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.
Finke was under world-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 with only the 4x100 medley relays remaining.
The Americans have never lost the men’s medley at the Olympics, and they were expected to battle defending Olympic champion Australia for the gold on the women’s side in a gold-medal race that went right down to the wire.