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>> Kaylee McKeown & Emily Seebohm
The Top Under-the-Radar Women’s Performances From the Tokyo Olympics BY DAVID RIEDER
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he Tokyo Olympics swimming competition produced many stars, some old and some new, some expected and some surprising. On the women’s side, you think of Emma McKeon’s seven-medal performance, Ariarne Titmus‘ sensational victory over Katie Ledecky in the 400 freestyle, Ledecky winning the inaugural gold medal in the 1500 free and capturing her third straight title in the 800 free, Yui Ohashi becoming Japan’s star of the swimming portion of the Games with her two IM wins, Kaylee McKeown affirming her status as the world’s premier female backstroker and Tatjana Schoenmaker’s emergence that culminated with a world record in the women’s 200 breaststroke. But in this space, we will focus on a handful of performances that did not get so much attention, maybe a swimmer who took silver or bronze or even fourth place. This is by no means an exhaustive list of impressive swimmers from the Olympics but a few that deserve another nod in case their exploits from a long week of swimming went unnoticed. 1. Emily Seebohm Returns to Olympic Podium in 200 Backstroke McKeown’s gold medals in the 100 and 200 back were the first ever for Australia in women’s backstroke, an honor Emily Seebohm came very close to accomplishing in 2012.
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In her second Olympics, Seebohm set an Olympic record of 58.23 in the 100 back prelims but could not match that time through the next two rounds, and American Missy Franklin would edge out Seebohm for gold in the final, although Seebohm would collect her first individual Olympic medal with a silver. Four years later, Seebohm arrived at the Rio Olympics as the reigning world champion in both backstroke events and as the heavy gold-medal favorite in the 100 back, having almost broken the world record multiple times over the previous year, but she ended up a surprising seventh in the 100 back final. She ended up 12th in the 200 back. Seebohm would rebound in 2017 to earn bronze in the 100 back and an impressive gold in the 200 back at the World Championships, but by 2019, she was struggling again, and she failed to qualify for the World Championships as McKeown and Minna Atherton claimed Australia’s two slots in both backstroke events. And that’s why it meant so much for Seebohm to return to the Olympic team this year — for her fourth Games — and to earn the second individual Olympic medal of her career. Seebohm, now 29, finished fifth in the 100 back in 58.45 (matching the gold-medal winning time from 2016) and then earned a surprising bronze in the 200 back, her final time of 2:06.21 beating American Rhyan White for the last spot on the podium by two tenths.
