Swimming at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Women's 800 metre freestyle
| Women's 800 metre freestyle at the Games of the XXIX Olympiad |
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| Competitors | 36 | |||||||||
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| Medalists | ||||||||||
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| «2004 | 2012» | |||||||||
| Swimming events at the 2008 Summer Olympics  |
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|---|---|---|---|---|
| Freestyle | ||||
| 50 m | men | women | ||
| 100 m | men | women | ||
| 200 m | men | women | ||
| 400 m | men | women | ||
| 800 m | women | |||
| 1500 m | men | |||
| Backstroke | ||||
| 100 m | men | women | ||
| 200 m | men | women | ||
| Breaststroke | ||||
| 100 m | men | women | ||
| 200 m | men | women | ||
| Butterfly | ||||
| 100 m | men | women | ||
| 200 m | men | women | ||
| Individual medley | ||||
| 200 m | men | women | ||
| 400 m | men | women | ||
| Freestyle relay | ||||
| 4×100 m | men | women | ||
| 4×200 m | men | women | ||
| Medley relay | ||||
| 4×100 m | men | women | ||
| Marathon | ||||
| 10 km | men | women | ||
The Women's 800 metre freestyle event at the 2008 Olympic Games took place between August 14 and 16, at the Beijing National Aquatics Center. This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated (unlike backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly events). Nearly all swimmers use the front crawl or a variant of that stroke. Because an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of sixteen lengths of the pool.
Five heats were held, with most containing the maximum number of swimmers (eight). The heat in which a swimmer competed did not formally matter for advancement, as the swimmers with the top eight times from the entire field qualified for the finals; there, they all competed in a single final heat to earn final placements.
The qualifying norms for the 2008 event were 8:36.00 (A norm) and 8:54.04 (B norm). NOCs with two or more swimmers meeting the A standard could enter any two such swimmers; otherwise, they could enter a single swimmer meeting the B standard.
The women's 800 metre event was unusual on the 2008 Olympic swimming programme in that there was no direct equivalent for men. Instead, the men's longest freestyle event was at 1500 metres and men did not swim an 800 metre freestyle event. For all other swimming events in 2008, the men's and women's programmes were identical.
Contents |
[edit] Records
Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
| World record |  Janet Evans (USA) |
8:16.22 | Tokyo, Japan | 20 August 1989 | [1] |
| Olympic record | Brooke Bennett (USA) |
8:19.67 | Sydney, Australia | 22 September 2000 | - |
The following new world and Olympic records were set during this competition.
| Date | Event | Name | Nationality | Time | OR | WR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 14 | Heat 4 | Rebecca Adlington |  Great Britain |
8:18.06 | OR | |
| August 16 | Final | Rebecca Adlington | Great Britain |
8:14.10 | OR | WR |
During the competition, Rebecca Adlington broke the Olympic Record in a preliminary heat. Thus, prior to the running of the final heat, Brooke Bennett's 2000 time was no longer the most current record to beat.[2]
[edit] Heats
[edit] Heat 1
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | Au Hoi Shun Stephanie |  Hong Kong |
8:41.66 | |
| 2 | 5 | Golda Marcus |  El Salvador |
8:51.21 | |
| 3 | 3 | Eva Lehtonen |  Finland |
8:53.50 | |
| 4 | 3 | Karolina Paulina Szczepaniak |  Poland |
9:08.87 |
[edit] Heat 2
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | Susana Escobar |  Mexico |
8:33.51 | |
| 2 | 5 | Kristel Köbrich |  Chile |
8:34.25 | |
| 3 | 1 | Jördis Steinegger |  Austria |
8:36.40 | NR |
| 4 | 3 | Gabriella Fagundez |  Sweden |
8:39.06 | |
| 5 | 6 | Reka Nagy |  Hungary |
8:40.38 | |
| 6 | 8 | Lynette Lim |  Singapore |
8:45.56 | |
| 7 | 2 | Cecilia Elizabeth Biagioli |  Argentina |
8:50.18 | |
| 8 | 7 | Cai Lin Khoo |  Malaysia |
9:04.86 |
[edit] Heat 3
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 5 | Camelia Potec |  Romania |
8:19.70 | Q |
| 2 | 6 | Li Xuanxu |  China |
8:24.37 | Q |
| 3 | 4 | Katie Hoff | United States |
8:27.78 | |
| 4 | 3 | Flavia Rigamonti |  Switzerland |
8:28.67 | |
| 5 | 8 | Andreina Pinto |  Venezuela |
8:30.30 | NR |
| 6 | 1 | Maiko Fujino |  Japan |
8:35.60 | |
| 7 | 7 | Tanya Hunks |  Canada |
8:38.05 | |
| 8 | 2 | Federica Pellegrini |  Italy |
DNS |
[edit] Heat 4
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | Rebecca Adlington | Great Britain |
8:18.06 | Q, OR |
| 2 | 2 | Lotte Friis |  Denmark |
8:21.74 | Q |
| 3 | 3 | Kylie Palmer |  Australia |
8:22.81 | Q, OC |
| 4 | 1 | Wendy Trott |  South Africa |
8:26.21 | AF |
| 5 | 7 | You Meihong | China |
8:31.11 | |
| 6 | 6 | Jaana Ehmcke |  Germany |
8:39.51 | |
| 7 | 5 | Ai Shibata | Japan |
8:41.63 | |
| 8 | 8 | Eleftheria Evgenia Efstathiou |  Greece |
8:41.65 |
[edit] Heat 5
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 5 | Alessia Filippi | Italy |
8:21.95 | Q |
| 2 | 1 | Elena Sokolova |  Russia |
8:23.07 | Q |
| 3 | 7 | Cassandra Patten | Great Britain |
8:25.91 | Q |
| 4 | 4 | Kate Ziegler | United States |
8:26.98 | |
| 5 | 6 | Coralie Balmy |  France |
8:28.34 | |
| 6 | 3 | Erika Villaécija García |  Spain |
8:32.27 | |
| 7 | 8 | Melissa Gorman | Australia |
8:32.34 | |
| 8 | 2 | Sophie Huber | France |
8:33.76 |
[edit] Final
| Rank | Lane | Name | Nationality | Time | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
4 | Rebecca Adlington | Great Britain |
8:14.10 | WR |
 |
6 | Alessia Filippi | Italy |
8:20.23 | |
 |
3 | Lotte Friis | Denmark |
8:23.03 | |
| 4 | 5 | Camelia Alina Potec | Romania |
8:23.11 | |
| 5 | 1 | Li Xuanxu | China |
8:26.34 | |
| 6 | 2 | Kylie Palmer | Australia |
8:26.39 | |
| 7 | 7 | Elena Sokolova | Russia |
8:29.79 | |
| 8 | 8 | Cassandra Patten | Great Britain |
8:32.35 |
- Q = Qualified, DSQ = Disqualified
- WR = World Record, OR = Olympic Record
- AF = African Record, AS = Asian Record, ER = European Record, OC = Oceania Record
- CR = Commonwealth Record, NR = National Record
[edit] References
- ^ Dimond, Jeff (October 1989). "Swim and Deliver" (PDF). Swimming World and Junior Swimmer 30 (10): 41–44. http://65.110.72.225/SPIPDF/1989janetevanswr.pdf. Retrieved 2008-07-08.
- ^ Long, John (August 2008). "Olympics, Swimming: Rebecca Adlington Sets Olympic Record in 800 Free Prelims". swimmingworldmagazine.com. http://www.swimmingworldmagazine.com/lane9/news/18821.asp?q=Olympics,%20Swimming:%20Rebecca%20Adlington%20Sets%20Olympic%20Record%20in%20800%20Free%20Prelims. Retrieved 2008-08-14.
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