Swimming at the 2008 Summer Olympics - Women's 800 metre freestyle

The Women's 800 metre freestyle event at the 2008 Olympic Games took place between August 14 and 16, at the Beijing National Aquatics Center. This swimming event used freestyle swimming, which means that the method of the stroke is not regulated (unlike backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly events). Nearly all swimmers use the front crawl or a variant of that stroke. Because an Olympic size swimming pool is 50 metres long, this race consisted of sixteen lengths of the pool.

Five heats were held, with most containing the maximum number of swimmers (eight). The heat in which a swimmer competed did not formally matter for advancement, as the swimmers with the top eight times from the entire field qualified for the finals; there, they all competed in a single final heat to earn final placements.

The qualifying norms for the 2008 event were 8:36.00 (A norm) and 8:54.04 (B norm). NOCs with two or more swimmers meeting the A standard could enter any two such swimmers; otherwise, they could enter a single swimmer meeting the B standard.

The women's 800 metre event was unusual on the 2008 Olympic swimming programme in that there was no direct equivalent for men. Instead, the men's longest freestyle event was at 1500 metres and men did not swim an 800 metre freestyle event. For all other swimming events in 2008, the men's and women's programmes were identical.

Medalists

Heat 2

Heat 5

Final

* Q = Qualified, DSQ = Disqualified
* WR = World Record, OR = Olympic Record
* AF = African Record, AS = Asian Record, ER = European Record, OC = Oceania Record
* CR = Commonwealth Record, NR = National Record

References