Chase Kalisz Clocks Personal Best To Lead 400 IM Prelims Field At 2016 Rio Olympic Games

Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

Editorial Coverage Sponsored By FINIS

Men’s 400 IM:

The men of Japan, the USA and Australia will highlight the final of the men’s 400 IM as all three countries athletes qualified for tonight’s final.

USA’s Chase Kalisz claims the top seed after posting a final time of 4:08.12, an all-time best for Kalisz. Kalisz utilized his strong backhalf to overtake Japan’s Daiya Seto in the final 150 meters of heat four. The two battled all the way to the wall, but Seto could not hold off Kalisz, slipping to second with a 4:08.47.

Kalisz spoke about his prelims swim, commenting, “I didn’t expect to be anywhere near that. I thought it was going to be a 4:11. I just wanted to control the heat. I feel like I’m in a good place. We’ll see what happens tonight. I’m just excited to represent my country. At Trials I felt like I was operating on nerves which is never a good thing for me. Now I feel like I’m operating on excitement.”

IM superstar and silver medalist at the 2012 London Games, Kosuke Hagino, picked up the third place seed with a qualifying time of 4:10.00. Hagino led the entirety of heat three and will look for the challenge from Seto and Kalisz in tonight’s finals.

Breakout star from the USA Olympic Trials, Jay Litherland, hung close to Kalisz until the very last leg of the IM, qualifying fourth overall with a time of 4:11.10.

Litherland spoke about the swim: “Felt amazing. Me and Chase going 1-4 pretty cool feeling kinda nice to set U.S. up…In the ready room I couldn’t stop shaking.”

“You can’t hold anything back. Thats for sure.” he said of prelims.

Great Britain’s Max Litchfield picked up the fifth place qualifying spot with a time of 4:11.95, just ahead of the Australian duo of Thomas Fraser-Holmes (4:12.51) and Travis Mahoney (4:13.37).
Joan Lluis Pons Ramon of Spain rounds out the top eight qualifiers with a time of 4:13.55.

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Joseph Sill

7 years ago

Go Chase