KAZAN: Germany successfully defended their team open water title over five kilometres on Thursday at the world aquatic championships in Kazan.

The German trio of Rob Muffels, Christian Reichert and Isabelle Haerle clocked a winning time of 55min 14.4sec while Brazil and European champions Netherlands both shared silver as their three swimmers finished in an identical time of 16.8secs back.

“I had a bit of fear after the first very fast lap whether I could sustain the pace,” admitted Haerle.

Netherlands swimmer Ferry Weertman, whose Twitter account is the imaginatively named @veryferryfast, claimed his second silver of these world championships having finished second in Monday’s 10km men’s race.

German youngster Muffels, 20, added gold to the silver he won in the men’s 5km race on Saturday.

His compatriots Reichert and Haerle were part of the German team which won gold two years ago in Barcelona with Muffels new to the trio, replacing retired seven-time world gold-medallist Thomas Lurz.

The open water team event is a time trial with each country nominating two male and one female swimmers.

Published in Dawn, July 31st, 2015

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