Swimming in the final of the men’s 400 free, Gregorio Paltrinieri of Italy has broke a six-year old European Record in the men’s 1500 meter freestyle.
Paltrinieri swam a 14:39.93, which cleared the 14:43.21 done by Russian Yuri Prilukov at the Beijing Olympics.
The 19-year old Italian was unchallenged in this race; silver medalist Pal Joensen was 10.6 seconds back in a 14:50.59, and nobody was close to Paltrinieri for the entire 1500 meters.
With that result, Paltrinieri not only posted the fastest time in the world by almost five seconds, but he swam the fastest time since the 2012 Olympic Games. He joins the elite company of now just five swimmers who have been under 14:40 in the race. Paltrinieri’s swim is among the 10-fastest all-time. That full ranking is below:
- Sun Yang, 14:31.02, 2012
- Sun Yang, 14:34.14, 2011
- Grant Hackett, 14:34.56, 2001
- Sun Yang, 14:35.43, 2010
- Ous Mellouli, 14:37.28, 2009
- Ous Mellouli, 14:38.01, 2009
- Grant Hackett, 14:38.92, 2008
- Ryan Cochrane, 14:39.63, 2012
- Gregorio Paltrinieri, 14:39.93, 2014*
- Ous Mellouli, 14:40.31, 2012
Four of those five swimmers are still active, and the already wide gap between the top 1500 freestylers and the world and everyone else continues to grow. There has never been a 1500 race in history that took faster than 14:40 to earn a medal, but the 2015 World Championships might be that race.
Paltrinieri’s previous lifetime best, done in April of this year, is a 14:44.50. This result also broke Paltrinieri’s European Championship Record of 14:48.92 done at the last edition of this meet in 2012.
Ous Mellouli’s best was done with a swimsuit. So it makes Paltrinieri the 4th fastest in history without polyurethane.
Nice to see some good sub 15:00 competition in this race. it`s too bad that all these guys are on different continents and we don’t see them clash to often. Australia probably has the most competitive trials for this race but Canada could see 3 sub 15:00 guys next year
We will probably see Horton join that club soon.. Sun Cochrane Horton and Paltrinieri for medals far ahead of the world..