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Katie Ledecky sets Olympic record in preliminaries

Which, to be honest, was nothing.

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Franklin just hopes she gets the chance to be part of the 4×200 free relay.

Ledecky has been unstoppable in the 400m distance she missed out on racing it at the 2012 Olympics. Redemption drove Katinka Hosszu, the star of Saturday night. Her opponents studied Ledecky’s wake. Predictably, and practically effortlessly, Ledecky touched well in time to qualify for Tuesday night’s final.

She finished the 400m race in 3 minutes, 56:46 seconds, nearly a full two seconds better than her previous record and more than four seconds ahead of the second-place finisher.

But she’s endured a mystifying loss of form since turning pro last summer, struggling just to qualify for two individual events and a relay at the U.S. trials.

It was a night of records in the Rio 2016 pool on Sunday as Michael Phelps added to his Olympic gold medal haul.

“It feels good to start getting toward the end how I want to”, Phelps said after the race.

“I was pumped. That’s what I wanted”, Ledecky said through USA Swimming. United States’ Katie Ledecky, center, competes in a heat of the women’s 200-meter freestyle during the swimming competitions at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Monday, Aug. 8, 2016.

“The thing is”, she went on, acknowledging her new reality, “everyone else really brought it. too”.

Imagine being 19-years-old and preparing for college at Stanford. Hosszu didn’t medal as a 23-year-old, either.

Sweden’s Sjostrom also smashed her own world record to clinch gold in the women’s 100m butterfly.

One later this week in the 800 free is a foregone conclusion. She’s still scheduled to compete in the 200- and 800-meter freestyles.

“The feeling is totally insane”, Sjostrom said.

Just as Phelps’ dominance forced other men to take a similar leap forward, Ledecky could be doing the same for women. She finished so far ahead her next closest competitors, she was able to turn around and look for her time before anyone else finished the race.

How dominating was her performance? “Part of you is in awe”.

“A goal I set after Barcelona in 2013 was 3:56 or better so to see 3:56 feels really good”, said Ledecky, who beamed when she saw the time.

“Pure happiness”, Ledecky said of her reaction after she had swam the 400 in a scintillating 3 minutes, 56.46 seconds, beating her record from August 2014 by almost two seconds.

Her next fastest split?

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“This is just the beginning”, Smith said.

Exciting finish in women's 400m freestyle