Renowned marathon swimmers are ready to dive into the waters of Karteros beach for the open water swimming events of the 3rd Mediterranean Coastal Games “Heraklion 2023”, which will be held on Friday morning (15/09), after a day’s delay due to strong winds.
The competition program includes the Μen’s 5 km and the corresponding Women’s event, with the participation of 13 athletes from eight countries (Albania, Cyprus, Croatia, Italy, Libya, Portugal, Kosovo and Greece) and 9 athletes from five countries (Croatia, Italy, Morocco, Portugal and Greece).
Some top-level representatives of the sport will be among them. In Men’s category, Italians Dario Verani (2022 world champion at 25 km, winner of the first-ever Mediterranean Beach Games “Pescara 2015” and competition record holder) and Marcello Guidi (silver medalist in 2019 in Patras) stand out, as well as the Portuguese Thiago Campos.
The battle is expected to be even more intense in women, where the entry list includes the Italians Silvia Ciccarella (title holder since 2019 in Patras) and Ariana Bridi, as well as the strong Portuguese swimmers Angelica Andre and Mafalda Rosa.
Asterios Daldogiannis, Giannis Skaris in men and Nefeli Evangelia Giannopoulou, Antonia Rakopoulou in women will compete with team Greece.
Greek open water swimming legend Spyros Gianniotis, who had won silver medal at the 2016 Olympic Games and currently serves as Open Water Marathon Swimming Technical Advisor for the Hellenic Aquatics Federation, will give additional glamour to the event, as Competition Manager of the sport.
“We are at the beginning of the season for all swimmers, who will certainly wish to claim victory in an important event such as the Mediterranean Beach Games, but at the same time this competition will serve as a test on their way to fight for the Olympic qualification and their new goals in total. The distance they will cover here is half the Olympic distance of 10 km, but their times will be important in order to draw useful conclusions”, Spyros Gianniotis said.
“Regarding the Greek side, our swimmers hope to achieve good placements and perhaps to be among the medals, which is difficult but not impossible. They will have to compete against very strong opponents, but I think they can distinguish.
We have the unpredictable element of the sea, which can create more difficult conditions with waves for athletes. But that’s the beauty of Open Water Swimming and the participants have to adapt to the conditions that exist each time.”
