Tokyo Olympics: China stun US, Australia with world record in women’s 200m freestyle swim relay
- Quartet of Yang Junxuan, Tang Muhan, Zhang Yufei and Li Bingjie clock incredible 7:41.29 to snatch gold from favourites
- Katie Ledecky’s Americans and Ariarne Titmus’ Aussies also break previous mark, but have to settle for silver and bronze
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China shocked the United States and Australia to take gold in the women’s 4x200m freestyle relay final at the Tokyo Aquatics Centre on Thursday.
The Chinese quartet of Yang Junxuan, Tang Muhan, Zhang Yufei and Li Bingjie touched the wall in a world -record time of 7:40.33 seconds to push the US into silver, despite their four clocking an American record. Australia won bronze in 7:41.29, an Oceania record.
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All three teams broke the previous world record, set by the Australians in 2019, of 7:41.50.
Yang led the way with a quick-fire 1:54.37 in the leadoff before Tang clocked in 1:55.00 after the first change.
Zhang swam third and could be forgiven for her 1:55.66, the slowest leg, as she had just won the women’s 200m butterfly gold. Li brought it home in 1:55.30 to beat the Americans by 0.40 seconds.
“We didn’t expect to win the gold, we just tried to finish third because Australia and the United States are very strong,” Li said.