Now, 19-year-old teammate Katie Ledecky is the USA freestyle star. Yet South Africa’s Chad le Clos outreached Phelps by 0.05 seconds in London four years, in one of the most dramatic races at those games.
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“I really just want to do well, more for my team than anything else”, she said. “I had been so close to breaking that all year and the past two years”.
Franklin’s next swim will likely come Wednesday afternoon in the preliminaries of the 4×200 relay. Not even when she revs her engine so hard, she almost throws up on the last lap. But that only made her narrow victory that much sweeter. She was only 15, but she won gold in the 800-meter freestyle in a stunning performance.
“Should be a fun race”, Phelps said. I was done when I touched the wall. “I’ll just pray normally to myself, but it’s there just in case”. Simone Biles and the American women’s gymnastics team are on the mat and the Brazilian women’s soccer team will try to pick up the slack for the celebrated men, who have underwhelmed early in the Olympics.
At the 2013 World Championships in Barcelona, she won gold and set an American record in the 400m freestyle.
The 19-year-old Washington, D.C., native amazed in her global debut four years ago at the 2012 London Games, winning gold in the 800-meter freestyle. Still, she said she was proud of the effort the squad displayed. “It means I pushed myself to the max”. By the halfway point, she had climbed to second, just six-hundredths of a second behind McKeon. “It was about getting my lane for tomorrow”, said Ledecky, after finishing behind Sjostrom in today’s semi-finals. “I’m just so glad I got my hand on the wall first”. However, Olympic fare was also shown on NBCSN and Bravo in prime-time this year.
Also like Biles, Ledecky’s Catholic faith is central to her identity.
In the summer of 2014, she became the first woman since Janet Evans to simultaneously hold world records in the 400m, 800m and 1500m freestyle. If Ledecky was clearly dialed-in, so, too, was Sjostrom. Defending Olympic champion Nathan Adrian had a tougher time in the 100-meter freestyle, grabbing the 16th and final spot for Tuesday night’s semifinals. When she saw the two digits 56 she said she felt nothing but pure happiness. It didn’t sit well with the American superstar, who got off to a rousing start to the Rio Games by leading the 4×100 freestyle team to gold.
Plenty of illuminating star power for the Rio Games on Tuesday.
Ledecky anchored the 4×100 free team that set a United States record and earned silver behind Australia on Saturday.
After her big splash in London, “Missy the Missile” chose to swim at California for two years, spurning lucrative endorsement deals to be part of a collegiate team.
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The 200 has never been Ledecky’s best race. “It’s one mistake and you’re done”. That silver medal marked the first time in 15 worldwide races, dating back to her surprise gold medal in the 800m freestyle in London, that she did not win gold.
