2025 U.S. NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Tuesday, June 3 – Saturday, June 7, 2025
- Indianapolis, Indiana
- Indiana University Natatorium
- LCM (50 meters)
- World Championship Selection Criteria
- SwimSwam Preview Index
- Meet Central
- Psych Sheets (Updated 6/02)
- Live Results
- How To Watch (USA Swimming Network)
- Prelims Live Recaps: Day 1
- Finals Live Recaps: Day 1
The 2025 U.S. National Championships, which double as the World Championship Trials, are in full swing, and in the penultimate event of the first night, 28-year-old Katie Ledecky, widely regarded as both the greatest freestyler in history and the greatest female swimmer of all time, posted a time of 8:05.76 to claim the women’s 800 freestyle title.
Her performance ranks as the third-fastest swim in the event’s history, trailing only her own world record of 8:04.12 from last month and her 8:04.79 from the 2016 Rio Olympics. It also marks the first-ever 8:05 swim in history, with Ledecky solely occupying the entire 8:04 to 8:08 range since no other swimmer has ever broken into that territory. The second-fastest performer in history, Canada’s Summer McIntosh, sits nearly four seconds back with her 8:09.86 from earlier this February.
With her swim tonight, Ledecky now owns the 11 fastest times in the event’s history, up from her previous total of 10. In fact, she holds 23 of the 25 fastest performances ever, with McIntosh accounting for the other two in the all-time top 25.
Ledecky went out aggressively, and midway through the race, it looked like she might capture her 17th career individual world record. She split 1:57.80 at the 200 mark, her first time under 1:58 at that point, and well ahead of her world record pace of 1:58.38. She reached the 400 in a staggering 4:00.66, a time that would have won last summer’s Olympic Trials if she hadn’t been in the field, and notably faster than the 4:00.86 she clocked to win bronze in the individual 400 free at the Paris Olympics.
She remained under world record pace through the 650 turn before falling off slightly over the closing 150.
See a full splits comparison between her three fastest 800 free swims in history below, along with the complete all-time top 25 list.
Splits Comparison:
| New World Record | #2 Swim Of All Time | #3 Swim of All Time (Tonight) | |
| 50m | 27.59 | 28.03 | 27.41 |
| 100m | 29.98 (57.57) | 29.95 (57.98) | 29.75 (57.16) |
| 150m | 30.01 (1:27.58) | 30.73 (1:28.71) | 30.11 (1:27.27) |
| 200m | 30.80 (1:58.38) | 30.71 (1:59.42) | 30.53 (1:57.80) |
| 250m | 30.67 (2:29.05) | 30.64 (2:30.06) | 30.60 (2:28.40) |
| 300m | 31.03 (3:00.08) | 30.70 (3:00.76) | 30.94 (2:59.34) |
| 350m | 30.70 (3:30.78) | 30.37 (3:31.13) | 30.64 (3:29.98) |
| 400m | 31.00 (4:01.78) | 30.85 (4:01.98) | 30.68 (4:00.66) |
| 450m | 30.47 (4:32.25) | 30.22 (4:32.20) | 30.78 (4:31.44) |
| 500m | 30.74 (5:02.99) | 30.74 (5:02.94) | 30.62 (5:02.06) |
| 550m | 30.50 (5:33.49) | 30.60 (5:33.54) | 30.79 (5:32.85) |
| 600m | 30.78 (6:04.27) | 30.76 (6:04.30) | 30.86 (6:03.71) |
| 650m | 30.43 (6:34.70) | 30.77 (6:35.07) | 30.84 (6:34.55) |
| 700m | 30.67 (7:05.37) | 30.37 (7:05.44) | 30.94 (7:05.49) |
| 750m | 30.29 (7:35.66) | 30.36 (7:35.80) | 30.84 (7:36.33) |
| 800m | 28.46 (8:04.12) | 28.99 (8:04.79) | 29.43 (8:05.76) |
All-Time Top Performances, Women’s 800 LCM Freestyle:
- Katie Ledecky — 8:04.12 (2025)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:04.79 (2016)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:05.76 (2025)*
- Katie Ledecky — 8:06.68 (2016)
- Katie Ledecky –8:07.07 (2023)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:07.27 (2018)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:07.39 (2015)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:08.04 (2022)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:08.87 (2023)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:09.13 (2018)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:09.27 (2022)
- Summer McIntosh — 8:09.86 (2025)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:10.32 (2016)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:10.70 (2019)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:10.91 (2016)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.00 (2014)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.04 (2024)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.08 (2018)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.21 (2015)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.35 (2014)
- Summer McIntosh — 8:11.39 (2024)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.50 (2017)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.70 (2018)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.83 (2022)
- Katie Ledecky — 8:11.98 (2018)
Ledecky, a nine-time Olympic gold medalist and the four-time defending Olympic champion in the 800 free, has also won the world title in the event six times, spanning from 2013 to 2023. She sat out the 2024 Worlds due to their proximity to the Paris Games.
Her career has seen a massive resurgence since she left Stanford in the fall of 2021 to train with Anthony Nesty at the University of Florida. In a five-year span starting from after she set the 800 free World Record in 2016 to the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, she only broke the 8:10 barrier twice in the event. However, after moving to Florida, she has broken 8:10 a total of six times.
She was out so fast that I wonder if her secret goal is to break 8:00.
Few thoughts. Saw Katie swim this and was shocked at how fast she was out. But the crowd collectively “awwd” in disappointment after going over WR pace. Just how it is but man can’t believe how quick everyone was like “eh whatever” nah I bet they’re trying to see how much quicker she can go out. She’s going to break her WR in Singapore with that type of strategy.
I understand when the crowd wants to see the world record but you can’t be disappointed by this swims from her because that is the fastest ever swim from her at the trials.
Katie Ledecky is the greatest swimmer of all time, male or female.
There, I said it.
Seeing those 3 races side by side there are some interesting oddities in the splits. Note if you don’t care about patterns in numbers just stop reading now because it’s not true split analysis that is actually interesting to most of us bigger fans. I’m sure she and Nesty do real analysis way better than I can anyway, against a much larger and appropriate sample set for where she’s at in training. I just saw some patterns and I find this stuff fun.
They are all three clearly different races but the tick tock pattern of faster out and slower home still shows up in all of them the closing 50 of course breaking that pattern and the opening 100… Read more »
how is she making summer’s 809 look slow
Idk how Katie keeps doing it but she does. Time after time. Legend.
We Americans are spoiled. As soon as Ledecky and Finke fell off WR pace, the audience and announcers lost interest
She’s really built different this year
Idk I think Florida is gonna cook tbh