SA swimmers struggle in men's 10km open water race

Cape Town - South Africa's two entrants struggled in the men's 10km open water race at the FINA World Championships in Gwangju, South Korea on Tuesday.

Multiple Midmar Mile winner, Chad Ho finished 23rd among the 73 finishers, while Danie Marais touched the timing mat in 30th position.

Ho finished in a time of one hour, 49 minutes and 37.9 seconds, a minute and 42 seconds behind race winner, Germany's Florian Wellbrock (1:47:55.9).

Marais' time was 1:50:14.2, leaving him 2:18:30 off the pace.

After the race, Ho said: “The race was pretty tough, one of the fastest I have ever done and I didn’t expect them to go at 4.5km into the lap, we usually go at about 7km, but the pace picked up really quickly.

“It just shows how everyone has evolved and I need to see where I can adjust my training and put it into practice. I will now be focusing on the 2020 Olympic Trials and go there and do my best and hopefully qualify for Tokyo. I will take it one step at a time, finish this year, get some more racing experience in and look ahead to the future.”