Katie Ledecky came into the Rio de Janeiro Olympics facing enormous expectations. Some athletes might have buckled under the pressure. She seemed to thrive on it.
The 19-year-old from suburban Washington capped off one of the greatest performances in Olympic history with her fourth gold medal and second world record, shattering her own mark in the 800m freestyle on Friday night.
“I just wanted to lay it all out there,” Ledecky said.
Photo: AFP
Ledecky and Debbie Meyer are now the only female swimmers to sweep the three longest freestyle races. Meyer took the 200m, 400m and 800m in Mexico City in 1968.
In recent days, Meyer’s been texting with Ledeckys’ mom, Mary Gen. Before the 800m, the former swimming great sent along a video message that was forwarded to Ledecky.
“I try not to think about the history much, but joining Debbie in that history is incredible,” Ledecky said.
She also followed fellow swimmers Amy van Dyken and Missy Franklin as the only American women to win as many as four golds in a single Olympics. Along with her individual golds, Ledecky also topped the podium with the 4x200m freestyle relay. For good measure, she earned silver anchoring the 4x100m freestyle relay, showing the sort of speed that has only recently become part of her repertoire, but bodes well for her branching out even more in the future.
“I hit all my goals right on the nose this week,’ Ledecky said.
Four years ago, she seemingly came out nowhere to capture gold as a 15-year-old at the London Games. Then, after her coach moved away, Ledecky hooked up with Bruce Gemmell and never missed a beat.
She called it “a testament to the vision that Bruce and I had three years ago when we set these goals, and we weren’t going to stop until we met them.”
As was the case in the 400m freestyle, where she crushed her own world record, Ledecky was merely racing the clock as she powered away from the field to touch in 8 minutes, 4.79 seconds, eclipsing the mark of 8 minutes, 6.68 seconds that she set in Texas in January.
“The goal was 8:05 or better,” she said.
Naturally, she was better.
Then, Ledecky played the waiting game, hanging on the rope for a while to let the rest of the field finish.
Jazz Carlin of Britain finally touched in 8 minutes, 16.17 seconds to claim silver, just ahead of Hungary’s Boglarka Kapas in 8 minutes, 16.37 seconds.
About 23 seconds after Ledecky touched the wall, the last of the eight finalists chugged to the end of the grueling race. Ledecky was barely breathing hard.
“What she’s doing in the sport is ridiculous, it’s insane,” said Michael Phelps, the 22-time gold medalist who plans to retire again after his final race yesterday. “She’s obviously someone I’m very excited to look forward to watching race.”
Ledecky said she was eager to get onto the next phase of her life, to Stanford, although she is not sure yet what she will study.
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