Men’s swimming’s biggest star, Caeleb Dressel, has played a relatively little role in the action in Tokyo. On day 6, however, it will no longer be the case.
Dressel plans to compete in the 100-meter freestyle, one of the Olympic games’ original events. He has set the standard for the entire world and is the current world champion in the sport.
Meanwhile, in the 4x200m freestyle relay, Katie Ledecky and Ariarne Titmus will face each other for the third time at these Tokyo Games. Detailed descriptions of the events happening today follow.
Tune in on NBC at 9:30 p.m. ET to catch the start of the action, and then stream the whole of the session on NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports app.
The Olympic 800-Meter Freestyle Event for Men is New this Year.
Gregorio Paltrinieri, the defending world champion, qualified last in the heats and will race in lane eight. American Bobby Finke, German Florian Wellbrock, and Ukrainian Mykhailo Romanchuk are all in the running for medals.
Australia’s Zac Stubblety-Cook and Britain’s James Wilby may go down to the wire in the 200-meter breaststroke.
However, ROC’s Anton Chupkov, who now holds the world record, is lurking in lane seven. Even though he was about two and a half seconds off his own record pace in qualifying (2:08.54), he is still among the event’s frontrunners.
Nic Fink of the United States of America also has a Shot at the Podium.
Among the competitors is Australia’s Emma McKeon, a two-time Olympic gold medalist. In the Olympic qualifying rounds, McKeon established a new world record.
The Australian Cate Campbell, the Swedish Sarah Sjostrom, the Canadian Penny Oleksiak, and the Danish Pernille Blume are all within a second of her time.
All told, the final might feature athletes who have won a total of 17 Olympic medals.
Ryan Murphy, the reigning Olympic gold medallist, and Bryce Mefford, also from the United States, will compete in the finals again this year.
In the final, 100-meter backstroke champion Evgeniy Rylov will try to position himself for a backstroke 1-2 finish. Both Hali Flickinger and Regan Smith of the United States are contenders for the gold medal, but China’s Zhang Yufei, who broke 2:05 in the semifinals, is the clear favourite.
The 2019 world champion, the Hungarian Boglarka Kapas, is also a serious contender for the podium. Caeleb Dressel has been in the shadows for the first part of the Tokyo swimming tournament, but now is his turn to shine.
Dressel, the defending world champion and record holder in the 100 free, will face stiff competition from the Russian swimmer Kliment Kolesnikov.
However, Dressel did indicate that there was a lot quicker time waiting for the final after his heat, and Kolesnikov did have a faster qualifying time out of the semis.
In the preliminary rounds, South African Tatjana Schoenmaker came extremely close to breaking the world mark with a time of 2:19.16, missing it by a mere.05 seconds.
What About in the Semi-Finals, can She Get that Score Lower?
Americans You can also expect Lilly King and Annie Lazor to make it to the championship match. Just how low can Michael Andrew go? The short-distance specialist looked to be in command of the 200 IM.
The defending champion, Hagino Kosuke of Japan, and the 400 IM champion, Chase Kalisz of the United States, both have good chances of advancing to the final.
Even with Ariarne Titmus on the bench, Australia came close to setting a new world record. Toss in the gold medallist from the individual 200-meter freestyle event, and Australia should cruise to victory. However, with veterans like Allison Schmidtt and Katie Ledecky in the U.S. team, they may be in for a tough race.
