NANTERRE, France — Bobby Finke set a world record in the 1,500-meter freestyle Sunday, giving the United States a huge boost on the final night of swimming at the Paris Olympics.
But the giddiness was quickly erased when the Americans lost the men’s 4×100 medley relay at the Summer Games for the first time.
China stunned the U.S., which had won gold in the event at every Olympics other than the boycotted Moscow Games in 1980.
The medley relay was added to the program in 1960.
The winning team included Qin Haiyang and Sun Jiajun, who were both among the nearly two dozen swimmers who tested positive for a banned substance at the Tokyo Games but were allowed to compete. The result is sure to stir more hard feelings from other nations that feel the Chinese got away with cheating.
But the real star of the Chinese team was Pan Zhanle, who had previously set a world record while winning the 100 free and powered away from American Hunter Armstrong on the anchor leg to touch in 3 minutes, 27.46 seconds.
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The Americans had to settle for silver in 3:28.01, with France taking bronze in 3:28.38 to give Léon Marchand his fifth medal of the games to go along with four individual golds.
Finke’s world record
Finke was under record pace the entire race and really turned it on coming to the finish. He touched in 14 minutes, 30.67 seconds to break the record of 14.31.02 set by China’s Sun Yang at the 2012 London Games.
The silver went to Italy’s Gregorio Paltrinieri in 14.34.55, while race favorite Daniel Wiffen of Ireland couldn’t follow up his triumph in the 800 freestyle. He was never a factor and settled for the bronze in 14:39.63, barely holding off Hungary’s David Betlehem for the final spot on the podium.
Finke set the third swimming world record of these Olympics and provided a much-needed jolt for the mighty American team, which leads the overall medal count but had endured a series of disappointing results from some of its biggest swimmers.
Finke’s gold was the seventh for the U.S., pulling them into a tie with Australia for the top spot in that column.
The two nations were expected to battle for the decisive gold in the final event at La Defense Arena, with Australia coming in as the defending Olympic champion.
Swedish gold in the women’s 50 free
Sarah Sjöström of Sweden claimed her second gold medal of the Paris Olympics, furiously dashing from one end of the pool to the other to easily claim the 50-meter freestyle title on the final night of swimming Sunday.
The 30-year-old Sjöström, competing in her fifth Summer Games, had already won the 100 free — an event in which she holds the world record but only decided to swim at the urging of her coach.
She was more surprised than anyone with that victory, which had her overflowing with confidence heading into the 50 free.
Sjöström touched in 23.71 seconds, just shy of the world record of 23.61 she set at the 2023 world championships in Fukuoka, Japan. In a race that’s usually decided by a hundredths of a second, the Swedish star turned this into a relative blowout. She was fastest off the block and clearly in control by the midway point of the single lap.
Meg Harris of Australia took the silver in 23.97, while the bronze went to China’s Zhang Yufei in 24.20. For Zhang, one of the swimmers implicated in a Chinese doping scandal, it was her fourth bronze of the games to go with a silver.
Gretchen Walsh of the United States just missed out on her fourth medal of the games, touching fourth in 24.21.
