The women's 400 metre individual medley event at the 1972 Summer Olympics took place on August 31. This swimming event used medley swimming. Because an Olympic sized swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of eight lengths of the pool. The first two lengths were swum using the butterfly stroke, the second pair with the backstroke, the third pair of lengths in breaststroke, and the final two were freestyle. Unlike other freestyle events, swimmers cannot use butterfly, backstroke, or breaststroke for the freestyle leg; most swimmers use the front crawl in freestyle events.
Results
Heats Heat 1 Rank Athlete Country Time Notes 1 Gail Neall 5:11.89 2 Susan Hunter 5:14.47 3 Jaroslava Slavíčková 5:18.53 4 Birutė Užkuraitytė 5:20.05 5 Helga Niemann 5:21.97 6 Shelagh Ratcliffe 5:24.27 7 Helmi Boxberger 5:32.31 8 Silvia Borgini 5:44.22
Heat 2 Rank Athlete Country Time Notes 1 Hennie Penterman 5:14.99 2 Marlies Pohl 5:15.38 3 Jennifer McHugh 5:20.25 4 Debbie Bengtson 5:21.62 5 Eva Sigg 5:22.92 6 Karen Moras 5:24.13 7 Kirsten Strange-Campbell 5:25.97
Heat 3 Rank Athlete Country Time Notes 1 Lynn Vidali 5:09.67 2 Novella Calligaris 5:11.16 3 Gerda Lassooij 5:22.09 4 Maria Isabel Guerra 5:24.43 5 Trine Krogh 5:25.08 6 Diane Walker 5:28.82 7 Eleni Avlonitou 5:32.49 8 Béatrice Mottoulle 5:35.38
Heat 4 Rank Athlete Country Time Notes 1 Evelyn Stolze 5:06.96 2 Jenny Bartz 5:07.31 3 Nina Petrova 5:13.42 4 Yukari Takemoto 5:20.89 5 Wijda Mazereeuw 5:24.00 6 Laura Vaca 5:24.63 7 Roselina Angee 5:35.44
Heat 5 Rank Athlete Country Time Notes 1 Leslie Cliff 5:08.64 2 Mary Montgomery 5:13.62 3 Angela Franke 5:14.81 4 Anita Zarnowiecki 5:15.05 5 Susan Richardson 5:19.53 6 Susanne Niesner 5:25.23 7 Gisela Cerezo 5:29.56 8 María Ballesteros 5:31.06
Final Rank Athlete Country Time Notes Gail Neall 5:02.97 WR Leslie Cliff 5:03.57 Novella Calligaris 5:03.99 4 Jenny Bartz 5:05.56 5 Evelyn Stolze 5:06.80 6 Mary Montgomery 5:09.98 7 Lynn Vidali 5:13.06 8 Nina Petrova 5:15.68
Key: WR = World record
References