DPA
Paris
American Katie Ledecky became the first female swimmer to win gold at four Olympics after she claimed victory in the 1,500-metre freestyle at the Paris 2024 Games on Wednesday.
Among men, only her compatriots Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte have achieved this milestone.
Ledecky added the Paris medal to her collection of one gold at London 2012, four at Rio 2016 and two at Tokyo 2020. Overall, this is her 12th Olympic medal. In Paris, she had already claimed 400m freestyle bronze.
Ledecky, widely considered the greatest female distance swimmer of all time, clocked a new Olympic record of 15 minutes 30.02 seconds, improving her own time. Anastasiya Kirpichnikova took silver for hosts France while bronze went to Isabel Gose of Germany.
Marchand close to
Olympics history
French sensation Leon Marchand got closer to making Olympics history as he claimed the men’s 200-metre butterfly gold at his home Paris Games.
Marchand is looking to become the first swimmer ever to medal in the butterfly and breaststroke events at one Games - and he took the first step. The 200m breaststroke final is later.
The Frenchman set a new Olympic record of 1 minutes 51.21 seconds in the event after a tight fight in the final 50m with world record holder Kristof Milak of Hungary, who took silver.
Bronze went to Canada’s Ilya Kharun.
Sweden’s Sjostrom
wins women’s 100m
freestyle gold
Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom euphorically celebrated in the swimming pool on Wednesday after she claimed the women’s 100-metre freestyle gold at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
The Rio 2016 100m butterfly champion and world record holder clocked 52.16 seconds to beat Paris 100m butterfly winner Torri Huske of the United States by 0.13.
Third place went to Hong Kong’s Siobhán Haughey, who claimed her second bronze in Paris, the other in the 200m freestyle.
China’s Pan sets new world mark in 100m freestyle
China’s Pan Zhanle sets a new world record of 46.40 seconds to win the men’s 100-metre freestyle gold.
Pan broke his own record of 46.80s, set at the 2024 world championships in Qatar in February.
He also holds the Olympic record (46.92s), which he achieved in the men’s 4x100m freestyle in Paris.