After a 16-year drought, Australia’s women’s 4x200m freestyle relay team won a gold medal in the longest team event on the Olympic swimming program.
Australia’s all-star team of Mollie O’Callaghan, Lani Pallister, Brianna Throssell and Ariarne Titmus were clear favourites coming into the final on Friday morning (AEST) at the Paris La Defense Arena, but faced some unexpected threats from the United States and China in a highly strategic race.
Not everything went to plan for Australia, but they secured first place in an Olympic record time of 7:38.08, slightly outside the world record of 7:37.50 the team managed at last year’s world championships in Japan.
Olympians talk about the greatest show on earth not being about who posts the greatest times. It’s about who gets their hand on the wall first. And after a blistering final leg, Titmus – with ice in her veins – brought home gold for the first time since Steph Rice, Bronte Barratt, Kylie Palmer and Linda Mackenzie won in Beijing.
Here’s how they did it.
Why O’Callaghan led things off
In winning her 200m freestyle gold medal on Monday (Tuesday morning AEST), O’Callaghan showed she is in slightly better form than Titmus across the four-lap distance.
O’Callaghan, Titmus and Throssell’s coach, Dean Boxall, was responsible for devising the tactics to beat the USA, who have been on the podium in every women’s 4x200m freestyle final since the event began in Atlanta in 1996.
It is widely assumed that the fastest swimmer on the team goes last, but the rationale is different in a 4x200m freestyle relay. In a perfect world, swimmers want clean water to motor through, as it’s easier to do. Getting the fastest swimmer in the water first gives them an auspicious platform to set up a lead without navigating a choppy pool.
In her 100m and 200m individual races, O’Callagan has a reputation of starting slow and coming from behind to win, like she did against Titmus earlier in the week.
Take this: O’Callaghan took 27.01 seconds to swim the first lap of her 200m freestyle final. In this relay, she was out quicker, in 26.95 seconds.
It was the same for the first 100 metres; 55.86 (relay) vs 56.07 (individual swim).
O’Callaghan gave Australia a buffer of exactly one second over China’s Yang Junxuan, which was just what Australia needed.
It’s tight at the halfway mark
By the 400-metre mark, China had reduced their gap on Australia to just 0.44 seconds, thanks to a wonderful second leg from Li Bingjie – a gold medallist in this event three years ago in Tokyo.
The hardest part for Australia’s second swimmer, Lani Pallister, was having to back up from the morning heat swim (Throssell also did). When you also factor in that Pallister was sick with COVID for the start of the Olympics, you can only imagine how much her lungs were burning.
The first 100-metre splits from Pallister (55.71 seconds) and Li (55.61) were similar but having a second swim in the same day seemed to affect the Australian’s final two laps.
However, the most important thing was that Pallister fought to keep the lead, which she did, performing in front of her mum Janelle Elford, who competed at the 1988 Olympics.
By this point, there was no cause for panic, but the race was certainly closer than astute judges had been expecting.
Ledecky tries to pull off some magic
The USA, 1.4 seconds behind Australia at the 400-metre mark, showed their cards by putting superstar Katie Ledecky in as their third leg, up against Throssell, who is Australia’s slowest option.
Throssell only found out on the team bus into the pool she’d have the daunting task of going up against Ledecky.
Ledecky, a 200m freestyle Olympic champion in 2016, made a move on her third lap and the 11th lap of the race.
The champion, who at one point was motoring along at 1.65 metres per second, tried to draw level with Throssell but couldn’t get past her.
At this point of the race, it’s just as much mental as it is physical, but Throssell held her nerve by clocking a 1:56.00 split and handing it over to Titmus with Australia in front by 0.33 seconds with four laps to go.
Titmus shows the field who’s boss
For three years, Titmus had wanted revenge after admitting her lead-off swim in Tokyo in the same race wasn’t her finest performance as Australia won bronze.
Inexperienced swimmers can sometimes get too excited in relays but Titmus is a seasoned pro now and knew that the USA’s anchor leg, Erin Gemmell, would come at her hard.
Titmus also knew her personal best in the 200m freestyle is almost four seconds faster than Gemmell’s.
With 100 metres to go, Titmus picked her moment and went for home. Her turn off the wall with two laps to go was magnificent. And so too was her underwater work. Titmus kicked much harder than her American rival, who by this point knew it was all but over.
A glorious final few metres
On the final lap, Titmus made sure she was breathing to her left towards Gemmell. The Australian star would have been immensely satisfied knowing the USA wouldn’t be able to haul her down.
Australia touched the wall in 7:38.08 and 2.78 seconds clear of the USA. It is the biggest margin in the history of the women’s 4x200m freestyle relay at the Olympics, surpassing USA’s win by 2.55 seconds over China at Athens in 2004.
Unsurprisingly, Titmus’ split of 1:52.95 was the fastest of swimmers in the field who didn’t lead off. She’s gone faster twice (1:52.41 in 2023 and 1:52.82 in 2022) in the final leg of a 4x200m freestyle relay but could not have cared less.
It was another gold in the bag for Australia.
The best bit for the four smiling swimmers? It keeps Australia ahead of the USA on the medal tally, five golds to four, with three nights of competition remaining.
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