Swimming at the 2004 Winter Olympics in Athens

8 world records were set in Athens. USA accounted for 4, Australia for 3 and South Africa 1. USA was by far the best nation by winning 12 gold medals, 9 silver medals and 7 bronze medals. Australia was a clear number two with 7 gold, 5 silver and 3 bronze. From a total of 32 events the Americans and Australians thereby won 19 events. The American-Australian dominance was also indicated by the fact that only in one event, the 200 m freestyle for women, there were no Americans or Australians on the medal stand.

In addition to the 8 world records an additional 26 new olympic records were set in Athens 2004.

The 19-year old American Michael Phelps was the king of the Aquatic Centre. Phelps won an astonishing 6 gold medals in Athens. At the world championships in Barcelona a year before the Olympics Phelps had won 3 world championships and beaten several world records and many speculated that he might be able to beat Mark Spitz' record of winning 7 gold medals at the games in Munich 1972. However, Phelps had to beat the superstars Ian Thorpe AUS and Peter van den Hoogenband NED in the 200 m freestyle - a mile stone race in international swimming - and he eventually had to settle for bronze in this event. 21 year old Thorpe won both the 200 m and the 400 m freestyle while Hoogenband regained his title from Sydney 2000 in the 100 m freestyle. Another noticeable result was achieved by Aaron Piersol USA who won both backstroke events and set a world record on the short distance. Kosuke Kitajima JPN seconded this by winning both breaststroke events - an achievement he had also accomplished at the world championships a year earlier. Finally one could mention the sensational South African victory in the men's 4x100 m freestyle including a new world record.

In the women's events Jenny Thompson USA became a swimming legend when she won her 12th olympic medal in the 4x100 m medley - more medals than any other swimmer in olympic history. Even though she had never won an individual gold medal - she has 10 gold medals from the relay events - she also superseded her compatriots Mark Spitz and Matt Biondi as the most successful olympic swimmer of all times.

Another noticeable achievement was made by Yana Klochkova UKR who regained both her medley titles from the games in Sydney 2000 but despite of this there were a total of twelve different individual female gold medalists in Athens. Klochkova was beaten by two Australians in the race for medals. Individually Petria Thomas won the 100 m butterfly and Jodie Henry the 100 m freestyle. Together they took two additional gold medals and set two world records in the 4x100 m freestyle and 4x100 m medley. Henry also set a world record in the 100 m freestyle semi finals and thereby set a total of three world records during the swimming competitions. Finally one could mention the new French star Laure Manoudou and Zimbabwe's Kirsty Coventry for their surprising results in the Olympic basin.