The men's 1500 metre freestyle event at the 2000 Summer Olympics took place on 22–23 September at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre in Sydney, Australia.
Australia's Grant Hackett denied his teammate and sentimental favourite Kieren Perkins a third straight title in the event. Having suffered badly over the first six days of the Games, Hackett maintained a strong lead from start to finish, and touched the wall first to claim a gold in 14:48.33. Perkins fought off a challenge against his newest rival in the middle of the program's longest race, but ended up only with a silver in 14:53.59, handing the entire medal haul for the host nation with a 1–2 finish. U.S. swimmer Chris Thompson came up with a spectacular swim to take the bronze in an American record of 14:56.81, holding off a fast-closing Alexei Filipets of Russia (14:56.88) by seven hundredths of a second (0.07). For the first time in Olympic history, all three medalists finished the race under a 15-minute barrier.
South Africa's dark horse Ryk Neethling powered home with a fifth-place effort in a new national record of 15:00.48, while American Erik Vendt, who previously set a continental mark from the trials, faded shortly to sixth in a time of 15:08.61. Ukraine's Igor Chervynskiy (15:08.80) and Germany's Heiko Hell (15:19.87) rounded out the finale.
Records Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
Results
Heats
Rank Heat Lane Name Nationality Time Notes 1 4 4 Kieren Perkins 14:58.34 Q 2 5 4 Erik Vendt 15:05.11 Q 3 6 4 Grant Hackett 15:07.50 Q 4 6 5 Ryk Neethling 15:09.12 Q, AF 5 4 3 Alexei Filipets 15:10.94 Q 6 5 5 Chris Thompson 15:11.21 Q 7 5 6 Heiko Hell 15:11.91 Q 8 4 5 Igor Chervynskiy 15:12.30 Q 9 6 6 Dragoș Coman 15:12.64 NR 10 6 2 Christian Minotti 15:12.72 11 6 1 Nicolas Rostoucher 15:13.26 12 4 2 Frederik Hviid 15:14.37 13 5 2 Masato Hirano 15:14.43 AS 14 5 3 Igor Snitko 15:14.67 15 3 5 Ricardo Monasterio 15:17.00 16 6 8 Yota Arase 15:18.20 17 6 7 Paul Palmer 15:21.09 18 4 1 Luiz Lima 15:23.15 19 6 3 Emiliano Brembilla 15:27.65 20 3 4 Dmitry Koptur 15:29.62 21 3 3 Spyridon Gianniotis 15:29.69 22 4 7 Alexey Kovrigin 15:30.69 23 4 6 Andrew Hurd 15:30.98 24 5 8 Teo Edo 15:32.01 25 5 1 Hannes Kalteis 15:32.90 26 1 4 Vlastimil Burda 15:33.25 NR 27 4 8 Tim Peterson 15:34.94 28 3 8 Torwai Sethsothorn 15:39.60 29 5 7 Adam Faulkner 15:39.86 30 3 1 Petar Stoychev 15:42.76 31 3 2 Jorge Carral Armella 15:43.03 32 3 7 Jin Hao 15:48.49 33 3 6 Cho Sung-mo 15:50.45 34 2 3 Juan Carlos Piccio 15:51.57 NR 35 2 6 Agustín Fiorilli 15:52.69 36 2 5 Dieung Manggang 16:02.11 37 2 4 Jonathan Duncan 16:03.41 38 2 7 Steven Chandra 16:10.98 39 2 2 Diego Mularoni 16:12.91 40 1 5 Li Yun-lun 16:13.05 1 3 Ivan Ivanov
Final Rank Lane Name Nationality Time Notes 3 Grant Hackett 14:48.33 4 Kieren Perkins 14:53.59 7 Chris Thompson 14:56.81 AM 4 2 Alexei Filipets 14:56.88 NR 5 6 Ryk Neethling 15:00.48 AF 6 5 Erik Vendt 15:08.61 7 8 Igor Chervynskiy 15:08.80 8 1 Heiko Hell 15:19.87
References
External links Official Olympic Report