Trying to Make Sense of Leon Marchand's

Leon Marchand demolished the US Open and NCAA record in the 500 freestyle, swimming a 4:02.31.
For context, the NCAA record had been lowered by a total of 2.6 seconds in the last 29 years. Marchand just lowered it by 3.9 seconds.
Read more about Leon's swim here:
swimswam.com/leon-marchand-dr...

[@terrificleon]

Thanks for this fascinating video. I follow Léon's performances for many years, but i confess i didn't realize the enormity of Léon's record last night. Thanks again for your explanations!

[@danieljagger8466]

Peter Vanderkaay went 4:08.6 at the Michigan Open in 2008. It was an American record at the time and still the pool record at Oakland University I believe.

[@walkerscoral]

Makes you wonder what Marchand can go in a full body suit

[@clashking8412]

​@walkerscoral it probably would make him worse, since he couldn't milk those underwaters

[@tonellimarcello]

How impressive was the 4:08.75 by Tom Dolan in 1995?

[@Delta66-jz1vl]

Your enthusiasm is a pleasure to see. I hope your brain will digest and accept this performance;)

[@juanc.fortunofas9224]

A little faster and I’ll start to think Leon Marchand is a mutant. To hold that speed and maintain those underwaters for 500 yards is a force to reckon with. / (Well done with the event history. Helps us appreciate the achievement even more).

[@nimocash3535]

I agree. Leon showed the way and now coaches will learn the underwater to kids and one day these kids will break all the records.

[@greggassen5548]

I thought I was watching a 3:59.99 for about half the race

[@jarrodhendricks7237]

I remember hearing back like 10 years ago Misty Hyman’s old coach say someone could go 3:59 kicking to 15 every wall. Thought that was a pipe dream then, but now…

[@luimulder3768]

Best swim analysis video ever. You said everything right and nothing wrong.

[@rogerhuston8287]

Agree. The 5th stroke is now the most important stroke. It is the true differentiator and everyone needs to be working on it. It's always been who can pop up the furthest last usually has the lead, but in shortcourse the person who has the best underwater in every stroke will win, except for breast. Hell, just think, fly is now 4 or 5 strokes a lap. A 100fly short course is now just 20 strokes. That's nuts!

[@aquamansanchez8784]

MOST impressive was he took it out in 1:33! For the 200

[@commirevo89]

Marchand is a fan of 4:02

[@McLightning95]

I knew the fastest kids in HS was like 4:22 I think first got high 4:19. So basically 1 second faster per 25 is insane.

[@642h4]

4:19 is still summer jnats tho

[@Mike-bc7xv]

4:19 is still quite rapid

[@sethaldrich6902]

I thought he was gonna break 4min ngl

[@gianpolignano2632]

What does John Culhane think?

[@RBin-pi4sv]

There’s no way he doesn’t go sub 4:00 for the 400IM in Paris after a swim like that.

[@Grantsand]

The guys going 4:10 in the heat look so pedestrian😶

[@ChristopheGirardnantes]

I'm a dawn lucky french with Leon ! The show must go on :-)

[@nickbaker3588]

Can he do Thorpe’s record in LC

[@psidot]

Yards, what are they? What century are we in again?

[@masongao123]

he was trying to go sub 4...

[@dylan_1313]

Wait, what 😳

[@jamessmith8882]

he is a fish (and nobody can convince me otherwise)

[@amkool6135]

Marchand will lead off in 39.89 and send dressing back into retirement

[@ccbgaming6994]

Dressing 💀 nah I but I know what you mean

[@BenHammond25]

🤯

[@Gerhard2770]

Short course swimmimg is not about findimg the fastest swimmer, but the fastest turner.

[@synfinyminecraft]

and turns are part of swimming

[@thesea4120]

The thing is only people in America are swimming 500y in competition otherwise I'm sure other athletes would be pushing the record more, I'm more interested to see the LCM performance at the olympics.

[@EXPLORADVEN]

❤️❤️❤️🏊🏊🏊❤️❤️❤️👌👌👌❤️❤️❤️👊👊👊🏊🏊🏊 4:02 min for 500 yard (457.2 metre) Freestyle swim - WoW.

[@christopheb.6121]

"Fabriqué en France"! 😁🇫🇷🇫🇷

[@ferencorosz9753]

With a lot of juice

[@Grantsand]

Underwaters is the difference

[@LukeSeed]

I was expecting sub 4

[@parkerfleischman1852]

Might be a hot take but this is only because of how much the women’s 400 free world record has just been destroyed. But I believe the men’s 400 free world record is a soft record. Think about it in 2009 peligrini broke 4 minutes for the first time the same time 3:40.07 was set. Then Ledecky brought the record from 3:59 to 3:56 then Arnie has now brought it to 3:55 while the men’s record has stagnated but today gave me hope that while not Leon will race it I believe the 400 free will hopefully and finally move on from 3:40s

[@davidhuszti1151]

So based on this logic if the woman's record won't be broken until like 2046 it will be called a "soft record"?

[@parkerfleischman1852]

@@davidhuszti1151 it’s not that Ian Thorpe was ahead of his time even he broke the record but now that others are beginning to approach it and we’re seeing more and more guys entering the top 10 all time recently I get the feeling the record is no longer that idea of being “difficult” I mean every world record is not easy to get but when you have 3-5 active swimmers within 2 seconds of this record is it really hard at that point? That’s why whoever breaks the world record is either gonna go 3:39 high or 3:37 low

[@farodyne]

Americans. Yards. Why? When will this nation adopt distances from a modern world?

[@sopherino5486]

do you not realize that Americans also swim lcm? this is collegiate swimming where they swim scy, it's not that hard of a concept to grasp lmao

[@ccbgaming6994]

@sopherino5486 Thank you. Ann’s you wonder why people question arguably the best swimming nation in the world. Of course they still practice and race lcm

[@osmithk]

Smoke Show

[@timothyli2176]

can we talk about how hot this guy is

[@christopheb.6121]

It will be insane at the next OG in my country (France) this summer, and I've got places for swimming competitions, I bought these only to see Leon on live.

[@walkerscoral]

Long hair is feminine

[@Gerhard2770]

BETA

[@leobertone4774]

leon will go sub 4 next year

[@jahoops10]

I thought the record was gonna be 3:58:36 seriously Leon could do a ridiculous time like that!

[@evanpan-wang3166]

Impossible

[@ayejayrulez9]

@@evanpan-wang3166you could go that Evan

[@phertek1]

Chemistry is the difference

[@Umma1967]

The phonetic transcription for ether is ee . thr.