Swimmer Caeleb Dressel wins 4th gold medal with victory in the 50-meter freestyle; Bobby Finke wins 1,500 free



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Win four gold medals for swimmer Caeleb Dressel at the Tokyo Olympics.

Dressel scored a relatively easy victory in the frenzied race from one end of the pool to the other, hitting an Olympic record of 21.07 seconds.

Frenchman Florent Manaudou won Olympic silver in 21.57 and Brazilian Bruno Fratus won bronze in 21.57, edging American Michael Andrew for the last place on the podium.

Dressel still has a chance to win gold in the 4×100 medley relay, an event the United States has never lost in the Olympics. He will swim with the butterfly leg in a race that will crown nine days of competitive swimming at the Tokyo Aquatic Center.

Dressel entered the day with gold medals in the 4×100-meter freestyle, 100-meter freestyle and 100-meter butterfly relay, in which he set the world record.

If Dressel earns a fifth victory, he will join Americans Michael Phelps, Mark Spitz and Matt Biondi, as well as East German Kristin Otto, as the only swimmers to win up to five gold medals in the only one Olympic Games. Phelps did it three times.

American Bobby Finke used a powerful finishing kick to win the grueling men’s 1,500-meter freestyle race for his second gold at the Olympics.

Much like he did when winning the 800-meter freestyle, Finke remained closed throughout the 30-lap race and activated speed at the end. He touched down in 14 minutes 39.65 seconds.

Ukrainian Mykhailo Romanchuk took silver in 14: 40.66, and bronze went to Germany’s Florian Wellbrock in 14: 40.91. Italian Gregorio Paltrinieri passed out in fourth place clocking 14: 45.01.

The top four were close for most of the race, often separated by less than a second in the corners. But that was exactly where Finke needed to be. After his last lap in 800, he knew he had the speed at the end to beat everyone.

Finke may have been America’s biggest surprise at the pool. Relatively unknown before the American trials, he became the first American to win the 1500 since Mike O’Brien at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles.

Australia’s Emma McKeon made history by winning her sixth and seventh medals in Tokyo, the most swimmers ever won in a single Olympic Games.

McKeon won the women’s 50-meter freestyle in an Olympic record time of 23.81 seconds. Sweden’s Sarah Sjostrom won silver and Dane Pernille Blume, the reigning Olympic champion, won bronze. American Abbey Weitzel was the last in the field of eight women.

Less than an hour later, McKeon earned her historic seventh medal when she won the butterfly stage and helped the Australians win the 4×100 medley relay with an Olympic record of 3: 51.60, to just 0 , 13 seconds ahead of the reigning two-time US champion in second. Canada won the bronze medal in 3: 52.60.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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