Video Analysis: How Pan Jianle broke the world record in the 100m freestyle (Athletes Only Podcast)
Only two individual world records were set at the Paris Olympics. While American Bobby Finke set the world standard in the 1500m freestyle on the final day of competition, China's Pan Jianle set a stunning world record in the 100m freestyle. Clocking 46.40 seconds, Pan shaved almost half a second off the previous record and won the gold medal at La Défense Arena by more than a second over Kyle Chalmers, the silver medalist who won the event at the 2016 Olympic Games.
In the latest episode of the Athletes Only Podcast, host Kyle Millis dissected Pan's world record performance. Millis broke down the record swim into four categories: starts and turns, underwater, strokes, and X-factor. In each of these disciplines, Millis noted how Pan, at just 20 years old, swam two laps to become one of the top swimmers at the Olympics. At one point, Millis analyzes why Pan, compared to other swimmers, spends more time swimming freestyle than he stays in the water.
Click on the video below to hear Millis' analysis, in which he makes a powerful comparison between Pan's approach to the 100m freestyle and that of 2012 Olympic gold medalist Nathan Adrian.
