With barely three hours rest back at the Village – she was too excited to sleep following her extraordinary win in the 400m freestyle on Monday morning over Ledecky, history’s greatest female swimmer. In the evening session Titmus did all that was required to win her heat of the 200m freestyle.

Titmus looked a little bemused when she surveyed the electronic scoreboard as it displayed her time, 1min.55.88sec. That may have been understandable given that the last time she raced this event, at the Olympic trials in Adelaide, she stopped the clock at 1.53.09 – the fastest time in the world this year – but she was never intending to go that fast this early in the event.

“I just had to do my job,” Titmus explained. “I knew it was going to be the semi-finals in the morning (Tuesday) so there was going to be more room to move, with the top 16 going through. I did what I had to do and I will be back in the morning.”

If there is one thing that Titmus’ two run-ins with Ledecky have demonstrated, both in the 400m freestyle here and at the 2019 World Championships in Gwangju, is that she is one of the most tactically aware swimmers Australia has fielded at the Olympic Games since Kieren Perkins. Like the two-times Olympic 1500m champion, Titmus knows precisely where she is placed during her races and what she needs to do.

She did not expend herself at all in the first half of the race, allowing 15-year-old Canadian Summer McIntosh and 31-year-old American captain Allison Schmitt to set the early pace before taking over the lead at the 150m mark. She momentarily accelerated to top pace before cruising to the wall a comfortable winner ahead of McIntosh (1.56.11) and China’s Yang Junxuan (1.56.17).

Normally being drawn into the first seeded heat is fraught with danger, but Ledecky, the defending Olympic champion also swam conservatively, mainly because she faced a gruelling 30-lap 1500m freestyle heat later in the session. She allowed the 2016 Rio Olympic 100m freestyle champion Penny Oleksiak to take it out hard in their heat before attempting to overhaul her right at the end. Unhappily, that contest ended in much the same way as her race with Titmus in the closing stages of the 400m, with the Canadian champion holding on to win in 1.55.28 to Ledecky’s 1.55.38.

Drawn in lane 5 between the two Olympic gold medallists, Australia’s Madi Wilson slipstreamed behind them to record an impressive 1.55.87, just .19sec slower than her entry time from trials. Still, it gave the 27-year-old boasting rights as the fastest Australian into the semis. She goes through as third fastest, Titmus fourth.

There was nearly a significant casualty of the heat, with Italy’s reigning world champion Federica Pelligrini unable to get out of second gear as she struggled to fifth in her heat only just scraping into the semi-finals in 15th position. Her time, 1.57.33, was light years removed from her 2009 world record of 1.52.98, set in the super-suit era. Still, she looked anything but a winner of seven world and Olympic golds and with her 33rd birthday just 10 days off, she is feeling the pinch at a meet where the youngsters are getting very uppity.

Significantly, six of the eight finalists in the 400m freestyle event made it through to the top 16 and Titmus must feel that she is an excellent chance of improving on her silver medal from the last world titles.

Gough and Melverton progress to final

Ledecky, as expected, streeted the field in the 1500m freestyle preliminaries, averaging 31sec laps in the early stages of her race before backing off slightly and still finishing in 15:35.35. It was enough for an Olympic Record although this might not be the occasion to boast of such a mark given that the women's 1500m is on the Olympic program for the first time in Tokyo.

Australia’s two entrants in the race, Maddy Gough – who came in ranked third in the world and Kiah Melverton managed to scrape into the final in the last two places, in 15:56.81 and 15:58.96.

There is no question that Australia’s sprinters have handled the switch to a US-style selection process with great aplomb. But the distance swimmers, perhaps not so much. Gough, in particular, looked dreadfully out of sorts early in her race but then picked up the pace impressively to keep alive her hopes of a medal.

Temple and Morgan miss fly semis

Victorian Matthew Temple, a bronze medallist in Australia’s 4x100m freestyle relay team on Monday morning, found it difficult to double-up in the evening heats – a not-uncommon experience at this meet. Temple swam a second outside his best for a 1.56.25 in the 200m butterfly. It was enough to cost him a place in the final 16. Australia’s other entrant, David Morgan, swam a 2.00.27 – four seconds outside his best – to finish last in his heat. Morgan looked very out of sorts.

Meanwhile, Hungarian Kristof Milak wasted little time in reminding everyone that he is the World Record holder as he led the field into the semis in 1.53.58, nearly a second faster than his nearest rival.

On Tuesday morning from 11:30am AEST, the main Aussie focus will be on the 100m backstroke swimmers. World Record holder Kaylee McKeown and 2012 Olympic silver medallist Emily Seebohm will go up against American Regan Smith in their final. McKeown and Smith hold the fastest two times of the year in the event.

In the Men’s 100m Backstroke, Mitch Larkin will be swimming from lane three against Ryan Murphy of the United States and Kliment Kolesnikov of the Russian Olympic Committee.  Australians won’t feature in the other two key finals – Men's 200m Freestyle and Women’s 100m Breaststroke.

Wayne Smith

#HaveAGo at Swimming