After the opening in Viedma in Argentina and Abu Dhabi earlier this year, the third stop of the 2017 FINA/HOSA 10km Marathon Swimming World Cup will be Setubal on Saturday 24 June. The city just a 45-minute drive south of the capital Lisbon is a wellknown venue in the calendar of the open water family.

“I expect a tough race”, the Olympic champion Ferry Weertman from the Netherlands said.

“The conditions will not be easy”, he added.

“But that it is, what I like. I like tough races”, Ferry Weertman said. After his first participation in 2012 he returns now for a second time to the event. “For me it is also a last test for the upcoming World championships next months in the Lake Balaton in Hungary”, said the 24-year-old the runner-up of the previous championships two years ago in Kazan in Russia.

The Marathon Swimming World Cup in Setubal is quite different to the other venues”, Andrea Prayer, Honorary Secretary of the FINA Technical Open Water Swimming Committee remarked.

“There can be a lot of changes during the race, like currents, waves and also the weather”, he added. “And it could be possible for the first time in an FINA open water swimming event, that we will use wet suits”, the Italian remembered to a ruke change. When the water temperature will be below 18 degree Celsius, wet suits wil be uses.

“The race will be very hard”, expects Ana Marcela Cunha as she returns to the venue, where she won for the first time a Marathon Swimming World Cup: in 2008.

Meanwhile she collected altogether 16 victories in the serie and is leading the all-time-winner list together with her countrymate Poliana Okimoto with the same number of first places. “So I have good memories of Setubal”, 25-year-old Cunha said.

47 men and 34 women from 24 federations have entered for the event, including the overall winner from last year, Simone Ruffini and Rachele Bruni, both from Italy. Arianna Bridi from Italy as the leading competitor in the overall ranking of this year has also entered. The start of the men’s race is expected at 3pm, the women’s race will start 10 minutes later on the 2km course in front of the Parque Urbano de Albarquel.