Marcello Guidi & Lea Boy Claim Maiden World Cup Victories
Marcello Guidi and Lea Boy claimed their first victories at the World Aquatics Open Water Swimming World Cup in Setubal, Portugal at the weekend.
Olympic champion Kristof Rasovszky traded the lead with Marc-Antoine Olivier early on, only for Guidi to take the lead on the final lap, accelerating away from the field to win by more than 25 seconds.
He finished in 2:08:31:20, leading home an Italian clean sweep of the podium ahead of Andrea Filadelli (2:08:56:80) and Dario Verani (2:08:57.00).
Olivier was fourth ahead of Ivan Giavannoni and Rasovszky with the Frenchman still leading the overall series rankings with 1900 points ahead of Verani (1550) and Filadelli (1500) with two races remaining.
In the women’s race, Boy pulled away on the final 200m to claim victory over the Brazilian duo of 2020 Olympic champion Ana Marcela Cunha and Viviane Jungblut.
It was a much closer result, with Boy touching three seconds ahead in 2:18:30.70 with Cunha – fourth at Paris 2024 – back on the podium in 2:18:33.80 and Jungblut 0.70secs adrift in 2:18:34.50.
Caroline Jouisse was fourth ahead of fellow Frenchwoman Ines Delacroix – winner of the overall European Aquatics open water series – and Bettina Fabian, who shared fifth while Leonie Beck didn’t finish.
Cunha overtook the lead in the overall rankings with 2000 total points with Jungblut and Fabian tied for second with 1650 points, and Jouisse in fourth with 1450. After failing to finish, Beck drops from first to fifth with 1400pts.
The next World Aquatics Open Water Swimming World Cup race takes place on October 26-27 in Hong Kong with the series concluding November 22-23 in Saudi Arabia.
Link to results here