Olympic Swimming Top Races, No. 4: Katie Ledecky Seeks Historic Four-Peat in 800 Freestyle
The Olympic swimming competition will begin Saturday, July 27, with the best swimmers in the world competing for medals in 28 individual races and seven relays over nine days of competition. Before that, Swimming World will count down the top-10 most anticipated races of the Games, where we can expect to find the best races and where the most decorated athletes will be racing for history.
- No. 10: Women’s 100 Butterfly
- No. 9: Men’s 400 Freestyle
- No. 8: Men’s 200 Butterfly
- No. 7: Men’s 100 Backstroke
- No. 6: Women’s 200 IM
- No. 5: Men’s 100 Butterfly
Most of the highly anticipated Olympic races lack a clear-cut favorite. Not the 800 freestyle, not with Katie Ledecky having won gold in the event at the past three Olympics plus at six consecutive World Championships. Not with Ledecky owning the 29 fastest performances in history in the 800 free and her world record sitting eight-and-a-half seconds clear of the second-fastest performer.
No, this one makes the list for the historical implications: no female swimmer has ever won four consecutive Olympic gold medals in one event. Ledecky became the third to three-peat when she beat the field three years ago in Tokyo, joining Australia’s Dawn Fraser (100 freestyle, 1956-1960-1964) and Hungary’s Krisztina Egerszegi (200 backstroke, 1988-1992-1996). The only swimmer of either gender to win four-in-a-row is Michael Phelps, who topped the men’s 200 IM in 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016. Phelps also won three consecutive 100 butterfly golds and three overall in the 200 fly, although non-consecutively.
One year ago, Ledecky was considered a total lock to pull off the historic feat in Paris when she threatened her world record for the first time in years at U.S. Nationals. She finished that selection meet with a time of 8:07.07, the third-quickest mark ever and her fastest time since 2016. At the ensuing World Championships, she recorded the seventh-quickest mark ever at 8:08.87, and it was enough to win gold by four-and-a-half seconds, even as China’s Li Bingjie and Australia’s Ariarne Titmus swam best times to become the second and third-fastest women ever, respectively. Those swimmers now ran
But in the final stretch prior to Tokyo, there is a silver of doubt after Ledecky lost an 800-meter race for the first time in more than a decade when Canadian teenager Summer McIntosh got the better of the American legend at a meet in Orlando in March. McIntosh moved ahead of Li and Titmus to become the second-fastest swimmer ever in the event with her time of 8:11.39, although she opted to concentrate on other events for Paris.
Ariarne Titmus — Photo Courtesy: Wade Brennan (Wade’s Photos)
As for swimmers who will be in the Olympic race, Titmus recorded a slightly faster time at Australia’s Olympic Trials than Ledecky did at hers, with Titmus clocking 8:14.06 and Ledecky going 8:14.12. Ledecky does own the world’s quickest time entering the Games with her 8:12.95 from a Pro Swim Series meet in April. Ledecky was noticeably displeased with her times in the two longest freestyle races at Trials, and a return to swims in line with her expectations — sub-8:10, if not faster — seems likely for the Olympics, but consider the following upset scenario.
By the time the 800 free comes around in the Olympic schedule, Titmus could already have won gold in the 400 free, 200 free and 800 free relay, all in world-record time. In the 800 free might have superior closing speed to Ledecky, putting her in a position to run down the American if she can stay as close as she did in the Tokyo final, when she ended up only 1.26 seconds behind. If Titmus enters the event with momentum, as expected, Ledecky will want to break away early to destroy any hope of an upset.
Li, an Olympic bronze medalist in the 400 free and gold medalist in the 800 free relay in Tokyo, will be in the thick of the medal chase, as will Italy’s Simona Quadarella, who edged out Germany’s Isabel Gose by nine hundredths to win the world title (in a field missing Ledecky, Titmus and Li) earlier this year. Australia’s Lani Pallister has also been under 8:20 this year while the United States’ Paige Madden and New Zealand’s Erika Fairweather are bigger longshots for the podium here.
At the conclusion of the U.S. Olympic Trials, Ledecky noted that her goals do not reflect the massive accomplishments and milestones she is reaching in her career. “My goals are very time-focused and splits-focused and technically focused,” she said. But a return to those target times will put her in a category all by herself in women’s swimming.