Paris Olympics, Day 1 Final: Lukas Martens Claims Historic 400 Free Gold
The electricity in the air for the men’s 400 freestyle final at the Fukuoka World Championships last summer presaged a doozy of an Olympic final 12 months on.
The pieces haven’t exactly fallen into place. But the resulting chaos in Paris still lived up to the billing.
Lukas Martens held off a pack of chasers to win Olympic gold in 3:41.78, and another Olympics brought another outside lane surprise via Kim Woo-Min of South Korea getting bronze.
Martens is the first German man to win a gold medal in the pool at the Olympics since 1988, when Michael Gross of West Germany won the 200 fly and Uwe Dassler of East Germany took this same 400 free. (Florian Wellbrock won open water gold in Tokyo.) Britta Steffen is the last German gold medalist, man or woman, in the 50 and 100 free in 2008.
The importance of the moment was a lot for Martens to take in during the moment.
“I was overwhelmed,” Martens said. “I stopped, looked at the scoreboard and thought, ‘nah, that can’t be right.’ That was anything but foreseeable, after this season and after all the exertion, even if all the performances beforehand were good.
“I would say it was a controlled race, a solid race. The last few meters hurt a bit. My time is OK, I don’t have to hide. During the race, I thought I was swimming against my training colleagues in Magdeburg.”
- World record: Paul Biedermann, Germany, 3:40.07 (2009)
- Olympic record: Sun Yang, China, 3:40.14 (2012)
- Tokyo Olympic champ: Ahmed Hafnaoui, Tunisia, 3:43.36
Australian Elijah Winnington hung on for silver in the first finals session of the Olympic swimming competition at La Defense Arena. Winnington went 3:44.24, followed by Kim in 3:42.50 and Sam Short I 3:42.64.
Martens was first in prelims in 3:44.13, one of six times in the 3:44s. That would prove much slower than what the finals produced.
The A final Saturday proceeded without just one holdover from the Tokyo Games. Reigning champ Ahmed Hafnaoui is out of Paris with an undisclosed injury. Silver medalist Jack McLoughlin retired. Bronze medalist Kieran Smith finished 11th in prelims Saturday, while Felix Aubock, who was fourth in Tokyo, also missed out in 24th. That left seventh-place Winnington as the lone Tokyo repeat. Only five swimmers are retained from last year’s Worlds final – Kim, Short, Martens, Guilherme Costa and Winnington.
Winnington felt some of the legacy of Tokyo, but he mobilized it to his benefit.
“Three years ago I was in the exact same lane, lane six, and I bombed out and came seventh,” he said. “I was fortunate enough to win a medal in the 4x200m heat (in Tokyo). I haven’t ever told anybody this, but I’ve never actually looked at that medal because I didn’t think I’d earned it, so having a medal around my neck tonight on the dais is going to be really, really special for me.”
Martens took it out Saturday night, more than two seconds under the world record at one point. The pack pulled him in late, though. Winnington pushed from Lane 6. Kim, in Lane 1, was out quick. Short looked like he was going to make a move on Kim twice, but the Korean held him off.
In fifth was Guilherme Costa of Brazil in 3:42.76. That takes down Larsen Jensen’s mark of 3:42.78 from the 2008 Olympics. Fei Liwei of China was sixth, with American Aaron Shackell eighth.
