The women's 50 metre freestyle event at the 2024 Summer Olympics was held from 3 to 4 August 2024 at Paris La Défense Arena, which was converted to a swimming pool for the swimming events.[1] Since an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of one length of the pool.
Sweden's Sarah Sjöström was the favourite going into the event and set a new Olympic record of 23.66 seconds in the semifinal to qualify as the top seed. In the final, Sjöström won gold, Meg Harris won silver and Zhang Yufei won bronze, finishing ahead of Gretchen Walsh by 0.01 seconds. Slovenia's Neža Klančar set new national records in her heat, semifinal and in the final, which she qualified for despite originally being seeded 23rd.
Background
Going into the competition, three of the top four finishers at the 2020 games were not competing. SwimSwam and Swimming World opined that Sweden's Sarah Sjöström was the favourite, with her having set the world record of 23.61 at the 2023 World Swimming Championships and owning the 27 fastest times among all swimmers potentially competing in the race.[2][3] Four days before the event started, Sjöström had won the 100 metre freestyle.[4]
Each National Olympic Committee (NOC) was permitted to enter a maximum of two qualified athletes in each individual event, but only if both of them had attained the Olympic Qualifying Time (OQT).[5] For this event, the OQT was 24.70 seconds. World Aquatics then filled the rest of the event places with athletes qualifying through universality; NOCs were given one event entry for each gender, which could be used by any athlete regardless of qualification time, providing the spaces had not already been taken by athletes from that nation who had achieved the OQT.[5][6] In total, 24 athletes qualified through achieving the OQT, while 55 athletes qualified through universality places.[6]
Ten heats took place on 3 August 2024, starting at 11:00.[a][7] The swimmers with the best 16 times in the heats advanced to the semifinals.[8] Sarah Sjöström clocked 23.85 seconds, qualifying with the fastest seed and only swim under 24 seconds. Katarzyna Wasick and Gretchen Walsh qualified with the second and third seeds, respectively. Simone Manuel from the United States, the American record holder, did not qualify for the semifinals.[9] Kenya's Maria Brunlehner and Slovenia's Neža Klančar set national records of 25.82 and 24.64 seconds, respectively.[10][11]María José Ribera from Bolivia, who had failed to qualify in 28th place, was disqualified after the International Testing Agency reported she had tested positive for furosemide, a prohibited substance.[12]
Two semifinals took place on 3 August, starting at 20:39.[13] The swimmers with the best 8 times in the semifinals advanced to the final.[14] Sjöström qualified for the finals with a time of 23.66 seconds, which broke the Olympic record by 0.15 seconds.[15][16] Walsh qualified with the second seed, and Wasick qualified with the third. Australia's two swimmers Shayna Jack and Meg Harris qualified, as did China's two swimmers Zhang Yufei and Wu Qingfeng.[17] Klančar qualified in seventh despite being initially seeded 23rd,[18] setting another new national record of 24.40 seconds and becoming the first Slovenian Olympic finalist in swimming since Sara Isakovič in 2008.[19][11][20]
The final took place at 18:30 on 4 August.[21]Sarah Sjöström had the fastest reaction time of 0.61 seconds but stated after the race that she dove too deep and resurfaced at around 12 metres. Gretchen Walsh had the slowest reaction time of 0.75 seconds, but her longer 15 metre underwater meant that she surfaced in first place, 0.12 seconds ahead of Sjöström and 0.30 seconds ahead of Zhang Yufei in third.[22]
Walsh held her lead until 25 metres, where she was overtaken by Sjöström, who extended her lead over most of the field until the finish. At 25 metres, Shayna Jack had overtaken Yufei, placing her in third position, while Meg Harris had the fastest split over the 15–25 metre segment which elevated her to fourth.[22]
At the 45 metre mark, Sjöström was 0.34 seconds ahead of the field. Harris had further elevated herself to second place and pushed Walsh to third, with Jack having dropped to seventh.[22] Sjöström and Harris finished in first and second, respectively.[23] Yufei was 0.06 seconds behind Walsh at the 45 metre mark, but overtook her in the last five metres to take third by 0.01 seconds.[22] Klančar set another Slovenian national record of 24.35 seconds.[11]
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