By: Sarah Zhong

Last Saturday, Katie Ledecky, a seven-time Olympic gold medalist, won another gold medal in the women’s 400-meter freestyle at Duna Arena in Budapest against Canadian phenom Summer McIntosh and American veteran Leah Smith. Ledecky swam a time of 3 minutes 58.15 seconds, McIntosh a time of 3 minutes 59.39 seconds, and Smith a time of 4 minutes and 02.08 seconds.

McIntosh and Ledecky were well ahead with Smith 3.93 seconds behind Ledecky in third. Ledecky has 10 Olympic medals, 7 of which have been gold. McIntosh was a strong runner-up, earning silver and becoming the fourth woman to have a time under four minutes. Smith took the bronze medal, the seventh world championship medal of her career.

Ledecky was very proud of her performance that night. She said, “I wanted to push to the point of pain tonight.” She also added, “It’s the fastest I’ve ever been at worlds, so I’m really happy with that and really excited about the rest of the meet. I’m just always trying to improve…We kind of set out this year without setting any time goals, just trying to improve each meet, and so far I’ve done that, so that’s pretty good.”

Ledecky summarized the race in another interview. “I was a little nervous. McIntosh hung in there the whole time, so she definitely pushed me a lot.” She also said. “…Summer is now in the sub-four-minute club, so it’s only going to get harder these races. So, I know I have my work cut out for me. It’s a good stepping stone here, to just kind of have a baseline for the next couple years moving toward Paris.”

McIntosh had been a “substitute” for Ariarne Titus. A rival to Ledecky in past years, Titus had skipped worlds for the Commonwealth Games. Titus had previously taken the world record from Ledecky last month. The question still holds whether Ledecky still would’ve won had Titus gone to the world championships and provided Ledecky another challenge.