World record in 4x100 free relay could fall at these Olympics

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PARIS — The men’s 4x100-meter freestyle relay world record is one of swimming’s oldest, and it could go down Saturday. 

The world record dates back to the 2008 Beijing Olympics when American Jason Lezak became a national hero by swimming the greatest relay leg ever, overtaking the French team at the very end to win gold — one of Michael Phelps’ historic eight from those Games.

But after watching the men’s 100 freestyle at the U.S. Olympic trials in June, Lezak predicted the 4x100 free relay world record will fall at the 2024 Paris Olympics, saying someone will take the lead and never look back. 

Cullen Jones — who swam third on the relay before Lezak’s epic anchor leg — agrees. 

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“I think this is the year,” Jones told USA TODAY Sports about the 16-year-old world record. “I got to see Phelps in trials, and we text from time to time. But I'm like, ‘The 4x100 [freestyle] relay is looking like it's in peril with these four guys.’”

Those four guys are Team USA’s Caeleb Dressel, Jack Alexy, Chris Guiliano and Hunter Armstrong, who are expected to compete in the fastest relay in the pool, possibly with the help of Ryan Held and Matt King in prelims. Alexy and Guiliano are also expected to compete in the individual 100 free. 

Prelims for the 4x100 free relay are Saturday midday (about 6 a.m. ET), and finals are that evening (about 3:45 p.m. ET). 

“We'll see what happens,” Jones said. “I think that they're gonna definitely be a shoe-in for first, but let's see if they can break that record.”

The world record — set by Phelps, Garrett Weber-Gale, Jones and Lezak — is 3:08.24 with the first three posting times in the 47-second range before Lezak’s stunning 46.06 split. 

The U.S. owns five of the six fastest relay times ever with France’s 2008 silver medal-winning team at No. 2. The third fastest was Team USA’s gold medal win led by Dressel at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, posting a time of 3:08.97. 

“I don’t think we should shy away from [the relay world record],” three-time Olympian Dressel told NBC Sports at trials. “I think [the] world record is 47.3 average. We have a shot at it. That’s unbelievably fast.” 

At trials, the top-6 finishers in the 100 free were all in the 47-second range and within .56 seconds of each other.

But if any team breaks the world record, Jones is confident it’ll be the Americans. 

“I don't know how [Team USA men’s] coach [Anthony] Nesty is going to set it up and how that line up is gonna go, but you might see it go down,” Jones said, adding, “[Phelps] was like, ‘Well, yeah, it doesn't look good for us.’”