Ledecky Wins 8th Olympic Gold Medal, Torri Huske Claims Silver in 100 Freestyle

NANTERRE, France — There are few sure things at an Olympic Games. But Katie Ledecky winning a 1,500-meter freestyle race is as close as it gets. She owns the 20 fastest performances in the event’s history, and she won the women’s 1,500 free’s Olympic debut in Tokyo three years ago.

At the Olympic Games Paris 2024, Ledecky again swam away from the field, winning the 1,500 freestyle in 15:30.02 and breaking her own Olympic record by over five seconds. Her nearest competition, Anastasiia Kirpichnikova from France, finished 10.33 seconds back.

Ledecky hit the wall, saw her time, and celebrated.

“I just wanted to swim a time that I could be really happy with, and that was one,” Ledecky said after the race, all smiles. “It's never easy to win a gold medal. So I’m just trying to soak in every moment of it. I’m feeling really happy.”

With the gold medal, Ledecky, 27, tied American swimmer Jenny Thompson for most Olympic gold medals won by an American woman (eight). Ledecky’s total Olympic medal count stands at 12 — also tied with Thompson and U.S. swimmer Dara Torres.

Larisa Latynina has the standard that female Olympians have been chasing for the past 60 years. The Russian gymnast won her final two golds at the 1964 Olympic Games and has nine gold medals and 18 total.

“I try not to think about history very much or any of that,” said Ledecky, when asked about the records. “But I know those names, those people that I’m up with. They’re swimmers that I looked up to when I first started swimming. So it's an honor just to be named among them. I'm grateful for them inspiring me and so many great swimmers over the years in the U.S. that have helped me get to this moment.”

So what was motivating Ledecky when she was so far ahead of her competition during the race? In Tokyo, she repeated her grandmothers names over and over again by the 15th lap of the 30-lap race. This time, she thought of her training partners at the University of Florida — guys like Bobby Finke, who won an Olympic silver medal in the men’s 800-freestyle last night. She repeated their names over and over as she swam.

Ledecky remembered all the 50-yard freestyles that they had done in practice — “just holding time, holding stroke count,” she explained. Some days, they did 60 or 70 of these 50-yard drills.

“I'm able to hold a really good time on pretty short rest, so I just tried to use that as confidence [tonight],” she said.

Then she brought it back to her teammates.

“I know I made their lives hard some days [in those practices], but they made my life a lot easier today, so it’s fun to share these moments with people like that,” she added.

Now a four-time Olympian, Ledecky thought back to the gold medal that she won at the 2012 London Olympic Games in the 800-meter freestyle — back when she was an unheralded teenager.

“The first [Olympic gold medal] totally was totally unexpected by the outside world,” she said. “I mean, I had it as something that I could visualize, but I knew that I had no expectations to do that.”

This Olympic Games, it was far different. Expectations weighed heavy on her shoulders — as sure a bet as there is at the Games.

“I know a lot of other people expected it of me, and that doesn't make it easy,” she said. “It's not easy to always follow through and get the job done. There are moments of doubt, there are hard days and training where you doubt yourself, and you just have to push through and trust in your training, trust that everything will come together in the end. I'm happy that it did today.”

Ledecky still has her signature event left to swim in Paris — the 800 freestyle, with finals on Saturday, August 3. She is also scheduled to compete in the women’s 4x200 freestyle relay tomorrow.

By the end of the Paris Games, she could have 14 total medals in her collection.

Coming to the Paris Olympic Games, Torri Huske’s goal was to win an individual Olympic medal. Now she has two — gold from the 100-meter butterfly the other night and now silver in the 100 freestyle.

Huske, 21, finished in 52.29, just 0.13 of a second behind world record holder Sarah Sjöström from Sweden. It was Sjöström’s first gold medal in the 100 free. Siobhan Bernadette Haughey from Hong Kong — the 100 free silver medalist at the Tokyo Olympic Games — rounded out the podium.

“As proud as I am of my 100 fly, I think I'm equally as proud of my 100 free,” said Huske as she held onto her medal.

A recent high school graduate in 2021, Huske just missed winning an individual Olympic medal at the Tokyo Games. She was out-touched by 0.01 of a second in the 100 butterfly. That finish stuck with her, motivating her in the past three years as she studied at and competed for Stanford University. She took the past year off college to focus on the Paris Games, and she has been on a roll since arriving in Paris.

On the first night of swimming at the Paris Games, she helped the U.S. win silver in the 4x100 freestyle relay (she also has a Olympic silver medal from the Tokyo Games in the 4x100 free relay). The next night, she won gold in the 100 butterfly. Now silver in the 100 free.

“It was anyone's game, and I love to race,” Huske said. “I think the competition brought out the best in me, so I'm just excited to have represented my country.”

An award-winning freelance writer based in Vermont, Peggy Shinn is in Paris covering her eighth Olympic Games. She has contributed to TeamUSA.org since its inception in 2008.