The 17-year-old McIntosh, the favorite and face of Team Canada, was second to Titmus throughout the race and finished in 3:58.37 to claim her first Olympic medal. The teenager had come close with fourth place in the same event at Tokyo 2020 aged 14.
“Going into tonight, I really wanted to put my best foot forward and compete as hard as I could,” McIntosh said. “Every time I get to race one of these girls it’s an amazing opportunity and I learn so much. They push me to be better and make me put my best foot forward, so it was definitely a good race.”
While McIntosh was a real threat from the start, Rio 2016 Champion Ledecky needed 200 meters to find her stride.
It followed both its Australian and Canadian rivals, as well as Australia at times Erika Fairweather and then the USA Page Madden, before reaching the medal position in the 250m. Still well behind the two leaders, however, Ledecky only managed 4:00.86 to complete her 400m freestyle medal set with a bronze – her first bronze in an illustrious Olympic career that now totals 11 medals.
Standing atop the Eiffel Tower-themed podium, it was clear that Ledecky was hoping for a different outcome, but any apparent sadness quickly vanished as she was handed a phone take a selfie of both her biggest rivals with their medals.
“They told us before we left that they were going to give us that phone,” the American swimmer later joked. “I guess they do that for all the medal ceremonies and I was joking with them [that] “Are you going to get the older person a phone to figure out how to open it and click the right button?” But I hope the photo will come out.”
If he didn’t, with two more individual races to go, Ledecky still has plenty of opportunities to snap a picture worthy of being labeled the “selfie of the century.”