The men's 400 metre freestyle event at the 1968 Olympic Games took place between 22 and 23 October. This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated (unlike backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly events). Nearly all swimmers use the front crawl or a variant of that stroke. Because an Olympic-size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of eight lengths of the pool.
Results
Heats Heat 1 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 John Nelson 4:18.7 2 Francis Luyce 4:30.3 3 Władysław Wojtakajtis 4:31.1 4 Mátyás Borlói 4:35.4 5 Gregorio Fiallo 4:41.5 6 Michael Goodner 5:00.2
Heat 2 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 Graham White 4:17.0 2 Semyon Belits-Geyman 4:22.7 3 Guillermo Echevarría 4:24.0 4 Julio Arango 4:25.8 5 Alfred Müller 4:26.4 6 Csaba Csatlós 4:47.6 7 Bob Loh 5:10.1
Heat 3 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 Mike Burton 4:19.3 2 Greg Brough 4:19.6 3 Jean-François Ravelinghien 4:30.7 4 Werner Krammel 4:34.0 5 Jorge Urreta 4:34.3 6 Ronnie Wong 5:05.7
Heat 4 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 Alain Mosconi 4:19.0 2 Greg Rogers 4:22.7 3 Akhmed Anarbayev 4:35.1 4 Fernando González 4:35.3 5 Friedrich Jokisch 5:09.2
Heat 5 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 Ralph Hutton 4:21.0 2 Gunnar Larsson 4:25.0 3 Pano Capéronis 4:31.4 4 Ørjan Madsen 4:31.8 5 Sven von Holst 4:35.0 6 Tony Asamali 4:47.6 7 Andrew Loh 5:03.6
Heat 6 Rank Athlete Country Time Note 1 Brent Berk 4:20.2 2 Hans Faßnacht 4:20.7 3 Juan Alanís 4:27.4 4 Ron Jacks 4:29.4 5 Jorge González 4:38.1 6 Rubén Guerrero 4:50.8
Final
Rank Athlete Country Time Notes Mike Burton 4:09.0 OR Ralph Hutton 4:11.7 Alain Mosconi 4:13.3 4 Greg Brough 4:15.9 5 Graham White 4:16.7 6 John Nelson 4:17.2 7 Hans Faßnacht 4:18.1 8 Brent Berk 4:26.0
Key: OR = Olympic record
References