Swimming at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Women's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay
| Women's 4 × 200 metre freestyle relay at the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad
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| Venue | Olympic Aquatic Centre | |||||||||
| Dates | August 18, 2004 (heats & final) | |||||||||
| Competitors | 74 from 16 nations | |||||||||
| Winning time | 7:53.42 WR | |||||||||
| Medalists | ||||||||||
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 United States (USA)Natalie Coughlin, Carly Piper, Dana Vollmer, Kaitlin Sandeno, Lindsay Benko*, Rhi Jeffrey*, Rachel Komisarz* |
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 China (CHN)Zhu Yingwen, Xu Yanwei, Yang Yu, Pang Jiaying, Li Ji* |
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*Indicates the swimmer only competed in the preliminary heats. |
Germany (GER)
Franziska van Almsick, Petra Dallmann, Antje Buschschulte, , Janina Götz*, Sara Harstick*
The women's 4×200 metre freestyle relay took place on 18 August at the Olympic Aquatic Centre of the Athens Olympic Sports Complex in Athens, Greece.
The U.S. women's swimming team (Natalie Coughlin, Carly Piper, Dana Vollmer, and Kaitlin Sandeno) broke the oldest world record in the book, when they clocked at 7:53.42, slashing 2.05 seconds off the old, drug-tainted mark set by the East Germans exactly 17 years ago. Leading off the race, Coughlin swam a fastest split and a personal best of 1:57.74, which became quicker than a gold-medal performance of 1:58.03 set by Romania's Camelia Potec in the individual 200 m freestyle.
With Team USA taking its third straight title since the event's Olympic debut in 1996, China made a surprise packet with a silver medal, in an Asian record of 7:55.97. Meanwhile, the unified Germans held off the Aussies for the bronze in 7:57.35, 45-hundredths of a second under an old Olympic record set by Team USA in 2000. Despite missing the podium by 0.05 of a second, the Australians broke their national record of 7:57.40 to settle only for fourth place.
Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
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