{"id":66414,"date":"2025-05-01T19:01:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T19:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/66414\/"},"modified":"2025-05-01T19:01:08","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T19:01:08","slug":"germanys-lukas-martens-rocks-340-61-400-free-world-record-follow-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/66414\/","title":{"rendered":"Germany’s Lukas M\u00e4rtens Rocks 3:40.61 400 Free World Record Follow-up"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t2025 GERMAN SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS<\/p>\n

Day two of the 2025 German Swimming Championships unfolded tonight in Berlin with World Championships bids on the line.<\/p>\n

As a refresher, this competition marks an additional qualification opportunity for athletes to add their names to the nation\u2019s roster for Singapore, although German athletes were able to qualify at any World Aquatics-approved competition from April 7th through May 4th.<\/p>\n

23-year-old\u00a0Lukas M\u00e4rtens<\/a><\/strong> has already made the grade in multiple events, highlighted by the men\u2019s 400m freestyle, the race in which he ripped a new World Record earlier this month.<\/p>\n

At the Swim Open Stockholm on April 13th, M\u00e4rtens overtook the longstanding 400m free WR benchmark of 3:40.07 retired countryman Paul Biedermann<\/strong><\/a><\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>put on the books during the supersuited 2009 World Championships.<\/p>\n

M\u00e4rtens\u2019 effort rendered him the first-ever man under the 3:40 barrier, surpassing his previous lifetime best of 3:40.33 notched at the 2024 German Nationals.<\/p>\n

While M\u00e4rtens bypassed the 400m free event at last week\u2019s Berlin Swim Open, he was back at it tonight and put up another head-turning performance of 3:40.61 to grab the gold.<\/p>\n

The reigning Olympic champion led 23-year-old\u00a0Oliver Klemet<\/a><\/strong> who clocked 3:43.43 for silver, followed by Olympic champion and open water ace Florian Wellbrock<\/strong><\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Wellbrock touched in 3:46.44 while 18-year-old\u00a0Johannes Liebmann<\/a><\/strong> followed up his 1500m free German Age Record from last weekend with a solid 3:48.79 as the 4th place finisher.<\/p>\n

Splits for top 4 finishers:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Klemet was just off his season-best of 3:43.30 to retain his position as the 2nd German Worlds qualifier.<\/p>\n

As for M\u00e4rtens, his 3:40.61 effort this evening represents the 10th-best performance in history and he now owns 3 of the swiftest swims ever produced. It also beat his Olympic gold medal-winning result of 3:41.78 from Paris.<\/p>\n

Top 10 Men\u2019s LCM 400 Free Performances All-Time<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. 3:39.96 \u2013 Lukas M\u00e4rtens<\/a> (GER), 2025<\/li>\n
  2. 3:40.07 \u2013 Paul Biedermann<\/strong><\/a> (GER), 2009<\/li>\n
  3. 3:40.08 \u2013 Ian Thorpe (AUS), 2002<\/li>\n
  4. 3:40.14 \u2013 Sun Yang (CHN), 2012<\/li>\n
  5. 3:40.17 \u2013 Ian Thorpe, 2001<\/li>\n
  6. 3:40.29 \u2013 Sun Yang, 2011<\/li>\n
  7. 3:40.33 \u2013 Lukas M\u00e4rtens<\/a>, 2024<\/li>\n
  8. 3:40.54 \u2013 Ian Thorpe, 2002<\/li>\n
  9. 3:40.59 \u2013 Ian Thorpe, 2000<\/li>\n
  10. 3:40.61 \u2013 Lukas M\u00e4rtens<\/a>, 2025<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"2025 GERMAN SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS Day two of the 2025 German Swimming Championships unfolded tonight in Berlin with World…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66415,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[2000,299,33785,1824,33786,33787,33788,33789],"class_list":{"0":"post-66414","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-florian-wellbrock","11":"tag-germany","12":"tag-johannes-liebmann","13":"tag-lukas-martens","14":"tag-oliver-klemet","15":"tag-paul-biedermann"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114434125573734372","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66414\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}