ZUMO Performance of the Week: Katie Ledecky Back on Track With 8:14 800 Free in Greensboro

Katie Ledecky wins this week's ZUMO Performance of the Week. Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

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This week’s ZUMO Performance of the Week goes to Katie Ledecky for her 8:14.95 in the 800 freestyle at the first stop of the 2019-20 TYR Pro Swim Series in Greensboro, North Carolina. Although it seems like a ho-hum swim for Ledecky, sitting outside the top 25 all-time swims in the 800 free, she has become so dominant in the 800 free that she has distorted our minds of what a good 800 free is.

Ledecky’s 8:14 from this past weekend would have won the silver medal in the recent World Championships, when Ledecky had to use all she was worth to win with an 8:13 after uncertainty over her health kept her at less than 100% all week. In that race in Gwangju, 1500 world champion Simona Quadarella had the lead through 750 meters and wound up with the silver with an 8:14.99, putting her at fourth all-time. Ledecky’s swim from this past weekend would have beaten Quadarella by 0.04. And that was an impressive enough swim from the Italian, and Ledecky went faster in just a tune-up swim in November.

Ledecky actually negative split her swim, going 4:08.49/4:06.50. Comparatively, she was a 4:04.9/4:08.6 at the World Championships when she was ill. Had she swum this swim at World Championships, she would have been in seventh place at the halfway point before running down everyone else but herself in the end.

That might say something about Ledecky’s ability to swim fast in-season but it definitely showcases just how dominant she is in this event in that she goes world class times during the year that only two other people in history have been able to beat. You read that right. Only Rebecca Adlington (8:14.10) and Wang Jianjiahe (8:14.64) have swum faster than what Ledecky swam this past weekend. And it was just another ordinary day for the reigning two-time Olympic gold medalist, going for an unprecedented third straight next summer.

Congrats to Katie Ledecky on winning the ZUMO performance of the Week!

  1 Katie Ledecky    22 Nation's Capital  8:07.27    8:14.95T  939  
    r:+0.68  28.66        59.99 (31.33)
        1:31.10 (31.11)     2:03.05 (31.95)
        2:34.28 (31.23)     3:05.90 (31.62)
        3:37.05 (31.15)     4:08.49 (31.44)
        4:39.23 (30.74)     5:10.32 (31.09)
        5:41.09 (30.77)     6:12.35 (31.26)
        6:43.40 (31.05)     7:14.42 (31.02)
        7:45.18 (30.76)     8:14.95 (29.77)

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