Swimming at the 2000 Summer Olympics – Men's 400 metre freestyle


The men's 400 metre freestyle event at the 2000 Summer Olympics took place on 16 September at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre in Sydney, Australia.
At only 17 years of age, Australia's overwhelming favorite Ian Thorpe, dubbed by his fans as the "Thorpedo", made his Olympic debut by claiming the first gold medal for the host nation at these Games. Cheered by a massive home crowd and rocketed to the chants of "Thorpie" by his swimming fans, Thorpe maintained a strong lead from start to finish before hitting the wall first in a new world record of 3:40.59.
Massimiliano Rosolino, born with an Australian heritage, earned a silver medal for Italy in a European record of 3:43.40, finishing just three body lengths of a pool behind Thorpe. Meanwhile, U.S. swimmer Klete Keller stormed home from last place in the 200 m lap to wrest a bronze in 3:47.00, an American record, edging out Rosolino's teammate Emiliano Brembilla by a hundredth of a second.
Romania's Dragoș Coman finished fifth with a national record of 3:47.38, and was followed in the sixth spot by another U.S. swimmer Chad Carvin in 3:47.58. Aussie Grant Hackett and South Africa's Ryk Neethling rounded out the finale within three-tenths of a second apart.
Acknowledging a massive roar of the home crowd, Thorpe also cracked Yevgeny Sadovyi's 1992 Olympic record by 0.35 seconds to lead the final of six heats, and pick up a top-seeded time of 3:44.65 in the morning prelims.

Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
The following new world and Olympic records were set during this competition.
DateEventNameNationalityTimeRecord
16 SeptemberHeat 6Ian Thorpe3:44.65
16 SeptemberFinalIan Thorpe3:40.59

Results

Heats

RankHeatLaneNameNationalityTimeNotes
164Ian Thorpe3:44.65Q,
243Massimiliano Rosolino3:45.65Q, NR
344Ryk Neethling3:48.08Q
463Emiliano Brembilla3:48.41Q
555Chad Carvin3:48.42Q
665Klete Keller3:48.62Q
753Dragoș Coman3:48.77Q, NR
854Grant Hackett3:48.91Q
952Heiko Hell3:50.80
1045Paul Palmer3:51.06
1141Masato Hirano3:51.42AS
1268Nicolas Rostoucher3:51.80NR
1356James Salter3:52.01
1467Alexei Filipets3:52.21
1566Rick Say3:52.72
1647Igor Snitko3:52.97
1742Luiz Lima3:53.87
1846Jacob Carstensen3:54.14
1957Vlastimil Burda3:54.40
2058Spyridon Gianniotis3:54.96
2162Mark Johnston3:54.99
2248Dmitry Koptur3:55.26
2351Ricardo Monasterio3:55.35
2436Torwai Sethsothorn3:56.68
2533Jin Hao3:57.22
2638Damian Alleyne3:58.12
2724Woo Chul3:58.31
2835Jorge Carral Armella3:58.34
2934Jonathan Duncan3:58.52
3022Mark Kwok Kin Ming3:58.94NR
3132Zoltán Szilágyi3:59.40
3225Agustín Fiorilli3:59.44
3361Igor Chervynskiy3:59.84
3423Petar Stoychev3:59.94
3537Jure Bučar4:00.19
3621Miguel Mendoza4:00.66NR
3712Sng Ju Wei4:01.34NR
3828Victor Rogut4:01.42
3927Aytekin Mindan4:01.46
4015Giancarlo Zolezzi4:01.51
4114Li Yun-lun4:03.10
4231Hannes Kalteis4:03.66
4326Dieung Manggang4:03.77
4416Hani Elteir4:04.23
4513Ivan Ivanov4:09.33
4617Marcelino López4:18.89

Final