Billert and Bausback on the podium

Both did their jobs very well and rewarded themselves by winning a medal.

Cäcilia Bausback (born 2003) was responsible for the start. The 18-year-old dolphin specialist skipped the long distances this time and concentrated on the 400m individual medley. After a varied course of the race, she found on the last part of the race, the crawl, in Helena Weber from TV Wetzlar, an equal, one year younger competitor, with whom she was stopped in the end with the same time (5:29.22 min.). . The Hessian took third place in the 2004 class, and the athlete from Strietwald the title of “Southern German Class Champion 2022”. Comment from her trainer Tom Ehrhardt: »Her performance was okay in terms of time. She was the only participant in her year. But if you’re not there, you can’t win either.«

Her five-year-old club mate tackled the full program and had to do the 1500 m freestyle on Saturday. In a direct comparison with his classmates, David Billert kept up the brisk initial pace and with his split times of over 400 m (4:42.56) and 800 m (9:35.44) he was well below his previous best times achieved in individual races ( 4:47.82 and 9:42.58). Up to the 1000m mark (12:03.05!) he defended fifth place, in the end it was enough for seventh place. With a final time of 18:15.23 minutes, he had significantly improved his house mark set up in January by more than 15 seconds.

The young Kahlfounder secured his bronze medal on Sunday morning in the 400 m individual medley, where he was able to keep up with the leaders with his strengths in dolphin and backstroke, but had to let them go in the breaststroke. In the end, a new personal best (5:07.54) was enough for a place on the podium. A little less than three seconds separated him from this in the race over 800F in the afternoon. Again he was fast and as an »ungrateful fourth« he reduced his best time to a fine 9:27.88 (!). Coach Tom Ehrhardt was very satisfied with the performance of his two protégés.