticket for the Olympic Games in Paris, but struggled because she narrowly missed out on World Cup gold. “I’m so mad it was so close“, said Gose: “I’ll never get a chance like that again, it’s just sad.“
Gose had previously won bronze in the 400 and 1500 m freestyle in Qatar and had already qualified for the Olympics in both distances.
Quadarella takes gold ahead of Gose
In the absence of the American defending champion Katie Ledecky, gold was won by the Italian double European champion and Olympic bronze medalist Simona Quadarella, who finished just nine hundredths of a second ahead of Gose in the thrilling final sprint. Bronze went to Erika Fairweather from New Zealand.
Wellbrock in the final of the 1500 m freestyle
Florian Wellbrocker confidently reached the final of the 1,500 m freestyle. The 26-year-old swam the fastest time of the heats in 14:48.43 minutes. The second German starter Sven Schwarz also reached the final as fifth in the heats. Wellbrock was surprisingly eliminated in the preliminary round over 800 meters. The Bremen native was also unable to fulfill his potential in the open water races over ten and five kilometers. He was now correspondingly relieved.
“Not so cerebral”
“It was much nicer than the 800 – not so cerebral and more fun. Then the time is better too”said Wellbrock Aspire Dome. “The last few days have been very modest, to put it simply. But I think we have now found a very good way to take an important step.”
Looking ahead to the final this Sunday (5:16 p.m./CET), Wellbrock said: “I didn’t even think about the final. I wanted to do a good preliminary run first. I think that could have been a problem because I was always in the final with one half of my brain in the preliminary heats. That wasn’t the case today.”
Köhler swims a personal best – but comes away empty-handed
Angelina Köhler, on the other hand, missed out on a medal in the 50 meter butterfly. Five days after her triumph over 100 meters, the Berliner had to admit defeat to strong competition on Saturday and came fifth.
She set a personal best in 25.71 seconds, but was 1.08 seconds behind world champion Sarah Sjöström of Sweden, who won on this course for the sixth time in a row. She relegated Melanie Henique from France and Farida Osman from Egypt to the other medal positions.
Köhler only made it into the final in eighth place via a jump-off. She also failed on Saturday morning in 20th place in the 50 meter freestyle heat, which had over 100 competitors.