World Swimming Championships: Domenico Acerenza bronze, Gregorio Paltrinieri only fifth
World Swimming Championships: Domenico Acerenza bronze, Gregorio Paltrinieri only fifth
An extraordinary Domenico Acerenza takes the bronze medal in the men’s 5 km at the World Swimming Championships in Doha. The Italian finished third in a convulsive final behind French pair Logan Fontaine, first in 51'29"3 and Marc Antoine Olivier, silver at +0.3. The 28-year-old from Potenza, one of the leaders of Fabrizio Antonelli’s group that was bronze six months ago in Fukuoka, completes the three laps of the race course in 51"30"0; behind him the double distance champion the Hungarian Kristof Rasovsky 51'30"5 and Gregorio Paltrinieri, outgoing silver medalist, who was bottled up in the final tussle, touching fifth in 51'31"7. Ninth was German Florian Wellbrock, who was gold six months ago, seven seconds behind the transalpine pair.
An Olympic qualification and a star bronze confirm Acerenza among the big names in the specialty, increasingly aware of his own strength that he was unable to unleash in the battle-hardened finale that saw him swerve at the expense of the French: "I tried at the end I felt pulled out of my head. I gave everything, and the bronze repays the podium that I è missed in the ten kilometers. Compared to the Olympic trial we started too strong, but I expected it. It's my first individual rainbow medal of this championship forò this time we came close to winning. We are competitive and have ample room for improvement, which I hope we will show in the relay" concludes the Azure at his sixth career rainbow metal.
Disappointed and a little upset about the fighters finish, Gregorio Paltrinieri tells regretfully: "I am sorry becauseé it was a race in which I was doing well. The arrival è was complicated becauseé in the final I found myself stopped with unfair contacts. I couldn't swim anymore. I wanted to stay there in the front and then close as a protagonist…. I suddenly found myself in a lot of traffic and could not express myself at my best". For SuperGreg, who will be the protagonist also next week in the pool with the 800 and 1500 freestyle, an unpredictable epilogue that perhaps he could have avoided if he had not been undermined in the last buoy by Frenchman Olivier, who began to pull the group, scattering the final. The condition seems to be there, Wellbrock è behind and the pool is getting closer.
