After water quality delays and extremely high (30°C/86°F) water and air temperatures, the men’s 10 km race at the 2025 World Aquatics Championships on Sentosa Island in Singapore finally got underway and did not disappoint. The race had everything:

• The top two men – Florian Wellbrock (27, Germany, MSF bio here, World Aquatics bio here, @flo.swim) and Gregorio Paltrinieri  (30, Italy, MSF bio here, World Aquatics bio here, @greg_palt) finished one-two, proving they are the best of the best when it comes to distance freestyle.
• Wellbroke used his stamina and self-confidence in his proven 2020 Tokyo Olympics strategy to push the pace and challenge the field to try and stay up with him – resulting in his 7th career gold medal performance.
• Kristóf Rasovszky (28, Hungary, MSF bio here, World Aquatics bio here,  @kristofrasovszky) – the reigning Olympic gold medalist and a dominant force at the 10 km distance – was apparently undone by the heat: 30°C (86°F) water and 30°C air temperatures to finish 12th.
• The overall times were among the slowest ever at the elite level – between 8-10 minutes slower on average compared to other podium finishes at major international races since 2008.
• Kyle Lee (23, Australia, MSF bio here, World Aquatics bio here, @kyle.lee__) proved that tactics, positioning, and timing are matters of great importance in the open water.  
• Preparation counts…a lot.

Compared to Paltrinieri’s best time of 14:32.80 and Wellbrock’s best time of 14:34.89 in the 1500m freestyle in the pool, Lee has only achieved a pedestrian time of 15:08.72 in the pool.  But that comparison does not matter in the open water.  Lee has sufficient stamina, but incredible tactics and open water knowledge to capture his first individual medal at the World Championships.

With the water temperature rising to 30°C – a level not surprising in Singapore in the summer – preparation was key and was reiterated by many in post-race interviews:

• Wellbrock: “I had one year to prepare for this. We did a lot of heat training and I think that was the key today to me taking the gold.”
• Lee: “We trained for this—we had a staging camp to help prepare for these harsh conditions.”

Later in the day, Moesha Johnson (27, Australia, MSF bio here, World Aquatics bio here, @swimmer_moe) won the women’s 10 km race.  Not surprisingly, Johnson trains with Wellbrock in Germany under coach Bernd Berkhahn. Similar to her male teammate, Johnson also has other open water races in store for the rest of the week as well as the 800m and 1500m freestyle races in the pool. Proof that great long distance freestylers can be great both in the pool and open water.

Eric Brown (22, Canada, World Aquatics bio here) who finished 21st said, “Overall I’m pretty happy with it. It was very difficult conditions, a long race, lot of waves and very hot conditions, but overall I’m happy. We had to stay on our toes with the race being postponed. That added a little bit of, maybe not stress, but added some confusion to the race. But we went with it and it all went well. We prepared very well for this, I’m happy about that. The water temperature was very high, 30 and a half degrees and very choppy out there which we didn’t quite expect but that’s OK, I’ve been training for that too.”

Men’s 10 km Final Results

1. Florian Wellbrock, 27, Germany 1:59:55.5
2. Gregorio Paltrinieri, 30, Italy 1:59:59.2
3. Kyle Lee, 23, Australia 2:00:10.3
4. Oliver Klemet, 23 Germany 2:00:10.40
5. Luca Karl, 23, Austria 2:00:30.40
6. Denis Adeev, 27, Neutral Country B 2:00:35.80
7. Andrea Filadelli, 24, Italy 2:00:43.70
8. Nicholas Sloman, 27, Australia 2:01:01.90
9. David Betlehem, 21, Hungary 2:01:13.80
10. Christian Schreiber, 23, Switzerland 2:01:39.50
11. Kaito Tsujimori, 19, Japan 2:01:47.9
12. Joey Tepper, 23, USA 2:01:53.8
13. Kristóf Rasovszky, 28, Hungary 2:03:05.5
14. Athanasio Kynigakis, Greece 2:03:05.6
15. Esteban Enderica Salgado, 34, Ecuador 2:03:06.1
16. Cho Cheng-Chi, 26, Chinese Taipei 2:03:08.9
17. Diogo Cardoso, 24, Portugal 2:03:17.9
18. Martin Straka, 24, Czech Republic 2:03:29.0
19. Paul Niederberer, 21, Switzerland 2:03:29.5
20. Luiz Felipe Loureiro, 21, Brazil 2:03:34.1
21. Eric Georges Brown, 22, Canada 2:04:04.60
22. Dylan Gravley, 22, USA 2:04:17.90
23. David Farinango, 24, Ecuador 2:04:18.10
24. Ruan Breytenbach, South Africa 2:05:07.60
25. Hector Pardoe, 24, Great Britain 2:05:38.00
26. Jules Wallart, 22, France 2:05:46.90
27. Piotr Wozniak, Poland 2:07:18.80
28. Matheus Melecchi, 19, Brazil 2:07:28.20
29. Yonatan Ahdut, 21, Israel 2:07:47.30
30. Lev Cherepanov, Kazakhstan 2:07:47.50
31. Logan VanHuys, 28, Belgium 2:07:52.70
32. Joaquin Moreno, 27, Argentina 2:07:52.70
33. Bo Ling Su, 14, Chinese Taipei 2:08:39.50
34. Riku Takaki, 20, Japan 2:08:39.50
35. Vladislav Utrobin, 26, Neutral Country B 2:08:39.50
36. Connor Buck, 22, South Africa 2:08:39.50
37. Tianchen Lan, 20, China 2:08:39.50
38. Jinhou Zhang, 22, China 2:08:39.50
39. Diego Dulieu, 20, Honduras 2:11:07.10
40. Bartosz Kapala, 18, Poland 2:11:32.10
41. Sebeom Oh, 22, South Korea 2:11:32.10
42. Tiago Campos, 26, Portugal 2:11:32.10
43. Artyom Lukasevits, 20, Singapore 2:11:41.40
44. Jose Barrios, 17, Guatemala 2:11:41.40
45. Ratthawit Thammananthachote, 22, Thailand 2:11:41.40
46. Diego Obele Cisneros, 23, Mexico 2:11:41.40
47. Nico Esslinger, 19, Namibia 2:11:53.40
48. Chin Ting Keith Sin, 30, Hong Kong 2:11:53.40
49. Jeison Rojas, 22, Costa Rica 2:11:53.40
50. Esteban Faure, 17, Monaco 2:11:53.40
51. Jakub Gabriel, 19, Slovakia 2:11:53.40
52. Alan Gonzalez Torres, 18, Mexico 2:17:34.00
53. Tomas Pavelka, 17, Slovakia 2:17:34.00
54. Jamarr Andre Bruno, 20, Puerto Rico 2:17:34.00
55. Aflah Fadlan Prawira, 27, Indonesia 2:19:35.00
56. Anurag Singh, 22, India 2:19:35.00
57. Adrian Gustavo Ywanaga Papi, 20, Peru 2:21:45.10
58. Juan Diego Nunez Barreras, 19, Dominica Republic 2:21:58.40
59. Army Pal, 23, India 2:21:58.40
60. Nithikorn Jeampiriyakul, 20, Thailand 2:21:58.40
61. Tsun Hin Chan, 20, Hong Kong 2:26:43.60
62. Gafar Hassan, 22, Sudan 2:26:43.60
63. Joaquin Estigarribia, 19, Paraguay OTL
64. Adam Ahmed Yacoub Ahmed, 16, Sudan OTL
65. Santiago Castedo, 16, Bolivia OTL
66. B Dilanka Shehan, 26, Sri Lanka OTL
67. Tharusha Rangitha Perera, 18, Sri Lanka OTL
68. Marc-Antoine Olivier, 29, France DNF
69. Matan Roditi, 26, Israel DNF
70. Jaehun Park, 26, South Korea DNF
71. Richie Oh, 22, Singapore DNF
72. Alejandro Plaza, 19, Bolivia DNF
73. Ronaldo Eduardo Zambrano Sanchez, 23, Venezuela DNF
74. Diego Vera, 29, Venezuela DNF
75. Alexander Adrian, 17 Indonesia DNF
76. Theo Druenne, 19, Monaco DNF
77. Samir Bachelani, 19, Kenya DNF
78. Oscar Garcia, 16, Guatemala DNF
79. Rami Rahmouni, 16, Tunisia DNS
80. Juan Manual Morales, 24, Colombia DNS
81. Swaleh Abubakar Talib, 25, Kenya DNS

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