Katie Ledecky Destroy World Mark In 800 Free At World Championships -- August 8, 2015

Katie Ledecky destroys world mark in 800 free at world championships

Katie Ledecky Becomes First Woman Under 8:10 In 800m Freestyle

Katie came in first, shaving more than three seconds off her own world record. She had time to take off her goggles, look at the "scoreboard," heat some tea, and cut a slice of Babka while waiting for the #2 finisher to touch the wall, ten seconds later.  

Link here.

It very well may be time to come up with some new descriptors for what Katie Ledecky is doing to the world record books. Smashed. Annihilated. Scorched. These no longer are sufficient for what she has accomplished in the pool the last two years, nor what she is likely to do in the next two or five or 10.

The 18-year-old broke her 10th career world record Saturday night, claiming her ninth straight world title in winning the women’s 800-meter freestyle final at the world swimming championships in Kazan, Russia.

Ledecky finished in a time of 8 minutes 7.39 seconds, shaving more than three seconds off her own world record that she has now broken three times in three consecutive years and is nearly seven seconds clear of the next fastest performer in history.

With the finish Ledecky becomes the first swimmer, male or female, to win titles in the 200, 400, 800 and 1,500 freestyle events at a single world championships — a feat Post reporter Dave Sheinin has dubbed the “Ledecky Slam.” She also joins Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte as the only swimmers to win four individual world titles in a single year. She swam the anchor leg on the U.S.’s winning 4×200 free relay too, giving her five golds in seven days in Russia.

New Zealand’s Lauren Boyle finished 10 seconds back of the 18-year-old Bethesda, Md., native, touching in 8:17.65. Jazz Carlin of Great Britain was third in 8:18.15, edging Australia’s Jessica Ashwood by .26 seconds.

The performance may be the Bethesda native’s best yet, and unlike the 1,500 free, an event she set the world record twice in two days earlier in the week, the 800 free is an Olympic event. With her new found dominance in the free events, Ledecky becomes the favorite for three individual golds next summer in Rio.

Like Phelps, Ledecky has now broken 10 world record between her first Olympic Games and second world championships. Phelps broke the world records in the 200 butterfly and 200 and 400 individual medleys three times apiece, plus the 100 butterfly mark once between 2001 and the 2003 world championships in Barcelona. Ledecky has broken the 1,500 free five times, the 800 free three times and the 400 free twice.

Let's see how fast someone can get this race posted on YouTube.

Another link here:

In her last swim of the 2015 World Championships Katie Ledecky became the first woman ever to break 8:10 in the 800m freestyle with a winning time of 8:07.39.

Not only did she break her 8:11.00 world record from 2014, she picked it up, threw it on the ground, and stepped up on it until there was nothing left. With an 8:07.39, Ledecky took an incredible 3.61 seconds off her previous mark. That’s the second largest world-record drop ever in the event behind Tracey Wickman who beat her own world record by 5.91 seconds in 1978.

As if beating her own mark wasn’t enough, Ledecky won the final by over 10-seconds. Second place finisher Lauren Boyle of New Zealand earned the silver with an 8:17.65, which is still an amazing performance in the event if you keep a blind eye to all of Ledecky’s swims.

The time makes her a whopping 6.71 seconds faster than the second fastest performer ever in the event, Rebecca Adlington of Great Britain, and 8.53 seconds faster than the third fastest performer ever, Jazz Carlin.

Ledecky now owns seven of the top 10 fastest performances ever in the women’s 800m freestyle.

It was quite generous of Lauren Boyle to let Katie Ledecky to have ten seconds of singular fame at the wall.