His troubles before the Paralympics – and bacteria are not the biggest problem

Before the Paralympic Games in Paris, new trouble is emerging over the Seine. After a long debate about whether the river is clean enough for competitions, Paralympic athletes are now also worried. In an interview with the sports information service SID, German triathlete Martin Schulz said that the water quality of the Seine is “certainly not ideal”, but that the main problem is the current.

At the end of July, athletes had already criticized how turbulent the river was at the Summer Games. “The current was extreme,” said German triathlete Tim Hellwig after the competition. “I was swept out ten, maybe 20 meters after the first buoy.” The current meant that the swimmers repeatedly lost control and collided with each other. “A very rough race,” said Hellwig. “A real brawl in the water,” added his teammate Jonas Schomburg.

The current at the Summer Games was already borderline, “even for swimming specialists,” said Martin Schulz. “For many para-athletes, it is impossible to swim upstream. Ideally, you stay in one place. But many will also swim backwards.”

“Bland aftertaste” at a duathlon

If the triathlon at the Paralympic Games cannot take place as planned, there are already emergency scenarios, Schulz explained to SID. It is conceivable that the competition will be postponed. Or that the athletes at the Paralympics will swim downstream. If a race in the Seine is impossible for the para-athletes, there would have to be a duathlon consisting of cycling and running.

In such a case, “a bitter aftertaste would remain,” said Schulz. The competition would take place under different circumstances, it would be distorted. “It’s like leaving out five disciplines in the decathlon,” said Schulz. Some athletes who are less good at swimming would benefit from it. Others who are actually particularly good in the water would be at a disadvantage.

The Olympic organizers had chosen the motto “Open Games” for the Paris edition. They staged the competitions in front of iconic buildings and squares. 3×3 basketball, for example, took place on the Place de la Concorde, horse riding in the park of the Palace of Versailles, beach volleyball in front of the Eiffel Tower. With the triathlon along the Seine, the organizers also wanted to produce images that would symbolize games in the middle of the city. They now want to repeat this for the Paralympic Games, despite criticism of the river’s not particularly clean and turbulent nature.

Given the backdrop, he can understand why the Olympic organizers also wanted to host the Paralympic triathlon in the center of the city, stressed triathlete Schulz, who is considered one of the favorites for gold. “That’s a boost, those are great images for the world,” said Schulz. A competition in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower is “certainly special,” but it is “a difficult dilemma. With the river, it’s always a lottery.”

Cases of illness after Seine competitions

At the end of the Summer Olympics in mid-August, there were increasing reports of cases of illness among athletes from various nations who had taken part in the competitions in the Seine. Three out of four German open water swimmers also complained of symptoms, including nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Two of them had to be treated as outpatients.

In recent years, France has invested 1.4 billion euros to clean the Seine. Due to the outdated sewage system, there were doubts about the success of the project. In Paris, rainwater and sewage sometimes run through the same pipes and also into the Seine when the system reaches its limits. After heavy rainfall at the start of the Summer Games, the limit values ​​for E. coli bacteria in the river were exceeded several times. The men’s triathlon had to be postponed by a day as a result. It has not been confirmed whether the cases of illness among the athletes that later became known are directly related to the Seine.