In the final individual swimming race of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on Sunday, 4 August, Bobby Finke of Team USA set a new world record in the 1500m freestyle with a time of 14:30.67 to win gold, surpassing the previous mark of 14:31.02.
Italy’s Gregorio Paltrinieri took silver with a time of 14:34.55. Ireland’s Daniel Wiffen clinched bronze with a time of 14:39.63.
Swimming in lane seven, Finke, the defending gold medalist in both the 800m and 1500m freestyle, was in it to win it after earning silver in the 800m gold. The 1500m final field included all three medalists from that event.
Finke took a new approach in this event, usually one to come from behind, he took the lead from the start. He showed no sign of tiring, instead Finke increased his lead with every 50m. But the question on everyone’s mind as the final 100m bell rang was whether he would be able to keep his lead and get the world record time in the sprint finish? The answer was a definitive yes, as Finke increased his speed to chase down the world record and become a back-to-back Olympic gold medalist.
Prior to Finke’s win, Team USA had yet to win an individual men’s gold medal at Paris 2024, a fact not lost on Finke, who said: “I knew going into the race I was the last individual swimmer for the guys.
“I didn’t really know how the race was going to play out. I was feeling pretty good at the first 300, I saw I had a decent lead and I knew I really just wanted to try to hold it.
“I was maybe a body length (ahead). I was like, ‘I can’t let go of this now. I can’t be the guy who got ran down after I do all the running down’. That was a big factor in my mind. I just kept that back there and I was just trying to keep going.”
Finke kept going, he said, his plan was to “hopefully try to make the guys hurt a little bit trying to catch up to me – but they started catching up to me”. He added: “I was getting a little worried but I knew I just had to keep pushing. As long as I can keep a little bit of the distance, I knew I was in a good shape for the end of the race.”
