A post-Phelps era was suddenly ushered in the year 2016, the moment the Rio Olympics concluded, followed by the next five years which paved the way for some of the most dynamic talents to emerge in a very short time span. This year’s Olympics posed a tough and unique challenge to swimmers all around the world. The Covid-19 pandemic left virtually all these Olympic hopefuls stuck at home for months, and anyone who has ever pursued swimming seriously would know that the Olympic level even something as simple as a few days out of the pool can seriously damage your peak performance. That is why, unsurprisingly, this year’s Olympics produced the lowest number of World Records in over two decades, four of them from the relays and just two legendary World Record performances in the individual events. Here’s a summary of that:
Tokyo 2020 - 6
Rio 2016 – 8
London 2012 – 9
Beijing 2008 – 24
(In 2008, special suits made partially of polyurethane were allowed, leading to a rush of World Records)
Athens 2004 – 8
Sydney 2000 – 14
Having said this, we cannot fail to notice the staggering number of Olympic records that were broken which saw several swimmers at the cusp of the world record having delivered some phenomenal swims.
To start off, let’s begin with the two swimmers who recreated history with by being the only two to break any individual world records. Normally, one would expect to start with USA’s Caeleb Dressel, but this year’s Performance of the Year must most definitely go to South African Tatjana Schoenmaker who obliterated Rikke Pederson’s World Record and became the first female ever to go under 2.19 minutes. It was a truly historic swim by a humble and remarkable personality such as Tatjana, which ended up with tears of joy in the eyes of everyone watching.
The next World Record that was broken was by none other than Caeleb Dressel who came with a lot of expectations on his shoulders, and he definitely did not fail to deliver! He just edged 0.05s ahead of his own world record in the 100m Butterfly with stiff competition coming from Hungary’s Kristof Milak who took down the last 50m just like Michael Phelps once did, and faster too! This made Dressel and Milak the all-time fastest performers ever in this event. Dressel then went on to break the Olympic records in both the 50m and 100m Freestyle which was at one point gut wrenching given the fact that Dressel was on course to break both elusive World Records in both events held by the sprint legend Cesar Cielo who once broke them, wearing the high-tech suits back in 2009. Nevertheless, Caeleb Dressel stamped his name as the male swimmer of the year once again without any doubt.
If one was to ask who the female swimmer of this year was, it would be an easy one, given the interesting fact that three of the best female performers came from Australia which was enough to almost topple the juggernauts USA off the top of the medal table. That being said, the female swimmer of the year is none other than Emma Mckeon of Australia. Her wins in both the 50m and 100m Freestyle events with Olympic records were absolutely stunning. Being one of the most versatile swimmers in the world, she medaled in the 100m Butterfly and swam in a record four relays all of which she anchored to the podium. She became the most decorated female swimmer ever in a single Olympics, second-most decorated Olympian in any sport in a single Games and most probably the most decorated Olympian of Tokyo, 2020 with a staggering seven medals of which four are Gold.
On par with Schoenmaker’s 200m Breaststroke world record performance would be Ariarne Titmus’ 400m Freestyle swim which shook the world as she overpowered the once unbeatable Katie Ledecky and delivered the 2nd fastest swim ever. She went on to swim the 200m Freestyle effortlessly and fought till then end trying to keep up with Ledecky in the 800m Freestyle which Ledecky eventually won, becoming the third woman ever to win Gold in the same event in three consecutive Olympics. Ariarne Titmus and Katie Ledecky are ready to take middle and long distance swimming to a whole new level.
Of course, Kaylee McKeown’s double gold in the 100m and 200m Backstroke was phenomenal, especially in the 100m event where she almost took out her own World Record. She was joined by Russia’s Evgeny Rylov who also achieved a wonderful double Gold in both backstroke events. Even McKeown’s backstroke split and Emma McKeon’s freestyle split wasn’t enough to even come close to Great Britain who smashed the Mixed Relay World Record, all thanks to Adam Peaty and James Guy. The other standout performance was China’s women’s 4x200m Freestyle relay team which broke the world record quite unexpectedly, in an event where Australia were the favorites.
Having said all of this there were so many historic performances all across the swimming schedule and given the circumstances, these performances are actually legendary and cannot be underestimated. With just three years to go to Paris 2024, one can only say that the future of swimming is as bright as ever.
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