Europeans take lion’s share of medals at final stop of Open Water Swimming World Cup 2025

A bright Sardinian crowd and a weekend of close, tactical racing provided a fitting end to stop four of the 2025 World Aquatics Open Water Swimming World Cup in Golfo Aranci. European swimmers dominated the headlines across the 10km races, the mixed 4x1500m relay and the knockout sprints, with home favourites and rising stars both leaving their mark. All-in-all, athletes from the continent took all-but-one of the 15 medals on offer across two days of action. 

Hungary’s David Betlehem opened procedings by executing a well-timed move on the final lap of the course to take Men’s 10km gold in a time of 1:53:28.20. France’s Logan Fontaine finished narrowly behind in 1:53:31.60; his result was enough to secure the overall World Cup crown for the season. Italy’s Dario Verani used his customary late surge to take bronze in 1:53:32.40, delighting the home crowd and himself as he came home for the bronze, just a couple of seconds ahead of Italy’s Andrea Filadelli.  

Italy’s Ginevra Taddeucci took the women’s 10km in 1:58:56.50, claiming her first individual World Cup gold and sealing the overall series title with 2600 points. She led from the front for most of the race and produced the decisive sprint in the final hundred metres to hold off Poland’s Klaudia Tarasiewicz, who closed strongly to take silver just 0.70 seconds back in 1:58:57.20 in what she claimed to World Aquatics after the race was “the best race of her life”. Germany’s Lea Boy completed the podium in 1:59:00.60, adding another World Cup medal to a consistent season and rounding out an all-European top three. 

The mixed 4x1500m relay produced one of the weekend’s tightest finishes. France won in 1:07:54.00 with a quartet of Caroline Laure Jouisse, Sacha Velly, Clemence Coccordano and Logan Fontaine combining steady legs and tidy exchanges to edge Italy by a tenth of a second. Italy’s team of Linda Caponi, Ginevra Taddeucci, Marcello Guidi and Dario Verani finished a fraction behind to take silver, and Hungary’s Napsugar Nagy, Viktoria Mihalyvari-Farkas, David Betlehem and Kristof Rasovszky claimed bronze. 

The knockout sprint formats gave Europeans more chances to shine. In the men’s 3km Knockout Sprint, David Betlehem again featured at the front, joined on the podium by France’s Marc-Antoine Olivier and Fontaine, who have all had strong years as it draws to a close. In the women’s knockout event, Boy and France’s Caroline Jouisse took respective second and third behind Australia’s Moesha Johnson, as they also bookended an impressive year for the pair. 

Golfo Aranci underlined the depth and tactical sharpness of European open water swimming this season: established performers closed out the year strongly while younger athletes announced themselves as contenders for the seasons ahead. With another busy year of open water swimming on the horizon, Europe once again seems to be in pole position for the top spots. 

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Stephen Stanley for European Aquatics

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