Valerio Cleri

Valerio Cleri (born June 19, 1981 in Palestrina ) is an Italian swimmer who increasingly specialized in open water competitions over the course of his career .

He became world champion twice: at the 2009 World Swimming Championships in Rome, he covered the 25 km in 5: 26: 31.6 hours ahead of Trent Grimsey (5: 26: 50.7) and Vladimir Djatchin (5: 29: 29.3). At the same event he finished fourth over 10 km in 1: 52: 11.4 behind the winner Thomas Lurz (1: 52: 06.9) and the Americans Andrew Gemmell and Francis Crippen (1:52:10, 7).

At the 2010 Open Water World Championships in Roberval , Canada , he was the winner over 10 km in 2: 00: 59.3 ahead of the two Russians Yevgeni Dratzew (2: 01: 00.6) and Vladimir Djatchin (2: 01: 03.0). Over 25 km, the American Alexander Meyer (5: 32: 39.38) relegated him to second place (5: 32: 40.40) ahead of the Bulgarian Petar Stoichev (5: 33: 50.29).

In addition, Cleri managed to win two European championship titles: At the European Swimming Championships in Budapest in 2010 he was the winner over 25 km in 5: 16: 38.3 ahead of the two French Bertrand Venturi (5: 16: 54.7) and Joanes Hedel (5: 18: 57.6). In addition, he won the silver medal over 10 km in 1: 54: 25.8 behind Thomas Lurz (1: 54: 22.5) and ahead of Dratzew (1: 54: 26.6).

At the European Open Water Championships in Dubrovnik in 2008 , he won the world title over 25 km in 4: 29: 00.0 (!) Ahead of Joanes Hedel (4: 32: 40.9) and Russian Dimitri Solowjew (4: 34: 02.4) won.

At the Olympic Summer Games in Beijing in 2008 Cleri missed the bronze medal over 10 km in 1: 52: 07.5 behind the winner Maarten van der Weijden (1: 51: 51.6), David Davies (Great Britain, 1:51: 53.1) and Thomas Lurz (1: 51: 53.6).

Web links

• Valerio Cleri's successes ( Memento from April 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) on a website of the Italian Swimming Federation (Italian)
• Valerio Cleri in the database of Swimrankings.net (English)
• Valerio Cleri in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )