Austrian swimming coach: no medal expectations, just doing best
1/8/2008 17:48
Austrian swimming coach Helge Godecke expected no medals from his swimmers
but is settled if his "family members" keep improving their time.
Godecke,
from Germany, took three Austrian swimmers to Beijing. "We don't have many
Olympic champions on the Austrian team, but I think we will beat many Austrian
records," he said.
A total of 12 swimmers, including Markus Rogan, a silver
medalist in Athens, will participate the Beijing Games. Rogan is trained by
another coach.
"Two of my swimmers have competitions on the first night of
the Games: Joerdis in the 400 meters individual medley and David Brandl in men's
400m freestyle. We have trained very hard to make a nice debut," Godecke
said.
Godecke once trained his countryman Mark Warnecke to win the bronze of
men's 100 meters breaststroke in the 1996 Atlanta Games.
Ten years working in
Austria, which he described as a "lovely country", he witnessed the improvement
of the country's swimming sport.
"Ten years ago, the national records were
very bad. For the 200m free, it was one minute 55 seconds. Now we have two boys
under 1:48. We also have Florian Janistyan, the first swimmer to swim under 15
minutes in 1500 meters free," he said.
One of Godecke's swimmers Dominc Koll
will swim in men's 4X200m freestyle relay and 200m freestyle. In the European
Championships in March, Koll's team won the bronze of the men's 4X200 meters
freestyle relay, the first ever relay medal for men swimmers in the
international competition.
"I hope Koll can do his best and make the final of
the men's 200m free," Godecke said.
Xinhua
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