Callan Lötter continued her dominance of women’s open water swimming by successfully defending all three of her national titles at the Bombela Concession Company SA Open Water Championships at Marina Martinique near Jeffreys Bay over the weekend.
The 19-year-old was in a class of her own as she comfortably defended her national 10km, 5km, and 3km knockout titles.
Lötter was the only woman to record a sub two-hour time in the 10km race, winning in 1 hour 59 minutes and 36 seconds, over four minutes in front of the second-placed Hannah Neilson, who finished in 2:03.54. Carli Antonopoulos was third in 2:04.51.
“It feels really good. I’m very proud of myself. Last year I just tried to stay with everyone and then take it out at the end. But this year my training has been much better, so I decided to take it out from the beginning and try and hold on and build a gap,” she explained.
Lötter went on to win the 3km knockout a day later when conditions were far from ideal, using the first 1.5km round simply as a warm-up before speeding things up in the 1km and 500m rounds.
The event is run on a knockout basis. After the first round (1.5km), the top 20 athletes proceed to the second round (1km). The top 10 in that race then proceed to the final (500m), with just 10 minutes between each round.
“The race was really good, the conditions were very tough. The waves were picking up quite a lot at the end, so you had to work much harder to finish the race, but I’m happy with how it went,” said Lötter.
The Pretoria swimmer’s next victory of the weekend came in the 5km event on Sunday, which she won in a time of 1:00.23. Neilson was second in 1:00.37 and Marony Jacobs third in 1:02.02.
“I was aware that Hannah was quite close to me on the first three laps and then I saw the rest of the pack was quite far behind, so I just tried to focus on my own race and see how far I could get ahead,” she said.
LOUW TAKES TOP HONOURS IN MARATHON SWIM
Meanwhile, in the men’s events, it was Henré Louw who took top honours in the 10km marathon swim, after a thrilling sprint finish.
He claimed the title in 1 hour 54 minutes and 46 seconds, just one second ahead of Byron Kimber, with Connor Albertyn third in 1:54.55.
“It was definitely a tough race. The strategy was just to sit back a bit this year and try and let the other guys do a little bit of work and then just try my best at the back end of the race,” said Louw afterwards.
“On the last lap I missed the buoy, I got pushed out a bit, so I had to turn back and I was probably about 30m behind those guys. I had to dig deep just trying to catch them on the last lap. And then when I got to the top buoy, I just tried to push as hard as possible to the finish.”
Louw had to settle for fourth place in the 5km event, which proved to be another massive battle between the leading bunch.
This time it was Albertyn who came out on top in 57:26 with Matthew Caldwell finishing second two seconds later and Kimber third, in 57:30.
“It was a very tough race. From the start to the finish, it was just go from everyone. I don’t think there was a moment in that race when we were all fully relaxed,” said Albertyn.
“We were all constantly watching each other, especially Matt, Byron, Henré – we were all trying to get to the front and win but I got lucky on that last lap. I saw a bit of a gap and I took it. I just kept my head down and kept pushing. I didn’t want to look back, I just focused on the finish and doing everything I could to secure the win, and I managed to do so at least.”
Earlier in the weekend, Caldwell had come out on top in the 3km knockout as well as the 3km event (34:31), while the women’s 3km title was won in 37:25 by Leah Markgraaff, who also took the 7.5km title in 1:33.49. Wian Bartleman claimed the men’s 7.5km title for junior athletes in 1:25.47.